“You do not have to.”
“I will.Do you have certain work hours?I do not wish to interfere.”He jolted down the steps right behind her.
When she reached the ground floor, she whirled around to face him before entering the front of the shop.“You cannot be serious.”
“I am always serious.”He did not blink, did not crack a grin.The man must be… serious.
She slapped her hands over her mouth to keep from laughing out loud.This mirth… she’d not laughed so easily in an entire week.That she could so soon…
“Yes,” she said.“You may visit me again.The shop closes at seven, and we spend an hour cleaning after that.”
“I’ll be here at eight.”He flinched as if he might… do something.She waited to see what it might be.But then he only said.“Good day, Miss Chester.”
She should not encourage him.But she could not quite let him go, either.A strange impulse.No, a perfectly practical one.He was her connection to the outside world.He could bring her information on Apollo, information that might keep her ahead of him, keep her safe.More than that, he fascinated her.What he’d said about alchemists, it contradicted everything she’d always known as true.
Her existence contradicted everything she’d always known as true.
She wanted to study him, to learn more about alchemists if he’d let her, to perhaps, learn more about herself as well.
“I will see you tomorrow night,” she said.“Good day, my lord.”
Then he swept into and out of the shop as if he were a breeze passing through, ruffling the leaves and vines and leaving nothing of himself behind.
But he had left something of himself behind.
The fear that had built a wall around her in the months since her grandfather’s death now possessed a crack or two.Hairline fractures were webbing throughout the stone.It should be stronger than ever.Apollo had… She shivered, dread like a chip of ice trailing along her skin.And Apollo was still out there, likely searching for her.
But she was free.And doing something interesting with kind, fascinating people.And Lady Guinevere took the safety of those in her care seriously, and…
And now this man, this alchemist had offered himself up as her knight.
He’d swept out of the shop like a ghost, leaving nothing of himself behind.
Except this new fullness in her heart.
