Page 175 of Fortress of Ambrose
Abby drops the bag, and it rips. She groans. Jordan and I rush over. We wrangle it into a new bag for her. And once she’s all set, she is out the door. The sky outside steadily brightens.
“It’s nearly time. I should go.”
Jordan takes my black rose corsage and ties it onto my wrist. Then he tosses my House sash over my head. “I’ll be a hundred feet away, no more, watching everything. If you need me—”
I kiss his cheek. “I know.”
“And remember, he will try to appeal to you in a fatherly way.” Jordan strokes my face. “But you’re everything already without him. You have never needed him, and you never will.” He plants a kiss in the palm of my hand, and I hurry to depart the estate.
Outside, Nore is being laid on top of thousands of blue flowers. Her perfectly made-up face is a picture of her frozen in time. Her hair has been curled, and blue flower buds are sprinkled throughout it. The cloakis folded across her from the waist down. Her hands lie on top of one another on her chest. In her fingers is a single bloom. Abby was supposed to give her some kind of elixir to help her breath become shallow, but Yagrin protested, not trusting anything that would alter her ability to react quickly. So she lies there, trying to not breathe noticeably.
“Leave me,” I tell everyone, before scanning the perimeter of the forest. There is no sight of the Dragunhead anywhere.
When I am alone, I whisper to Nore, “You’re doing incredibly. You know, there is something that I never got to talk to you about. I probably should have before now. But thank you for welcoming my House here and standing up for unity the way you did.” My suspicions about the Dragunhead have me in a knot. “If things come to light today as I suspect, I am evenmorethankful for you. For giving me an opportunity I may have never had. I’ve always wanted a sister.”
Nore’s lip twitches, and it makes me smile.
“Do you always talk to dead people?” The Dragunhead’s voice sends my heart knocking into my ribs.
I face the man walking toward me with clasped hands.Showtime.
“I prefer to talk to people when they’re alive. But if the chance escapes me…”
His wavy gray hair is loose down his back. He wears a thick leather coat embroidered with each House’s sigil. The sleek lines of his face are sharper and more severe than I remember. And he is much taller than I recall. He walks with a stride uncharacteristic of someone of his age. How did I not notice that before?
“Well, I would never want to put you in that position.” He joins me on the dais and gazes at Nore. He touches his chest, his mouth turning down.
“You can’t. Because you can’t die. Isn’t that right?”
“Not easily.” He moves closer to Nore, and I pray she is holding her breath.
“Was there anything you wanted to say to her? Your daughter.”
“Many things, when she was alive. But her mother kept her away.”
“That’s not what I hear.”
His attention moves to me. It’s only then I notice a bouquet at his back. He sets it on top of Nore’s body, and my insides slosh for her.
“With as much family as you’ve lost, aren’t you grateful for a sister?”
He doesn’t know my mother lives.“I wish I’d have known about her years ago.” Angering him isn’t the goal. I need to position him somehow with his back to Nore. But he stands across the dais from me, staring between Nore and me.
“Thank you for coming,” I say, biting back my frustration and all the accusationsand magicI wish I could hurl at him.
“You don’t need to thank me, child. I should thankyou.”
My heart ticks faster.
“This wasn’t my plan, Quell. I never wanted to leave you or Nore. You know, I came up with her name.”
“Oh?” My throat thickens. I watch Nore, and thankfully she doesn’t move. The Dragunhead’s body hasn’t turned away from her, but his eyes are all on me now.
“It was Noriana. But her mother said that sounded like a disease. So I shortened it. Noriana was my mother’s name.”
“Thadius’s mother?”
“No, Quell. My real mother. Noriana Paru, daughter of Areya Paru, whose name you might have heard.”
