Chapter 36 If I had a Heart
Emrys
If I had a Heart
Gray morning crept over Marseille. Mist drifted from the sea in silver ribbons, veiling the dockside warehouses and masts. Somewhere, a bell tolled the hour. The city was waking up.
We reached the port without talking. Too often, I was glancing at Daphne over my shoulder. When she saw the sliver of water behind the boats, she frowned. Some old, forgotten instinct made me fold her hand into mine and squeeze it. She took in a sharp breath.
“We’ll make it to Alexandria safe, Daphne.
I promise.” Her nostrils flared, catching the scent of salt and coal, citrus and sweat.
Around us, sailors shouted in French and Arabic, and porters heaved crates.
Merchants argued while families gathered close, clinging to their battered luggage.
Pigeons strut between the cobblestones like they owned the place.
It had changed. But not that much.
I stood at the edge of the dock, boots planted, eyes sweeping the bustle. Too many people. Too many faces I didn’t trust, too many shadows that shifted wrong. Clio wasn’t here. Yet. Nor any agents of the Renegade.
With some luck, the old goddess was enjoying her newfound freedom in the azure waters at the far end of the globe.
I held out my hand. “The earrings, Miss Daphne. I’m afraid you need to part with these.
First-class passage to Alexandria doesn’t come cheap.
” She gave me a sharp look—half protest, half reluctance—but took them off and handed them to me.
She understood. Everything we owned remained in Paris catacombs.
The diamonds caught the morning light with a defiant gleam. Stolen from Duskmere. Likely cursed. Perfect. I headed to the pawnshop at the entrance of the port and returned with two tickets.
“Come on. The Aigle d’Azur sets sail in an hour.” I pointed at the twin-stack steamer with gilded railings. Lines of passengers were already crowding the docks.
“Keep the cloak on,” I told her, scanning the sky again. “Stay near me, Miss Daphne.”
Our cabin was huge–two bedrooms and a bathroom, ebony furniture, a crackling fireplace and a cold bottle of champagne.
She walked across the cabin like she belonged there, a little frown between her brows as she looked out to sea.
For a moment, I saw not a thief or a ward-breaker but something more dangerous. Someone I wanted to protect.
Well, that went great the last time I tried to do it.
Instinctively, I placed my hand on her shoulder and smiled when she didn’t pull away. “With some luck, your undyne won’t even sense our passage. Your connection has been severed.”
“Well, I survived the Channel.” She shrugged. I walked to the table and popped a bottle of Veuve Clicquot.
“Only the finest for surviving death rituals and wardrobe thefts.”
Daphne took her glass and shook her head. “Emrys, or whatever you’re called… Are we ever going to stop getting chased by demons, specters, flesh-eating fairies or whatever those little bastards at the Folded Tower were? What’s next? Getting caviar served by ghosts in white gloves?”
I raised my glass in a toast. “We just might, Miss Daphne. But tell me, won’t you miss it a little?”
She chuckled, but her eyes remained serious. “I’m afraid that I might. Now, as we’re already sailing, and we’re still alive, let’s go and find some food.”
The ship’s dining room was all polished brass and red velvet.
Large mirrors multiplied the flickering candlelight, and the hum of conversation echoed beneath the soft strains of a violin quartet.
A ridiculous display of human decadence afloat—but I’d take it over bone-lined catacombs and Twisted Ones any day.
Daphne looked nearly civil across from me, wrapped in her stolen green dress, a single curl refusing to stay pinned behind her ear. Yet she still flinched when shadows moved too quickly.
I poured the champagne with a steady hand.
“You’re staring at people again,” she said, taking the glass. “You’re twitchier than usual. Is it the caviar?”
“I don’t trust anyone who smiles that much before noon,” I murmured, nodding toward a bejeweled woman fluttering her eyelashes at a man who looked like he’d taxidermied his last wife. “Or anyone who orders pigeon for three courses.”
She snorted into her glass. “What is it with the French and birds?”
“Need to ask Nibble. His observations are always spot-on.”
She laughed—really laughed—and I memorized the sound before I could stop it.
A waiter brought out another course. Something drowned in cream and truffle oil. I barely tasted it.
Daphne pointed with her fork at an old man seated alone near the captain’s table. “See him? The one with the mustache that could lasso cattle?”
“Explorer,” I said. “Too many years in the sun, and that monkey on his shoulder is the only creature that’ll still talk to him.”
“What about the couple on the left?”
“Not a couple. He’s her employer. She’s hoping to marry into the title. He’s hoping she doesn’t notice he’s bankrupt.”
Daphne rolled her eyes. “You are terrifying.”
“Observant,” I corrected.
She tilted her head. “Were you doing that the entire time I was stitching you back together at the tower? Observing me?”
Yes.
“I was unconscious,” I said.
She leaned forward, chin propped on her hand. “Have you been to Egypt before?”
“Yes.”
She waited. I didn’t speak.
“And?”
I looked past her to the sea, to the ribbon of silver light beyond the window. “I remember music along the Nile. Flutes, mostly. Bright, reedy things. They’d play them at dusk, in the temples. Before the sun god went to sleep.”
Daphne blinked. “You were really there?”
“I was younger. Less jaded. They still built things to last back then. Temples painted in colors that would blind you. Kings who thought themselves gods.”
“Were they?”
“No.” I met her gaze. “But they managed to convince everyone they were.”
She didn’t look away. And I hated how much that mattered.
The music shifted. Slow waltz. The world softened for a moment.
“Dance with me,” I said before I thought better of it.
She arched a brow. “You don’t strike me as the dancing type.”
“I strike better on my feet.” I stood and held out my hand. “Come on. Humor a relic.”
She took it. Her fingers were warm.
We moved to the floor. Only a few couples joined us. I led her easily—too easily. Her weight against me felt… right, as if she belonged there. And that thought was deadlier than anything that hunted us.
“You’re dangerous,” she said, barely audible above the strings. Oh, sweet little thief, if you only knew how dangerous you are.
“I know.”
She looked up at me. “And yet here I am.”
I could have kissed her.
I should have stepped away.
Instead, I pulled her a little closer. Let her feel the strength of my arm around her waist. Let her head rest near the place where, if I had one, a heart might still be.
She smelled of hyacinth soap and stolen perfume and something unmistakably her. I wanted to hold her there forever.
And I couldn’t.
Not again.
Branwyn’s blood was still on my hands. I wouldn’t let Daphne join her.
The music ended.
I stepped back. Not too fast. Not enough to make her question it.
But enough to remember myself.
“Come,” I said lightly, “you haven’t had dessert yet. I promise not to psychoanalyze the chocolate mousse.”
We returned to the table. She licked the crème br?lée from her spoon and rolled her eyes at something I said. I barely heard myself speak.
The curve of her smile, the flick of her wrist as she reached for her glass—it all got imprinted in my mind like a blade stuck deep in the bone.
I had survived centuries with teeth bared and heart locked. And now—
Now, I was watching her laugh and wondering how many ways I could lose her.
I wasn’t supposed to want this.
And yet.
When she brushed a crumb from the corner of her mouth and looked up at me, something old and buried cracked in my chest.
If I had any sense, I would have walked away from her then, moved to another cabin, and avoided her.
I stayed.
Gods help me, I stayed.