Page 77 of A Dawn Of Blood

It doesn’t even flinch, it just keeps looking at me. I never used to think a cat could make itself look hurt or sad, until I came into contact withthis one.

My lips curling into a smirk, I bend forward a little, take the chair by one leg and start turning it up, until the pest is forced to jump down.

It hesitates, and it doesn’t fail to throw me yet another ‘hurt’ look, but it does walk away.

Content, I take my seat so I’m facing the table.

It’s always around it that they have their little meetings, but sometimes, when it’s bad news… they maketeafirst. While the tea is being made, theychat. And while they chat, they…share. Not all of them are like this, but it’s still the overwhelming majority — even the smarter, more composed members like the male fae — that seems to be perfectly willing to lay themselves bare to the group in relation to anything and everything — fears, desires, weaknesses…

Most of the time, I simply ignore this, focusing on retaining information that could prove useful. But some days, like today, I find it endlessly distracting.

Today, as I watch them pour their tea, all I can think about is that time the Archduke’s family came to the palace. It’s been at least a decade since I last thought about this, but it was the first time father had me join a lunch with his guests, and the first time I saw a family that wasn’t my own. It’s not the meal itself that seared into the memory as much as the solitary way back to the training grounds. The way they wouldn’t desert me — the echoes of their laughter, the images of that strangely familiar way in which they interacted.

To this day, the memory makes me cringe, just like the sight before me is making me cringenow.

I look away, keeping them all in my peripheral view, but fixing my eyes on the painting across the room.

Whatever the situation, I seem to be stuck in it for now. There’s the plan I’m working on, but I can’t rush it.

In the meantime… It’s become clear that no one will be coming for me. My gaze goes out of focus and the image of my father flashes before me — the ageless, all-powerful god with eyes like burning flames.

There’s the sinking feeling in my stomach that I shove aside as soon as it appears. I clench my jaw and my fists. It’s good. It’s better than good, actually. As long as I manage to ignore the witch, it’s exactly the way it’s supposed to be.

“Alright,” MacArthur Junior snaps me out of my ruminations, “enough chit-chat. Onto the matter at hand.”

I guess they’re done with their tea.

It’s de Groot that speaks first. “Here’s whatI’dlike to know.” She glances around the table. “Wasn’t that the whole point of the past two weeks of work? To find the bloody bones so we can forge the sword.”

As usual, listening to them conduct their little meeting makes me wonder — what is it that they’re really after? Territory? High-ranking positions in the order they’re planning on establishing? But the meetings are always about the war, or themission, as they like to call it. They’re never about the spoils, which is… surprising to say the least.

“Did Sieger learn anything?” MacArthur Senior asks his daughter.

“Not yet,” she tells him. “How about you?” she turns to ask the witch herself.

At this, all eyes dart tome, but I barely register any of it. Now that it’sherwho’s being addressed, the anticipation of hearing her voice is making my breath catch. I put all my focus into stopping myself from glancing at her.

It’s like every single look I throw in her direction makes it that much harder to keep ignoring her, but it’s proven to be especially dangerous to lock eyes with her. Wheneverthishappens, I find myself feeling utterly and disturbingly naked. But what makes it downright dangerous is that it seems to always make me lose track of my surroundings.

“I haven’t,” she says in response to MacArthur Junior’s question. I become acutely aware of her eyes on my profile, but I don’t look. There’s this anxiousness in her voice when she adds, “But there have to be information sources we haven’t explored yet.”

“Sure,” de Groot drawls, “you could just get us all back in time. How about some thirty five years? You know, when there were still Libraries and we could just walk into any one of them.”

“Anna,” I hear Dryden ask, “is that an option?”

The sound of her name echoing in my mind, with the corner of my eye, I register her shake her head. “It was hard to find a portal evenwithall the resources.”

Now Nimueh joins the conversation. “Have you truly exhausted all your options? Would a Library really help?”

I hear the witch let out a soft chuckle. Before I can do anything to stop it, the sound makes my eyes dart to her face. “Yes, Nimueh, a Library really would help,” I hear her say, but all my focus is on the lingering smile on her lips.

The lips are extremely problematic — the shape, the plumpness, the maddeningly defiant curve of that Cupid’s bow, and for a moment, I almost give in to the urge to keep committing them to memory. Then I use the tactic. I imagine a field of rotting corpses instead, my lips curling into a smile at the same time I breathe a sigh of relief.

“Would you be willing to go to Egypt?” Nimueh asks.

The witch frowns. I watch her take her cup in her hands and bring the rim to those lips. As always,hersis not filled withtea but coffee, and as always, to my great annoyance, whenever she takes a sip, she gives this sigh of contentment that makes my skin flush. I imagine hearing the screams of people being tortured instead.

She lowers the cup and shrugs. “Why not?” she says. “If the rest of the team would be up for it...”

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