Page 16 of The Threads Between

Stable. As though I were a horse that had once bolted.

“And you are comfortable marrying someone with an affliction?”

“Your father assures me any children we have will be free of it.” She said it as calmly as discussing household accounts. “The Sterling bloodline is pure. The taint will be bred out.”

The words made my stomach tighten with something close to nausea.

“Besides,” Constance continued, “you are hardly using magic.” Her head tipped slightly. “Your father says you were instrumental in removing the Weaver threat from Oxford. That the demonstration in London will show everyone what proper control can accomplish.”

“Proper control,” I repeated.

“What would you call it?” Her tone sharpened. “Those people are dangerous. Unstable. Using powers they cannot regulate. Your father is bringing order to chaos. Safety to uncertainty.” She leaned forward slightly, earnest. “And you are helping him. You should be proud.”

“My father uses magic. I can use magic. How is that different from what Weavers do?”

“It's completely different.” She said it like I was being deliberately obtuse. “Your father's gift is corrective. He removes the corruption that Weavers create. It's like—like a surgeon cutting out disease. Necessary. Controlled. Masculine strength used to protect society.”

“And the pendant?”

“Is brilliant.” Her eyes lit with genuine admiration. “Your father engineered it to channel your . . . condition into something useful. Something directed.” She straightened. “That's what separates proper magic from Weaver chaos. The application of rational male intellect to harness what would otherwise be wild and destructive.”

“So when I break threads, it's acceptable because my father controls it.”

“Exactly.” She smiled, pleased I was finally understanding. “Weaver magic is emotional. Instinctive. Feminine in the worst sense—unregulated, prone to excess, dangerous when left to its own devices. But your father has tamed yours. Directed it toward protection rather than destruction.”

I looked at her—truly looked. There was no cruelty in her pale eyes. No malice. Only certainty. The kind that made kindness into a weapon, because it never considered it might be wrong.

She actually believed she was saving England.

She believed she was saving me.

“The wedding is in six weeks,” Constance said, settling back into pleasantness as if she had never sharpened at all. “I have consulted with the dressmaker. Ivory silk, perhaps, with Brussels lace. Mother insists on fresh flowers despite the season, which will be costly but—“ She stopped, studying my face. “You are not listening.”

I had not heard most of what she said. Just sound. The shape of words I did not need to translate. Six weeks. Ivory. Lace. None of it real. None of it mine.

“I am listening.”

“You are thinking about her,” Constance said, and the pleasantness drained away. “You sit here—the week of our announcement—thinking about her.”

I kept my face blank. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Don’t,” she snapped, sudden and sharp. “Do not insult me by pretending. That provincial girl.” Her voice turned cold. “Lily Whitmore. That is who you are brooding about, isn’t it?”

The sound of Lily’s name in Constance’s mouth was an intrusion. A trespass.

“She is gone,” I said carefully.

“Is she?” Constance’s eyes flashed. “Because you look at me the same way you looked at me when she was still here. Like I am an obligation. Like I am merely . . . arranged.”

She moved to the window, spine rigid.

“I saw the way you watched her,” she said. “At the Pemberton gathering. She was inappropriate—asking questions, challenging your father’s work, behaving as if education granted her permission to have opinions on matters beyond her understanding.”

“Constance—“

“And then she disappeared,” Constance said, turning back with something like satisfaction. “Just before the Oxford incident. How convenient. Though I suppose we both know what happened to the Weavers who remained.”

The thread pulsed hot in my chest. Alive. A small rebellion the pendant could not extinguish.