Caris made a cutting gesture with her hand. “My road isn’t yours to walk. Ihada road. I had a future. I’m a Dhemlan.”
“You’re a Rourke,” Lore pushed back, eyes bright in her face as she stood. “And you are needed.”
“I won’t walk the road you’d have me stay on.”
Blaine grimaced at the viciousness of Caris’ tone. He moved so he could see her face, catching her eye. “The Dusk Star left me in E’ridia. I spent years in that country, and I learned to call it home. I gained a clan and a husband, but my road was never going to end there. Yours was never going to end in Cosian, but that doesn’t mean you can’t find a new path forward.”
Caris looked at him, all righteous fury and grief, twenty years old and shaped by too many hands into a country’s possible savior. But the core of her was sharp like clarion crystal—he’d seen it in the years he’d taught her, watching her grow into a well-educated engineer. Caris wouldn’t break, but that strength didn’t come from Meleri’s teachings or his own. That was all Caris and the teachings of the family who had raised her in the wilds of the Eastern Basin.
Blaine looked away from Caris to meet Meleri’s gaze. “I’m taking Caris out of Amari.”
“She shouldn’t leave,” Meleri protested.
“She’ll be safer away from Eimarille. You know that.”
“Caris—”
“Is standing right here and can decide for herself,” Caris shouted, cutting them both off. “I’m not going anywhere without my parents.”
“You shouldn’t go anywhere without an escort,” Lore said.
“She’ll have me,” Blaine replied.
“In which case, I’ll be going with you.”
“Mainspring is needed here.”
“On the contrary. I’m needed wherever Caris resides. You are not the only one who serves the Rourke bloodline.”
“I’m not Rourke,” Caris bit out.
Lore eyed her pityingly but for once didn’t press the subject. Blaine cleared his throat, drawing everyone’s attention. “Debt collectors took Nathaniel on the way here. His chain is compromised, as is his family and their company. The trains are no longer safe to use to transport debt slaves out of Daijal.”
All the blood drained out of Meleri’s face. “No.”
Lore swore in a very unladylike way. “You couldn’t have led with that report?”
Blaine glared at her. “Does that make you want to stay?”
“Absolutely not. You’ll need my help while on the run,” she shot back.
“Tell them about therionetkawho attacked the ambassador last night,” Caris said.
Meleri’s gaze darted from Blaine to Caris, then back again. “The press is reporting it was a diplomatic aide who harmed your husband.”
“Siv shot Honovi, but she wasn’t in control of her actions.” Blaine dipped his fingers into the inner pocket of his day jacket and withdrew several tintype photographs. He approached Meleri’s desk to hand them to her. “You’ll see by these photographs that her heart was replaced by a clockwork machine. The magician who took her memories before she died said Siv referred to herself as arionetka.”
Meleri peered at the photographs. “A puppet?”
The images were macabre, taken when Siv’s chest had been broken open to reveal the metal clockwork heart nestled in the cavity there. One or two other photographs showed a close-up of the spellwork on the framework before the self-destruct spell had slagged it all.
Lore touched her finger to the photograph depicting Siv’s body. “Our cogs found a bucket of hearts in the apothecary.”
The horror in her voice was echoed in Meleri’s eyes. Blaine nodded in the face of the duchess’ questioning gaze. “Siv was Siv right up until she shot Honovi. Whatever she was before that, it was a lie. Someone else pulled the strings of her life, making her obey their orders to further their own needs. No one at the embassy was the wiser.”
Lore’s expression became bleak. “The bucket had so many hearts. She can’t be the onlyrionetka.”
“I think it’s a safe assumption that theserionetkascould be anyone, anywhere, no matter the country.”
