Page 120 of This Dark Descent
Ari peered over the heads of the crowd to the opposite corner, where a second fire burned. Shira was sprawled across one of the armchairs, her nose buried in a book. The crowd gave her a wide berth.
“Ari?” Reid asked.
Ari handed him her drink. “I’ll be back.”
The crowd parted for her with surprising ease, and she lowered herself into the chair opposite Shira’s. The leather cover of her book had practically fallen away from the binding, but Ari could still make out the title. It was a romance novel.
“Exactly how many times have you read that?” she asked.
“One fewer than enough,” Shira replied without looking up.
“At some point knowing what’s going to happen has to ruin it.”
Shira closed the book with a snap. “Ari. I’m reading.”
Which translated loosely toTell me what you want before I bite your head off for interrupting me.A trait that ran in the family it seemed.
Ari smiled. “Why did you call the Anthir on Loic?”
“A question I’d like an answer to as well.” Damien appeared beside Ari’s chair, laying a hand on her shoulder.
Shira didn’t respond right away, and Ari could read nothing of her reaction in her face. How much of his emotional control had Damien learned from his older sister? He’d told her of his relationship with Loic, but not with her.
Eventually, she set her book aside. “They were supposed to stop him from doing anything foolish.”
“You mean stop him from winning,” Damien said. “You couldn’t have possibly thought he’d make a better house head.”
Ari agreed. Loic was as unpredictable as a wolf and twice as quick to bite. Surely Shira could see that?
Shira picked up a forgotten cup of tea from the table. “I think that winning the Ascension would have ruined him… and that losing it would have ruined you.”
“Then we agree,” Damien replied. “Loic is weak. He wasn’t fit to lead this house.”
Shira laughed softly. “How quickly we forget.” He frowned, and she turned sideways in her chair to face him. “Do you remember when those boys cornered you outside the pub? Who came for you?”
Damien ground his teeth. “Loic.”
“And what about when you took Father’s prized racehorse out for a midnight ride, only to cause a sprain? Who took the blame?”
This time, more quietly, “Loic.”
“We are all of us weak sometimes,” she said. “You just like to forget when it is you.”
Damien’s hand tightened briefly on Ari’s shoulder, the only indication that Shira’s words had gotten to him. They always seemed to. His sister knew him well, and Ari suspected that was the very reason Damien avoided her. That, and what Ari now understood was Shira’s deep desireto protect her brothers. This was why she’d followed her and Mikira, why she’d helped with the golem but wouldn’t have agreed to the endeavor herself.
Damien downed the rest of his drink and set the glass aside. “The Loic you speak of is gone. He vanished when we became House Adair and Mother died, and he saw me as a threat to his position.”
“That’s the thing the two of you have forgotten.” Shira picked up her book and settled back into her chair. “We’ve always been House Adair.”
She cracked open the book to her marked page, and recognizing the dismissal, Ari and Damien returned to the party.
THE NEXT MORNING,Ari woke with a pounding head and a thirst for water so powerful, she nearly knocked over the pitcher on the drink cart scrambling for it. She’d downed three glasses before she thought to try verillion. It burned away the worst of the hangover in seconds, and she dropped onto the chaise, wishing it could do the same for her headaches when they pestered her. But she’d learned long ago the human body didn’t always do what it was supposed to when it came to medicine.
Reid trudged out a short time later, looking far more disgruntled than she thought possible, even for him. He muttered something unintelligible and collapsed beside her. She reached behind them and poured him a cup of tea, which he accepted with another incoherent mutter.
Several minutes of silence and multiple cups of tea later, he finally looked at her. His eyes narrowed, taking in her obvious lack of discomfort, and said, “That is entirely unfair.”
She smiled innocently.
