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“The others.”
“Silver and Roland.”
She was thankful for the dark. It hid the murderous look on her face.
“Roland?”
He nodded at that. “Strange name for a dog. I don’t know. My father picked it.”
“Your father named him? When?”
Theo’s head tilted. She could tell he thought these questions were strange. Ren did not care. She’d never needed to know something more in her entire life. “Well, I was pretty young.…”
“How old?”
Theo shrugged in the dark. “Nine or ten? He was my first pup. Not that our family really treat them like pets. More hunting hounds than anything. I’ll never forget the time—”
“Stop talking, Theo. Please stop talking.”
Her hands were shaking violently. All the years of anger coiled to life inside of her. It took every ounce of control to batter that forming monster back inside the gates, to slam the mental doors shut on its clawed fingers. She knew if she could not shut it out, someone was likely to get hurt. And that someone would be Theo.
Her tone had raised an alarm for him. He knew something was wrong and now he kept silent, wondering what misstep he’d made. The truth was that he didn’t have any idea. He could not possibly fathom the depths of her fury. Ren breathed in and out until her hands steadied. She altered the course of her anger, channeling it in a more logical direction.
“I’m just… trying to understand. You’re talking about your favorite bakeries. Restaurants down by the wharf. And now we’re planning for me to meet your mother when we get home? Is that really the first thing that you think deserves your attention?”
Theo did not answer. He was smart enough to hold his tongue.
Roland. His father named a dog Roland. After my father’s death… the heartless bastard…
“Because I imagined the first thing you’d want to do is walk into that teahouse,” she said. “Help them clear away the wreckage. Take care of their expenses. Find out the names of everyone who was rushed into the hospital that night. Go and see if there’s any help they need. Some of them will have been fired, if they’re not in a union. It happens all the time. Maybe that’s the first thing you should do, Theo. See if they need your help. If they want your help. And you could go talk to the three musicians that you stole the seventeen-string from. Maybe you could replace their instrument. If I were you, those would be the first things that I would be dreaming of doing.”
Theo was nodding to himself as Ren’s mind kept digging up other graves. She’d carefully redirected her anger, made it more logical sounding, but she couldn’t get rid of the image in her mind. Some tongue-lolling hound on the Broods’ family estate bearing the name Roland. My father’s name. No doubt it was a slice of gallows humor. Something for Landwin Brood to privately smile about. A reminder that he’d won in the end. He’d crushed the fool who’d dared stand in his way.
The thought made Ren want to set the entire world on fire.
“You’re right,” Theo whispered. “Atonement first. I will make all of that right. And I will do that the moment I step foot in the city. You have my word.”
For the first time Ren saw the road that was waiting for them. Their bond would secure her position—even if his father contested the decision. It would also complicate her angle of attack. Theo was both the bridge and the obstacle to all her plans now. She’d made a promise to herself. In those quiet and sleepless hours after her father’s death, she’d vowed to punish the men and women who had his blood on their hands. She repeated that silent promise now. Twice. A third time. Until the thought had the unmistakable shape of prophecy to it.
Landwin Brood will die. His entire house will burn. And I will be the one who sets it aflame.
“Good,” Ren said to Theo in a hollow voice. “I will hold you to your word.”
They walked on in silence. Ren actually pitied him. He had no idea what she intended. No clue that he was now the key that would open the door and let the monster inside of his family’s house. As their footsteps carried them down the darkling path, Ren’s breathing steadied. Her future walked in step beside her—handsome and quiet and utterly unaware.
40
The bridge was perfect, unexpected.
Ren wasn’t sure who’d built it, but she whispered her silent thanks to them. A single path wound around a jutting formation of rocks before curling back toward the mouth of the waiting bridge. It was wide enough for a very careful carriage driver. The sides of the bridge were shoulder high, designed with a pattern of hand-sized holes to keep the wood from taking on too much water. Beneath ran some kind of gorge. Ren didn’t think the creeks could rise this high, but during a rainy season, she guessed the land would grow boggy enough to be unpassable without a bridge. It was possible Della’s outfit had built it to transport their goods to the city. No matter its history, they couldn’t have asked for a better place to make their final stand.
“You think it will work?” Theo asked.
“Narrow entry,” she said. “Upper ground. No access from below. The only visible spot for someone to port to is that bare patch of grass. The path takes them directly through where we’d be setting up on the bridge. We can always cast a spell to ward against that. Which means there’s no way to get behind us…”
He was nodding. “It’s perfect. Light the candle.”
Ren slipped the earring on one more time. She heard a brief strum from a three-string, a voice matching the rhythm easily, and it was a fine-sounding confirmation. “We’re in range.”
