By three, fear had worn itself dull.
It hadn’t gone anywhere. It had only worn a groove through me, deep enough that I could sit there with it calmly and still feel it moving underneath.
Hale’s voice stayed under it.
Leverage.
Fine.
I had leverage now.
I was tired of sitting with it and doing nothing.
So I put the notebook under the stolen blanket, put the brooch in my inside pocket, and went to the east kitchen.
The kitchen was between meals and pretending to be empty. A pot cooled on the stove. Flour dusted the long table in pale handprints. The strings of garlic over the door had gone dry at the tips.
Rev was at the table with her sleeves pushed up, scraping burnt sugar from the bottom of a pan.
She didn’t look up until I cleared my throat.
“Absolutely not,” she said.
“I haven’t asked anything yet.”
“Your face has.”
I sighed and sat on the counter beside her.
Rev pushed a cup toward me with the back of her wrist.
“Drink that before you start.”
“Is it safe?”
“It’s tea, Astra. I don’t have to poison you. You’re already one bad decision from an early grave.”
I drank. The tea was bitter enough to make my eyes water.
Rev looked satisfied, which told me it was supposed to be that bad.
She watched me over the pan.
“What happened?”
“Cosima gave me her notebook.”
Rev winced.
“Bad?”
“The bonds affect each other.”
Rev set the pan down.
The scrape of burnt sugar stopped.
“She wrote that?”
