He sighed and fixed me with a bored look. “Long enough,” he said again. “We arrived a few weeks before ourmost holyShroud Warden.” He sneered the words with such disdain that Penny snorted.
It was nice to know Merrick was unpopular with more than just the two of us.
“How well did you know him?” I continued. “My father, not Merrick.”
Otis heaved another noisy breath. “You ask a lot of questions”
“I find that if you ask the right questions, you learn all kinds of interesting things,” I said, parroting back the same thing he’d told me the day we met.
He scoffed. “Are you sure these are the right questions?”
“Are you going to answer?” I asked as I looked up from the trowel and met his eyes.
He held my gaze for several long moments before responding. “Well enough.”
It was my turn to scoff. “That’s not an answer.”
My father wrote extensively about his protege in the journals he’d filled after my escape, though he never specifically named the other man. He was referred to only as “O,” making Otis the most logical suspect. But if he’d worked with my father, how had he ended up as Harlan’s apprentice and not climbing the ranks instead?
Admittedly, he was young, likely just now old enough to attempt his Oaths, which would have made him only sixteen when my father was executed. If he had designs on leadership now that he could actively follow in my father’s footsteps, that would make him even more of a threat.
Rosie’s appearance in the doorway ended our standoff. She gave Otis a wave and me a subdued smile before turning her attention to my recruit pouting in the back of the space.
“Ready to go, Penny?”
Penny didn’t so much as look at me as he brushed past, then led the way out into the market. Rosie glanced between us before following him, and I could barely hear her asking Penny if everything was okay before the passing crowds swallowed them from view.
I rushed through polishing the trowel, ready to be rid of the ominous cloud of Otis’s presence so I could finish the day’s work. He seemed content with the silence, not even acknowledging me with a nod when I handed over the completed piece a few minutes later. He simply took it and left.
It was a struggle to get back to work once I was alone. My mind churned with unanswered questions about the pale-faced initiate who knew more about me than I was comfortable with. Underneath that, guilt simmered. The look of hurt and surprise on Penny’s face when I dumped him in the dirt haunted me.
All he wanted was to comfort me. I knew that. But I also knew how dangerous it would be for someone like Otis to know how close Penny and I were becoming. It was a risk I was unwilling to take.
For as much as Penny thought he was a curse on his family, I wasn’t sure that it wasn’tmewho was the curse onhim. All my life, anyone or thing I cared about was at risk, and not just here. Clover and Garret had lost their lives because of me, and that ripple effect extended beyond Ashpoint’s gate. I would do whatever it took to protect Penny, even if it meant having to hide what he was to me.
I didn’t think I could survive losing anyone else.
4
Penny
Trudging into Rosie's family cottage, I found a fire roaring in the hearth and filling the air with dry heat. I eyed the dancing flames and strayed wide of them on my way to the kitchen where I found something—rather someone—else I would have liked to avoid.
Tessa stood engaged in lively chatter with Rosie's father. She flipped her long dark hair and batted her eyes in a way that would have made me wonder if she wasn't trying to charm the older man, but I knew she had her sights set on another target.
As the door swung shut behind Rosie and me, Tessa turned, and her fur trimmed skirt swished around her legs. “Oh, Rose, you brought Penny,” she said.
I couldn't decide if it was amusement or disdain in her voice.
Rosie came up behind me where I'd stalled in the living area. She tugged my snow-speckled cloak off my shoulders and took it to hang on the rack in the corner while I muttered in response, “Oh, Rosie, Tessa's here.”
Shouldering out of her own cloak, Rosie rejoined me and threaded her arm around mine. “Penny comes for baking lessons nearly every day at this time. You know that.”
Tessa flashed a smug smirk. “Lessons, is it? I assumed by now you'd have let him sample more than your pastries.”
Rosie gasped and clapped a hand over her mouth. Her cheeks burned with a deep blush while her father cleared his throat.
“Looks like I'm in the way,” he said. Stepping around Tessa, he passed into the living room to greet Rosie with a kiss on the cheek, then extended a handshake to me. “What's on the menu today?” he asked.
