Page 10 of Strange Familiar

Midday was a propitious time for arrival at House Phel, the early spring sunlight warm on the gracious manse with its long wings, large windows—only Byssan glass used in the restoration, so all gleamed flawlessly clear in their white-painted, wooden frames—and the wide porches and balconies. The more temperate climate allowed the vast lawn to remain evergreen, studded with tufts of colorful spring flowers. The rolling lawn surrounded the perfectly still lake that mirrored the graceful lines of the manse. With the soft blue sky above, barely touched with a few fluffy white clouds, the whole scene was an idyllic portrait of gentle, rural splendor.

Alise released a long sigh of relief and sorrow, twined indelibly together. House Phel felt like home in a way Elal never had—and apparently as Harahel never would. She couldn’t get over the sinking sensation that she’d let Cillian down by leaving. She knew he’d wanted her to see the house of his birth, to meet his family. It was just like him to blithely assume that his family would embrace her, not to mention “forgetting” to mention that the grandmother he’d portrayed as a sweet old lady spending her days baking and quilting was in fact an intimidatingly sharp dragon of a wizard and actually Lady Harahel. Seriously, Cillian couldn’t have warned her?

Knowing him, he probably thought it wasn’t important. And, knowing him, he wouldn’t understand why she’d been compelled to leave. He’d be hurt, upset, possibly angry. And knowing that simply exhausted her. She’d been clear from the beginning that she couldn’t give Cillian what he wanted and needed. He possessed the heart of a true romantic. With his particular aspirations for a good and quiet life, he could afford that kind of softness and vulnerability where she couldn’t. Plus he possessed that dragon of a grandmother to protect him, which Alise could heartily agree he needed. Lady Harahel was wrong about Alise, but her logic was impeccable. Were the situations reversed, Alise wouldn’t let herself near Cillian either.

Which served to prove, right there, that their relationship shouldn’t be. She’d been deluding herself about that, seduced by cinnamon rolls and sweetness, and it was time to stop.

During her morose musings, the carriage had circled the lake and slowed to a halt before the manse, the echo of her arrival at House Harahel a bit unsettling. But, where that moment had been dark, cold, and desperate, the house there like something out of a gothic romance, this arrival was the exact opposite. The sunshine, flowers, birdsong, the lovely white manse with its sparkling windows—and an incredibly pregnant Nic coming slowly down the wide steps, a huge smile on her face. Her black curls bounced around her high-cheekboned face, emerald eyes brilliant.

“I wasn’t sure if you’d get the message in time,” her sister exclaimed, hugging her, the embrace made exceedingly awkward by Nic’s enormous and enormously hard belly protruding between them. Then it rippled. Nic gasped, and Alise leapt back. Nic’s forest-green Ophiel gown clung lovingly to the rounded surface, magically adapting to even the large mound of her pregnancy like a second skin. Skin that rippled like a wave.

“You’re in labor?” Alise demanded.

“Yes.” Nic laughed, an hysterical edge to it. “Finally! Isn’t that why you’re here? And what in the dark arts happened to you? Barefoot, mud-spattered, and you smell like you haven’t bathed in days.”

“I love you too,” Alise responded sourly, figuring that answered that.

“This pregnancy,” Nic explained. “I can smell anything rotten or unpleasant from a league away.”

“Even better. Should you be standing out here on the steps if you’re in labor?”

“No,” Gabriel Phel said, emerging from the house, his magic billowing around him like a cloak in a high wind. His startlingly white hair contrasted with his tawny skin, the lone black streak at his temple matching his snapping wizard-black eyes. “Hello, Alise. Good to see you and I’m glad you made it in time.” He gave her a hug that was quick, perfunctory, and felt so much like what a brother—a real brother, not her actual turd of a one—would give that she nearly teared up. “Now,” he continued, turning to glower at Nic, “do me a favor and make your obstinate sibling go lie down.”

“Wizard Qaya, the midwife House Gaia sent me,” Nic explained to Alise, “says that it could be hours and hours and that walking is good for me.”

“Nic,” Gabriel grated, sounding like a wizard on the edge. Silver sparkled in the air, the humidity condensing into tiny silver specks, transformed by Gabriel’s water and moon magic, Alise realized. He’d clearly been working on blending the two kinds of magic, but not with perfect control.

“Mind your magic, my only love. Go terrorize the minions or something,” Nic told him impudently, patting him on the cheek and giving him a kiss. She looped her arm through Alise’s. “My sister will walk with me.”

“Don’t upset her,” Gabriel instructed Alise.

“She can upset me all she likes,” Nic retorted. “I’m bored of being treated like I’m breakable. You stay here and practice being calm. This is all your fault anyway.”

Gabriel actually made a growling sound under his breath, the palpable surge of his magic causing the once-fluffy clouds to gather into heavy-bottomed threats of rain.

Alise eyed the gathering storm with unease. “I don’t think your cautions are working,” she said sotto voce to Nic.

Her sister shrugged that off. “We could use the rain. And it would help him to blow off a little steam, as it were.” She cast a coquettish glance at Gabriel over her shoulder, fluttering her lashes. “One day my wizard will learn I only like it when he bosses me around during sex.”

Startled, Alise blushed. Nic rolled her eyes. “Oh come now, you’re an adult now and—dark arts!” she suddenly exclaimed, startling Alise. “I forgot your natal day. I’m a horrible sister.”

Alise laughed. “You are not.” In truth, with all that had been going on, she’d practically forgotten it herself.

“I don’t suppose our father acknowledged it.”

“Does he ever?”

“No.” Nic let out a sigh. “And now I’m no better.”

“It’s all right, Nic. It really is.”

“All right then. Then tell me this, what’s with this whole ‘Cillian Harahel is looking after me’ thing?” Nic squeezed her arm. “You had to know that your missive would only pique my interest. You and the shy librarian wizard a romantic item now. Tell me everything.”

Alise really regretted having put that in her letter to Nic.

“He’s not shy, really. He’s—” Alise broke off when Nic’s grip vised on her arm as she bent over, propping her other hand on her knee, blowing out her breath rhythmically. “Nic! We should go back to the manse.”

“No, no, no,” Nic panted, straightening and waving a hand in the air. “They’ll just all hover, which you know I can’t bear, as it really will be hours and hours of this, and besides Wizard Qaya did say that walking is good for me. I need a distraction. Tell me more about adorable Cillian. Did you have sex with him yet?”

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