Chương 27: Chapter 27

Ismene waited at the front door of the Ferry estate for Lysandra when she returned home after sunset. Lysandra didn't even have a chance to make it to the front door before Ismene started yelling, but she didn't hear any of it. She was still preoccupied with Cale and Memory Theft and Zephyr.

"Lysandra Anna Ferry!" Ismene shouted finally, breaking Lysandra free of her thoughts. "For the sake of the Angels! Don't you understand that without you, there would be no one left in the Ferry estate!"

"I understand!" Lysandra shouted back. "You yell at me every time I leave the house, Ismene, but do you ever think about what you're doing? You're trying to keep me caged in here like a damn animal! You must not trust me in the least, or else you might have considered that I'm trying to fix my memory!"

Ismene stared at her, her lips parting slightly in a look of stunned surprise. Lysandra had not even made eye contact with her since she'd come through the gates, let alone spoken a word.

"Memory," she repeated in a whisper. "As in Memory Recoding."

Lysandra laughed humorlessly and shook her head, her light brown hair moving against her shoulders. "No, Ismene," she said. "Someone already tried that on me. I'm trying to figure out who it was."

Ismene's mouth hardened into a straight line, and she took a step back. "Lysandra, I cannot allow you to get mixed up in such things."

"Ismene, are you listening to me?" Lysandra demanded. "I just told you I'm not Recoding."

"And anyway, you have a meeting with Remiel and the other Collingwoods tomorrow," Ismene said, ignoring her. "You would not dare to disgrace your father's name in front of the Collingwoods, would you!"

"Don't bring my father into this!" Lysandra said. "It's not even about him anymore. It's about you!"

"Your father requested that Dagon Remiel Collingwood court you!" Ismene fired back. "It is about him. It is about his wishes for you. You could not defy them!"

"Watch me," Lysandra hissed, and darted up the stairs to her room.

She pushed the heavy wooden door shut behind her and leaned against it. How was she going to manage to get out, if Zephyr probably wouldn't be available until the morning?

She had to get out.

She couldn't bear to sit through another meeting with the Collingwoods. Not after last time. Not after what had happened with Cale.

Cale. The thought of Cale made Lysandra's cheeks flush and her pulse quicken. What would Ismene think about what had happened between her and Cale? What would Nereus think? She pushed those thoughts away.

Remembering Cale's advice, she reached out and flipped the lock over the door. No one would be in this room tonight. She couldn't afford to forget anything that she had done today.

Even when, hours later, she heard a knock on her door and knew it was Nereus, she didn't call out to him. Even when he pushed against the door and found it was locked, she feigned sleep and pretended she hadn't heard.

Lysandra woke before sunrise. She climbed out of bed and went to the window. Seeing no note from Zephyr, she carefully pried away the lock and pushed the pane of glass out. She turned, crawled over the windowsill and let one of her feet down so as to find a foothold. Thankfully, she found one among the stone exterior.

As she made her way down the wall, she encountered several tangles of pure wiretree branches which had somehow grown against the house. They cut into her skin and the fabric of her skirts, sometimes leaving traces of oil, sometimes drawing blood. She didn't care.

A few feet from the bottom, she leaped to the ground and looked up. When she laid eyes on her window, she cursed under her breath. Of course she had left the window wide open, leaving clear evidence for whoever went looking for her. Brilliant.

She didn't dare climb the wall again, so she gathered her skirts into one hand and dashed across the lawn.

The chill of the morning settled in even as she ran. At the gate, she shivered and breathed into her hands. She should have brought a cloak.

Unlike most mornings when she left the house, this one felt too quiet. The sun hadn't even crept up over the horizon yet, and the crowds were absent from the streets. The only lights came from the gas lamps on the side of the cobblestone roads, placed few and far between so that they wouldn't light the wiretrees on fire.

She hadn't been to Zephyr's house in months, and she barely knew her way in the dark, but somehow she made it to her best friend's street by memory. When she reached the Winslows' house, she circled around to Zephyr's window and tapped on the glass lightly.

Lysandra waited. After a minute, the curtains parted and she saw Zephyr's face, framed by her dark, unkempt hair. Her eyes widened in surprise.

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