Page 41 of Down Comes the Night

“I want to say yes, of course, but…” Lowry turned toward the window, his hands twisting together. The clouds beyond the glass were a solid gray wall. “That storm is nothing to trifle with. Once night falls, you’ll never find your way back.”

Wren tucked her bloodless hands into her pockets. Speaking slowly to edge the impatience out of her voice, she said, “In the military, I braved things far worse than a storm. I’m afraid I must insist. This is a matter of life and death.”

Lowry’s face paled, and she could see him wrestling with indecision. The choice was dire: risk his favorite servant, or risk the healer herself. “Perhaps I can order your ingredient for you? I understand it’s not ideal, but—”

“He’s getting worse.”

“Please, Ms. Southerland, take pity on me. My nerves can’t bear it.”

Lowry laid an imploring hand on her arm. His grip was surprisingly firm—enough that she flinched back—and his eyes were too pleading, too wounded. This close, she noticed a burst blood vessel leaking red into the sclera. Against it, the milky blue of his irises shone like ice.

Frozen in the intensity of his stare, she had to wonder if he could have done it. If he could be lying to her.

“I simply cannot let you leave the house in good conscience,” he continued. “I’ll have nothing but terrible visions of the spring thaw. Just imagine it. Me, unearthing your frozen corpse from the garden like some sort of spud. It would be macabre!”

The wind wailed like a keening ghost, and the whole house groaned with strain. As Wren shivered, all of her fight went out, extinguished like a tapered flame. Alistair Lowry wanted her to believe he was a man concerned with the well-being of his servants, including her. And right now, with the genuine quaver in his voice, the artful fall of his hair across his furrowed brow… it worked.

He was right, after all. Night was creeping down from the mountains now, and wandering into a storm to find a town she only approximately knew the location of guaranteed death by hypothermia. Hal would do her no good if she was dead. Until the weather changed, she’d have to depend on her magic to keep him alive.

Her shoulders slumped. “You’re right. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“I appreciate your understanding. Truly.” Lowry heaved a sigh of relief and let go of her arm.

Just like that, all of his urgency, all of his desperation, fell away. It was such a swift change, Wren was left reeling. Now that adrenaline couldn’t keep her upright, she emptied of everything save for a haze of paranoia. Lowry was truly the most tempestuous and easy-to-reassure man she’d ever met, and she could not shake the queasy thought that she’d just been played for a fool. But after what she’d learned today, maybe she couldn’t trust her own instincts. Even if Lowry was manipulating her, he certainly wasn’t hiding anything sinister behind that self-assured smile. With no clear motive, he seemed an exceedingly unlikely murder suspect.

“Of course, my lord,” she said quietly. “Thank you for watching out for me.”

“Anytime, my dear. I’m all too sympathetic to the effect this house has on people in winter.” He turned and leaned against thebanister, a grim silhouette against the bar-shaped windows. The wan afterglow of dusk flickered in the shadow of the snowfall, and far below them, the darkness gathering on the ground floor churned like the rising sea. “It gets to be quite claustrophobic. The shortening days. The wind and snow and the insufferable creak of the old foundation. It’s enough to drive anyone mad.”

“Yet you’ve stayed,” Wren said.

“For most of the year, I have plenty of company,” he said. “For the rest… Well, I’ve come to find it peaceful, being so undisturbed. I have things to keep me busy.”

“Like collecting?”

“Like collecting, yes.” The amusement with which he spoke veered decidedly into the cryptic. Before she could press harder, he spun on his heel toward her and said, “And planning events, of course. Speaking of! I’m considering the color palette for the ball. What do you think? Black and silver, or navy and white?”

“Um.” In all the chaos, the ball had slipped her mind entirely. Although she owed Lowry nothing, she couldn’t help feeling another pang of guilt. All this planning, all this effort, would be for nothing. She would betray him soon enough. “Black and silver are Danu’s colors.”

“So they are,” Lowry said. “So it shall be for my guest of honor. May I take your coat, my dear? I’ll see to it that Hannah hangs it up for you.”

A flash of movement past his shoulder drew Wren’s attention. In the grand hall below, Hannah was dusting a lacquered table with such care, it may as well have been a work of art. Unsubtle eavesdropping if she ever did see it. Wren removed her overcoat and passed it to him. Lowry folded it over his arm like a butler’s white serviette.

“Perhaps you’d like to assist me with the menu as well?” he said.

“That’s very kind of you.” Wren rubbed her temples. She could hardly remember why she’d come down here in the first place with how quickly he flitted from topic to topic. “But with the patient in the state he’s in, I’m afraid I have no time.”

Lowry frowned. “Of course. Do keep me posted on his progress.”

“I will.”

With that, he turned over his shoulder and snapped his fingers. “Hannah, darling?”

Hannah jumped, dropping her feather duster with a clatter that echoed through the hall. It dislodged a layer of dust from the east wing’s tapestry.

Lowry pinched the bridge of his nose. “When you’ve quite surfeited yourself with scrubbing the varnish from that table, put this away for Ms. Southerland, will you?”

“Yes, milord.”