Page 49 of Enslaved

“Clara?”

I whirl on heel. A figure clad in footman’s livery stands in the passage just outside the library entrance. “Danny!”

He’s a far cry from the bruised and battered, half-naked man I’d seen last time I visited. His hair is combed back from his forehead, emphasizing his sunken eyes, his hollow cheeks. He’s still handsome, of course; Estrilde would hardly have him in her personal service were he not. She’d send him back to the fighting pits and never think of him again.

“Clara, what are you doing here?” Danny grips the door frame with one hand, his knuckles tense and white. He’s fighting the pull of Obligation. No doubt he’s on some errand for his mistress, and the longer he delays fulfilling it, the more pain he will suffer. A vein stands out on his brow.

Hastily I jump to his side and take his arm. “Come, let’s walk together,” I say, smiling a little desperately. “Where are you going?”

He takes a step, and immediately his face relaxes. “The Princess requires a specific berry, the juice of which supposedly augments the glamour on her lips. I am to fetch it from the south garden. Everything is in uproar. Preparations for the ball, you know.”

He sounds so exhausted, it makes my heart ache. “But you’re no longer . . . She’s not making you . . .” I can’t quite bear to say it. Instead, I point at the floor, indicating the dark underbelly of the city where I’d last seen him.

Danny shakes his head and offers a weary laugh, though his eyes are haunted. “The crowds grew bored with me. For the time being. The Princess may well change her mind, but . . .” He drags his feet, walking as slowly as he dares without activating the Obligation. I remember all too well how delicate a balance that can be. “It’s good to see you, Clara.”

A trace of his old smile colors his voice, but when I look at him, I can discern no glimmer of it in his face. “It’s good to see you too, Danny.” I wish I knew what else to say. “Have you . . . have you found your feet then? Made any friends?”

“Hardly.” He laughs bitterly. “In some ways it was better Under. At least the brawls kept me active, kept my blood pumping, kept my rage burning. Now it’s all the same. Hour upon hour ofstandingwith nothing to occupy my mind. Knowing the Princess may summon me at any moment. Knowing as well she probably won’t.” He pinches the bridge of his nose, grimacing. “When I think about the children back at Westbend Hospital . . .”

I drop my chin. Any feeble words of comfort I might speak die before they reach my tongue.

“I had a free day, you know,” he continues after a short silence. “I’d intended to use it to try again. To find the bloodgem necklace for Estrilde, to break your Obligation and mine. In the end . . .” He sighs and passes a hand down his weary face. “In the end, I simply went back to see Kitty.”

He goes on then to tell me what it was like, visiting his sister after a month-long disappearance. How frantic she was, almost hysterical. How when he explained the situation to her, she called him mad and tried to summon a doctor. “Things are not well for her,” Danny admits. “She has some inheritance from our parents, but without me there to support her . . .” He shakes his head heavily. “She’ll have to take a job. Become a companion to our great-aunt Gerthsted.”

“Kitty hates old Lady Gerthsted.”

“Everybody does. But Kitty’s a brave soul. She’ll get by.”

The pain and regret in his voice could break my heart. This is everything I’d feared would happen, everything I’d warned him about, all come to pass.

“Did you see Oscar?” I ask quietly.

“Oscar?” Danny blinks down at me. “No, I’ve not been to see him since . . . since . . .”

He can’t say it. But we both know. He’s not seen Oscar since my brother pounded him in the face for kissing me against my will. Not a moment either of us wishes to remember. Oscar had seen the act as far more threatening than it was and reacted impulsively.

“Oscar is . . . very protective,” I offer lamely.

A shadow falls across Danny’s face. “I could never hurt you, Clara. Oscar should know that. After all these years, he should know that at least.”

I hold my tongue. Like I always do. It sticks to the roof of my mouth, but I hold it. And only when I’m sure I have it under control, do I say, “Oscar needs help.”

Danny lets out a sharp breath. “Oscar needs to learn to stand on his own two feet.”

“Don’t say that!” I shake my head, gripping his hands. “You know how hard everything is for him! Please, Danny, you mustn’t give up on him. We have to help him, we have to—”

“I know what I have to do.” Danny looks down at me, his eyes deeply shadowed. “I am going to get that bloodgem necklace. I’m going to save us both, I swear it.” He curses then, his face lined with pain. “I must go. Estrilde won’t wait much longer. Clara, please, trust me. I’m going to figure this out. Somehow.” He touches my cheek with one hand. For a moment, his expression melts into a phantom image of the boy I once knew and loved. “I’m glad to have seen you again. You give me hope.”

With that he turns and hastens on his way. This time, I do not follow him. I can only stand there, watching him go. Blood throbs in my ears. All this time, I’ve been telling myself that saving Danny would somehow be saving Oscar too. But what if I’m wrong? What if Danny intends to leave Oscar to rot?

What if all this is for nothing?

I bow my head, press my fist against my forehead. Their faces swim before my mind’s eye—Danny and Oscar and Kitty. All those poor children at Westbend Charity Hospital. Even the tortured face of Seraphine’s son. I can almost hear them begging, pleading for me to do something, anything.

And always, always in the back of my head, that dark, whisper:

Love him.

---