Page 64 of Dagger’s Shield

While everyone laughed, Rémy looked at me over their heads. “It’s good to have you home, cousine.”

Dagger stood and presented my father with a box. He opened it and removed a corkscrew with a polished handle that looked old enough to have opened bottles before the war. My father held it up for the room and declared that Rourke was welcome every year for the holidays.

Maman’s gift from me was the santon Marthe had helped me choose—a vigneronne, a woman with a basket of grapes on her hip. My mother turned it in her hands for a long while. Then she carried it to the crèche and set it at the front.

“One figure a year,” she said. “For a lifetime.”

Before she returned to her seat, she set a small unwrapped box, worn at the corners, on my lap. It was tied with a ribbon so delicate I feared it would disintegrate in my hand. Inside lay a gold locket on a chain.

“This belonged to your father’s grandmother,” Maman said. “Open it.”

The photograph was smaller than my thumbnail. It was of a woman with dark hair but no smile. Her chin was raised.

“She looks like she’s about to give the photographer an earful,” I said.

Maman laughed, but then her expression softened. “She looks like you, ma chérie.”

I fastened the chain at my throat, kissed her cheek, and thanked her. It was exactly the gesture my mother had always made—the right thing, at the right moment, with the family’s history inside it. My father, beside her, said nothing. Not that I expected him to.

My gift to Dagger was a bottle of wine. “Ravel,” he said as he read the label, making note of the year. Similar to the one my father had opened during our meal last night, this one was from the year of Dagger’s birth.

He held it carefully and met my eyes. “We’ll drink it in May,” he whispered.

The last gift was for me from Dagger. The box he passed to me was small and heavy for its size. I opened the lid and removed the tissue. Beneath it was a serpette—a little pruning knife.

Dagger took it from the box, set it in my palm, and closed my fingers over the handle.

“A perfect fit,” he said, like he had when he slid his mother’s ring on my finger.

My maman gasped. “You remembered the story of my darling Maëlle, pruning with a man’s knife,” she said to him as her eyes filled with tears.

“Thank you,” I whispered, because if I’d said anything more, I would have cried like my mother was.

“There’s a condition,” he said. “In spring, you show me how to use it, and if I ruin a vine, you take the blame.”

“You’ll ruin an entire row.”

“Then, we’d best start with your father’s least favorite.”

We spent the rest of the day doing little other than eating and telling stories. Rémy pushed Dagger until he finally told one about his favorite Christmas.

“I was eight and my sister, Alena, was seven,” he began. “Someone at school told her that Father Christmas sees you when you’re sleeping, and my sister decided she didn’t care to be watched by a man she’d never vetted.”

“Vetted?” Rémy repeated.

“She was a thorough child. On Christmas Eve, she spread flour across the hearth for footprints, hung bells on a string across the door, and told me we’d take turns staying awake. I fell asleep in twenty minutes.”

“And your sister?” Rémy asked.

“At two in the morning, the bells rang, and Alena switched on her torch and caught our father, in his dressing gown, filling the stockings.”

“Oh no,” Maman said. “Was she devastated?”

“Not Alena. She used it to her advantage. She negotiated an extra gift each year that she kept the secret of Father Christmas. She even asked our mum to draw up a contract that our dad had to sign.”

“And did he deliver?” I asked.

“Oh yes. He wouldn’t have dared face the wrath of his youngest child.”