Page 8 of A Dagger of Ice and Intrigue
“Alaric.” Silas sputtered. “She just–”
“Quiet,” my father said in that eerie calm tone that somehow leashed the loudest voices. “Allie, my brother is right, for once in his life. Some things need to follow their due course.”
“I will not let Evie suffer, tied to that heinous man. Fabrian is vindictive. Dangerous,” I said. “We have failed my cousin once. Wecannotdo it again. We can’t take this standing down–”
The first tendrils of anger coiled in my father’s voice. “You think that’s what we’re doing?”
I licked my lips, caught off guard. My father was the pacifist, I was the fiery one, and I didn’t like this reversal of our roles. “I–”
“Do you think I want our Clan to be tied to that brute? To let him and his lackeys traipse around our island?” he asked. “Fabrian cares for nothing but his own miserable self. Has no regard for life and squashes it any chance he gets. No, my dear Allie, I am not pleased by this. And I am nottaking it standing down.”
Suddenly, I felt seven years-old again, being chided for spilling wine onto the Fair Isles emissary lap after he’d stolen one of the cherries from my plate. Silas grinning from ear to ear also didn’t help.
My shoulder caved. “I’m sorry, but–”
“Did you mean what you said?”
I clenched my jaw and tilted that famed Vegheara pointed chin up. “Yes.”
“Then the problem still stands. Regretting the words but not the thought doesn’t help, does it?” His thumb tapped his temple gently. “I raised you to speak the truth. But we each have our own truths.”
“Yes.” I sighed. “Dad, this is serious, please–”
“Setting sail from Sanctua Sirena is no small feat.” He turned, watching a sparrow dive underneath the embossed eavesof the castle. “Not when the strong winds rattle the sea and fight against your sails.”
The sky was as clear as a mountain spring, the sun glistening over the castle raised from the stones guarding the island.
There would be no storm today–unless one was created.
I huffed a surprised laugh. “You want to call on the winds.”
My father nodded, not taking his eyes off his precious swallow nest.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked, hating how vulnerable I sounded. Exposed.
“I’ve already asked so much of you.” He sighed and I heard the guilt in that small sound. Still, he didn’t turn to me. I sometimes wondered if he avoided my gaze because I reminded him too much of Mom. Her death had cracked the warmth between us, like we were suddenly speaking different languages. “You make sure Evie is alright and let me fret over this marriage.”
“But–”
“Evie, Fabrian, and his slithering Serpents won’t be leaving this island until we get to the bottom of this marriage and this strange newfound love that nobody understands.” He rolled his shoulders back, his blue coat wrinkling as if waves washed over him. “The sea will understand and the gods will forgive me.”
His words eased the knot tightening inside me, but didn’t unravel it fully. “But they’d still be wedded. Undoing a Clan marriage is no easy feat.”
“No marriage contract has been signed yet. Nothing is official until then and we will keep it that way for as long as we can.”
“That’s a mighty plan, but you should listen to the girl, Aric,” Uncle Maksim said. He still had the stature of a warrior and the steely stare of someone who’d won all the battles he’d faced, but my father had never been easily swayed. “Fabrian might takeoffense. He won’t dare attack directly, but the Clan Council will have our hides for it if the Serpents demand retribution.”
“Then we make them an offer not even Fabrian can walk away from,” my father said.
“The Serpents are the richest Clan in all of Malhaven. We can’t pit our gold against theirs,” I said.
Especially not with the pitiful state of our vaults. That mountain of ledgers painted a very grim image, and I hadn’t even gotten through all of them yet.
“Fabrian could always go missing,” Uncle Maksim said.
“Uncle Maksim.” I sighed. It was one thing for me, the headstrong Huntress, to threaten assassinations left and right. People expected that. But it sounded so much worse when he said it, in that smoke-soaked, serious tone of his. “What if Dad’s right? What if she really loves the louse?”
“Plenty of other men in this world, many of them just as bad as Fabrian. If Evie wants another one, all she has to do is walk into the first bar and offer a free drink.” Uncle Maksim cocked his head to the side. “Though I hope she–andyou–find better. Much better.”
