جميع فصول : الفصل -الفصل 80

“No.” I let out a laugh. “You . . . Father, we cannot marry our way out of this war.” I don’t know why I’ve switched to the Tongue, but it takes him aback. And maybe that’s good, maybe this is what he needs. A moment to think this madness through. “Who would agree to this?” Father looks at me so pointedly, I know. I just know. And I burst into laughter. I only ever laughed out loud with Anna which means that it must have been well over a month since I last did it. My brain nearly hiccups, startled at these newfangled, mysterious sounds my voice box is producing. “Did you drink rotten blood? Because you’re unhinged.” “What I am is charged with ensuring the good of the most, and the good of the most is the furthering of our people.” He seems somewhat offended by my reaction, but I cannot help the laughter bubbling in my throat. "It would be a job, Seraphine. Compensated.” This is— God, this is funny. And mental. “No amount of legal tender would convince me to— Is it ten billion

The gathering can only be defined as “a party” with lots of generosity. About one hour in, I decided that I had finally had enough. If my husband—my husband, who was on the edge of murdering me at our altar of connubial bliss because I stink—could be off somewhere discussing important matters with my father, I, too, could sneak away. I made my way up to the mezzanine balcony to be alone. Unfortunately, the governor had the same idea, and brought along a watering can’s worth of alcohol. He decided to join me—heartbreaking—and seems intent on making conversation—a fucking cataclysm. His eyes keep straying to Maddie Garcia’s table, as though he’s trying to incinerate her ahead of her inauguration next month. I should probably join him in his resentment toward the Human governor-elect, since her choices are what made this sham of a marriage necessary, but I cannot help admiring the way she has been expertly avoiding my father. She’s definitely a smart woman. Unlike the bumbling idiot ne

Still, I have no idea what to say. So far we’ve only exchanged recited promises that neither of us means to keep, and some commentary on my body odor. “You can call me Seraphine.” He’s quiet for a beat. “Yeah. I probably should.” We fall into silence. In the far corner of the courtyard, what seems to be another small ruckus involving a Were and Vampyre nearly pops up, but it’s swiftly curbed by a Were woman I vaguely remember standing by the altar. “Do we have another interspecies brawl?” I ask. Moreland shakes his head. “Just some idiot who drank too much.” “Not from a Were, I hope.” I regret the words the second they’re out of my mouth. I’m not usually a nervous blabberer, because I’m not usually nervous. One doesn’t serve as the Collateral for a decade without learning a baffling number of anxiety management strategies. And yet. “Did you just joke about your people drinking my people dry?” I close my eyes. Death would be nice, right now. I’d welcome it with open arms. “It wa

The voice is young and sullen. It worms its way under my pillow and into my ears, nudging me awake in the dead middle of the day.“This used to be my room,” it says.The floor is hard underneath me. My brain is blurry and my ears are made of cotton and I don’t know where I am, why, who would commit this ignominy upon my person: wake me up when the sun is bright in the sky and I am sapped of all strength.“Can I hide in here? She’s grumpy today.”I gather six months’ worth of energy and unearth myself from under the blankets, but run out of steam when it comes to lifting my eyelids.No, we Vampyres don’t pulverize in the sun like glitter bombs. Sunlight burns us and it hurts, but it won’t kill us unless the exposure is unfiltered and prolonged. However, we are pretty useless in the middle of the day, even inside.Lethargic and weak and crawly and headachy, especially during late spring and summer, when the rays hit at that pesky steep angle. “This crepuscularity of yours is really cra

Because no one cared whether I was safe, or healthy, or alive. No one but Anna. The sister of my heart, if not of my blood. And even though I’d been plenty alone, I’d never felt so lonely as after she was gone.I wished I could cry. I wished for lacrimal ducts to let out this horrible terror that she’d left forever, that she’d been taken, that she was in pain, that it was my fault and I’d driven her away with our last conversation. Unfortunately, biology was not on my side. So I worked through my feelings by going to her place and taking care of her damn fucking cat, who showed his gratitude by scratching me every single day.And, of course, by looking for her where I shouldn’t have.I had the keys, after all. Because the key to everything is but a line of code. I was able to rifle through her bank statements, IP addresses, cell phone locations. Herald emails, metadata, app usage. Anna was a journalist, one who wrote about delicate financial stuff, and the most likely option was that