Page 109 of The Mercy of Dawn

Luca gave her hand a gentle squeeze before he turned his attention back to Dion. He clasped Dion’s shoulder and tipped his head away, saying, “Can I steal you away from your lovely niece for a moment to chat?”

Dion eyed Cyril. “You’ll be alright on your own for a bit?”

“Go ahead.” Cyril schooled her grin into something polite. Dismissing Dion was not something she got to do, well…ever. “I’ll just stay here and eat. It was nice to meet you, Luca.”

Luca pressed his hand to his chest and dipped his head before he led a begrudged looking Dion away.

True to her word, Cyril did a few laps of grazing around the amply stocked dessert tables. By the time she’d gorged herself on at least half a dozen miniature cakes layered with berries and cream, and started her second generous mug of wine, she realized Dion was not coming back.

This always happened at parties.

Dion would make some big show of being Cyril’s chaperone, wheel her around for an hour or two, then poof. Gone. Something shiny—and intoxicating, more often than not—would catch his eye, and he wouldn’t surface until morning.

At least it meant she could walk around and people-watch on her own.

She tried, honestly, to sort out a familiar face amongst the crowds—like Kaia, or even Ari and Gunner—but there were too many damn people moving about. The faces all blended into one another, the rumble of noise drowning out any one voice in particular, and Cyril realized her mission was a hopeless one.

Just another damn solstice spent wandering around on her own.

A table of young and bright-eyed mortal men invited her to sit with them, but Cyril politely declined the less than discreet gesturing one of them did at his lap, and she slipped back into the crowds.

She looped all the way back to the tables where Runa had given Cyril her introductory taste of lockmead when she finally found the first group of familiar faces all damn night—the stable staff.

“Lady Cyril!” exclaimed that sweet, beautiful woman whose name still eluded Cyril. “Come and have a drink with us?”

She waved a bottle of lockmead in her hand.

Cyril didn’t hesitate to join them.

The first heavy-handed pour from Boone went down rougher than she would have liked, but the second slid down like nothing.

And the third? Cyril had just raised the glass to her lips when she saw Dion.

Walking back to the palace.

With Luca, and…a woman. A nymph, with long, cherry-red hair.

And they all looked…comfortable.

Handsy.

Cyril shot back the lockmead to suppress the shudder that ran through her.

She was going to need an entire damn bottle to get that image out of her mind.

Chapter 27

Somewhere in the dancing and music, in the drifting blur of faelights, Mikael lost track of Cyril and Dion.

The lockmead might’ve had something to do with it too.

He was just looking for a window of opportunity. Just a sliver of time to convince her to come to the barracks tomorrow night, after the merchant’s death sent his last attempt up in smoke.

Watching Cyril drift around the party hadn’t been a chore either.

She’d left her hair down, like a sheet of black silk, and the dress she wore was flattering in all the right ways. Gods, maybe the wrong ways too.

Mikael was certain he’d never felt so invested in a damn article of clothing before. The blue, or green, or whatever damn color the dress was, did something to her eyes that he didn’t quite understand, but was happy to look at regardless. The gold was so bright it was fucking mesmerizing.