Page 146 of Architecti
“What does it matter?”
“It matters because regardless of what you think, you are my daughter, and I do love you, and I don’t want… You have to be protected at all costs.”
“We’ve unlocked part of it…”
Ignatius continues checking the windows, the doors, bathroom, any entrance and exit while the pair of us stand still, feeling helpless.My fingers slide to my scythe.
“Wait,” I say.
Ignatius stops what he’s doing.
“Where was the bone?What did it look like?”
“It was a finger bone.It was in a glass box.”
I unclasp the leather holster and pull out the scythe I’ve carried for a decade.
“Like this?”I say and as I present it, it shifts and morphs back into a bone.
His eyes widen.“It was you…”
He hurls himself at me, but Lucy charges him and they careen into the kitchen counter.
“You will not fucking touch her,” she screams.
“I didn’t steal it today.I’ve had it the whole time.I took it the day you made me a reaper.I don’t know what magic it has, but a ghost of a bone reformed in the glass case the second I removed it.You’d annoyed me, and I liked having one up on you.”
He sags against the floor and Lucy clambers up.
“And no one else knows you took it?”
“No.”
“Then that is something.I guess I’ll be collecting that from you in a few days.”
And there it is, the godsawful truth that lingers between us.Lucy’s eyes flash.
“You will not reap her,” she snarls.
“Lucy, sweetie, she made a contract.It’s binding.”
“Like mine, you mean?”
“Exactly.”
“Then I guess I’ll unmake mine.”
He smiles softly at her, cups her chin the way a proud father does.“That tells me you still haven’t unlocked the final rune.”
“You’re not taking her from me,” Lucy says, and it’s the first time I’ve truly seen her fight for me.A hint of red smoke forms between the buttons of her pyjamas.I tense, expecting him to see it.He doesn’t.
Instead, he says something that turns my blood cold.
“You won’t.Not when you find out what you have to do to break it.”
44
Midnight
