Chapter 16
Elsedora
Knock. Knock. Knock. The rapping jolted me awake. I couldn’t have been asleep for more than an hour.
When I opened the door, Angeline’s silver hair and warm smile greeted me. She held up a bottle of wine. “I come with an apology offering.”
“Angie.” My drowsiness gave way to surprise. “I didn’t expect you.”
“I couldn’t find you in Luz today to tell you, but the palace baker was unwell. I covered dinner tonight. My apologies, dear, for being so late.”
I suspected Angeline missed her role as head baker. She itched to be in that kitchen. Em hated it and encouraged her to relax more and work less.
“You came all this way at night, alone?”
Angeline waved away my concern. “Well, I would have. But Emmerick insisted yesterday that Leo bring me. We didn’t want to startle you, so we Egressed into Belray and took a carriage over together. He’ll wait for me in town, since I can use your Egress later.”
“He could have just used the Egress, too. You both didn’t need to go out of your way.”
“There’s a little place in Belray, Shantey’s Pub, that Leo will make any excuse to drop by. He isn’t out of his way, trust me.” She chuckled. “Plus, Emmerick asked me to, and he never asks for favors. Not that I needed the reminder.”
Heat burned behind my eyes. I hadn’t realized how much I needed her here. Mention of her son dug a different sort of pit in my stomach.
I wondered if she shared similar hopes for his future. Would she bake birthday shortbread for her grandchildren and teach them all of her recipes?
“Have I intruded?” she asked.
“No, no. I’m happy to see you. Come on into the parlor.”
Angeline took off her cloak, and I hung it on a hook by the front door. “Be grateful your bones don’t grow old, Elsedora. Even the faintest chill becomes an assault on your will to move. I dread the winter more each year.”
Taking her arm in the crook of mine, I led her to the fireplace and helped her into the closest wingback chair.
“He was worried about you, you know? Didn’t want you to be alone today.”
Emmerick’s promise cracked at my resolve to keep my affection for him close to heart. “I will never let you face this week alone again.”
I uncorked the wine and poured us each four fingers of it. On nights like this, there was no use in pretending to strive for moderation.
After handing her a glass, I sat in the chair opposite hers. “I have Lark here for the summer. And your son would do well to stay out of my business,” I teased.
Angeline huffed a laugh. “I can’t say I taught him how to do that very well.”
“You raised a good man.” One that occupied my thoughts, even when he shouldn’t.
Despite looking older, Angeline was centuries my junior. Though, in wisdom, she was my elder.
Immortality meant that my maturity had stopped developing past a certain year. Some joked my year was earlier than most. I couldn’t commit to being on time if I tried, and my sense of humor was juvenile at best.
“Yes, well…” she said before she sipped her wine. “He has a reason for concern. This time of year haunts all of us.”
“I am alright, really.”
The passing of the day that Ryn died always peeled back the scab and pushed intrusive questions into my head.
What if I hadn’t kept him at an emotional arm’s length for so long? We could have had nearly four hundred years together.
What if I’d never climbed up that amphitheater wall and distracted him? I might still have him.
Angeline did not look at me with pity. Instead, she leveled a serious gaze in my direction. “You lost your Source Match, Elsedora. It is okay to mourn. It is okay to not be alright.” Angeline’s tone was hard, but not condescending.
“We never…” I shook my head. “It was not like that. We loved each other as friends, but he was not my husband or betrothed.”
Because I had not let him be.
Though, if I assessed our time together more closely, Ryn had guarded his emotions, too.
Riddled with guilt over his involvement in his sister’s death, he’d never allowed himself anything that wasn’t still possible for her. Including love. Yet he’d admitted it that night after Krait had beaten him to a pulp for his dishonesty.
I’d been too afraid to say it back.
“Love comes in many forms—and no matter the form, it is still a tragedy to lose someone you care for. No one should ever have to endure it alone.”
My eyes welled, and I nodded. “I know, thank you. It’s so much easier to not think about it.”
The honest admission felt better than any lie I could placate her with.
She offered me a sad, watery smile. She mourned, too—for lost time with her son.
“Then shall we drink about it instead?” She held up her wine toward me. I leaned across the space between our chairs to clink my glass to hers.
“Gladly. That I can manage.”
I appreciated Angeline for not coddling me or coaxing more vulnerability out of me than I offered. She allowed me silence to sip my wine and stare blankly into the fire, and she did not comment when tears rolled down my cheeks.
There were so few times I let anyone see me cry aside from Emmerick. I never felt weak in front of either of them.
With the bottle drained, she crossed the room to grab her cloak.
“You get some rest,” she commanded.
“Let me walk you out.”
“Come over for breakfast tomorrow after you go visit my boy.”
“I wouldn’t miss that,” I admitted as we carried on into the hall of a thousand doors. The dim lamp-lit corridor stretched farther than the eye could see—its magic held strong even after centuries of neglect.
When we reached the fifty-fifth door on the right, Angeline gave me a quick hug.
She stepped into the Egress, and I commanded it for her. “To Luz Square.”
Looking forward to seeing Emmerick in the morning light, I reached toward my heart to grasp the skeleton key to the mirror’s cabinet.
It was missing.