6. Cassiel
“Sophia.”
I let the name rest between us. Her footsteps are careful on the rug; the faint scuff of a heel, then the whisper of fabric as she hovers around her seat.
She breathes out; the air smells of citrus and something floral that always reminds me of summer and spring.
It’s not like Wren’s scent. Wren was earthy, and the trace of flowers around her always felt like rolling in a meadow.
Sophia’s aroma is like walking into a perfume shop.
“It’s good to see you again,” she says. “I apologise for forcing my way in here. I just—”
“How can I help you?” I ask, my voice flat.
“I’m not looking for help, Cass.”
Cass. The softness of the word slices through me. Only a handful of people have ever used it before, and now two of them are dead, one of them might never wake, leaving only Sophia, Ru, and—
Wren. If I ever see her again. If she ever dares use it.
“What are you looking for, then?” I barrel on.
“I wanted to see you,” she insists.
“Well, here I am.” I make my way towards my desk and sit down, my hands falling to the arms of my chair. Robin nudges my fingers.
A few more moments tick by in silence. When I first met Sophia, conversation poured between us like wine. I could get drunk on her voice. I’d savour her words like honey cakes.
But now, every intake of breath seems like frost, and I wish she’d vanish from this room.
The fabric of her dress rustles, only slightly. I think she inches forward a fraction. The desk still stands between us.
“I came to your brother’s funeral, you know,” she continues. “I wanted to speak to you then. Only… that didn’t seem like the right time for a reunion.”
“No, I suppose not.” I remember the hush of the hall and the weight of a hundred living bodies around me, and a single completely empty one.
The silence stretches between us, as heavy as stone.
“He was a good man, Evander,” Sophia says, her voice barely above a whisper.
“He was.”
“I liked him a great deal.”
“I know.”
“He was… very good to me.”
“Has anyone ever not been?” The question is a small, dry thing; there’s an edge to it I don’t bother to soften. Sophia’s life has never been anything other than comfortable. I doubt she’s ever met anyone who didn’t adore her.
Sophia breathes, but she doesn’t speak. For a moment, neither of us dares.
“Apart from me, of course,” I add.
She tries to laugh, but the sound catches short. “I—I want you to know… I never blamed you for how things went. Whatever you did or said—”
“I’m sorry,” I tell her, because I am, or I was. Back when I still had feelings to be frayed, I know I was sorry. I certainly owe her that.
“You don’t need to apologise—”
“I do. It’s much overdue. But I’ve given it now, and I have nothing left to say. Go back to your husband, Sophia.”
There’s a small, incredulous pause, like the intake of someone who’s heard an impossible sentence. “You… you haven’t heard?”
“You’ll forgive me if I haven’t been reading the society papers of late.”
She speaks the next words carefully. “I called it off.”
“Why?” I ask, though I think I already know the geometry of the answer.
I know it, and I don’t want to hear it. I was never angry at her for leaving.
I was angry at myself. It stung a little to hear she’d moved on so quickly, but I didn’t have much of a heart to break at that point.
By the time I cared again, I was happy for her.
She did not deserve the way I treated her back then.
She probably doesn’t deserve it now, either, but there’s even less of me to give now than there was when I first lost my sight.
“Can you not guess?” She exhales.
I can. I can, and I don’t want to.
“I understand if you’ve moved on. I didn’t do it for you, not precisely. It wouldn’t have been fair to Frank to marry him when I still had feelings for someone else…”
The sentence trails away. All I can do is listen to the way her voice breaks on that last clause and map the sound onto the empty places in myself.
“Sophia—” I begin. I don’t get much further. My voice is painfully soft.
“I heard… well, they say your former guard, that you and she—”
“Don’t,” I snap, but the word comes out too quiet.
“What she did, it’s unforgivable. When I heard… You must—”
“I do not want to talk about her.”
“To me?”
“To anyone.”
Sophia breathes, deep and sharp. “You can’t keep all of this locked in, Cass. Not again. You shouldn’t be alone in this—”
She comes around the desk, her hand brushing over mine.
I yank it away, kicking the chair backwards and moving towards the window as if I can stare out of it.
I try to picture the view; the rolling hills and the forests far away.
I try to think of anything other than Sophia in the room, but all my mind can conjure up is Wren.
Wren, a blur of colour, brown and black and green. Wren among the trees, Wren alone, Wren laughing in my room, perched at the window like a bird. Her voice trails through the air like summer rain, a glittering, touchable thing. Warmth bleeds through memory. It cuts like a knife.
I do not want Sophia.
As much as I hate Wren, I think I want her. It’s foolish and it’s stupid and it makes no sense. She isn’t who I thought she was. Who knows the extent of the lies she told me?
But it’s her company I crave. Her breath in this room. Her hand on mine.
“I’d like you to leave,” I tell Sophia.
She inhales again, like she’s planning to speak, but all she does is sigh. She crosses the room towards the door.
“If you change your mind—”
“I won’t.”
The door opens, and a second later, it closes once more. I am alone again. I will not change my mind. I want to. How easy the world would be if I could, if I could make myself fall in love with her again.
But like she said, it would not be fair to be with someone when you still had feelings for someone else.
*
Dain does not ask me about Sophia, and I do not volunteer any information either.
I spend the rest of the day doing what is expected of me—listening to reports I barely retain, signing my name where hands guide mine, pacing familiar routes through the castle to keep my body from stiffening along with my thoughts.
I drill with Dain until my muscles ache, let him correct my stance, my timing.
I read what I can through sound and memory, and dictate letters I revise twice before sending.
I keep busy because stillness leaves room for too much.
At some point in the afternoon, Aunt Imogen manages to coax me away for tea with Runara. We take it outside, on the western terrace, where the stone still holds warmth from the sun. The weather is kind: light breeze, the faint scent of late flowers drifting up from the gardens below.
We sit together at a small table. Porcelain clinks softly. Tea is poured.
We are all painfully quiet.
Runara swings her legs beneath her chair, the rhythm uneven, betraying her restlessness. Imogen sips her tea and pretends it is enough. I listen to the world around us—the distant calls of birds, the murmur of servants somewhere far below—and try not to catalogue who is missing from the soundscape.
The next day, Dain brings me a curious story.
He waits until breakfast is finished, until Anne has cleared the tray and the room has settled, before saying carefully, “There are reports of a blind man in Caldrin who has seemingly recovered his sight.”
The words strike harder than I expect. I keep my expression neutral.
“Do you want me to investigate the claims?”
No.
Yes.
It is not so simple. Yes, I would like my sight back; no, I do not want to chase false leads, or waste time or funds, or—or hope. I cannot afford that right now. Hope is too expensive a currency.
“No, not at the moment,” I tell him.
I sit with the decision for a heartbeat, then another thought presses forward, insistent.
“These reports of miracles—where are they occurring?”
“All over the place, Your Excellency.”
“Any pattern? The dates—is there a logical progression to them?”
“No,” Dain says. “It can’t be any single person, if that’s what you’re wondering. Well, not unless they can fly.”
Fly.
The word opens something sharp and bright in my mind. Some of the fey can fly. Nubaia can. Is it a gift she passed to her granddaughter?
How did she survive the fall? a voice asks from somewhere I do not invite.
Maybe she didn’t.
Then where was the body?
The questions pile atop one another, slippery and impossible to grasp. I feel the faint edge of panic rising and press it down with force.
Come back, Wren, I whisper into the ether. Come back and explain.
My hand tightens beneath the table, fingers closing around the hilt of her dagger. The leather is worn smooth where her thumb used to rest. Shame curls hot in my chest.
The words sound far too much like I care.
And perhaps that is the most dangerous thing of all.