Written to Die for the Angel, So I Exposed Her First novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: The Knot

The Warden orders her to apologize to the angel, she refuses and asks who lit the harbor lantern six years ago, and her fingers tie a sailmaker's knot she has never learned.

"No," Perrine said.

The tea had broken up in a hush of rustling silk.

Odile had been led away by her mother's footman, still insisting on the fan.

Aurelie had been carried to a chaise under the awning to be fussed over.

And Perrine stood on the quay terrace below the Dowager's garden, with the Lord Warden of Saltmere standing too close to her and looking down.

"I beg your pardon," Lucan Halcyr said.

"I won't apologize. I didn't do anything."

"You made a girl cry in front of her friends," Lucan said.

"Miss Quillon cried. Miss Merrin lied. I asked a question and you answered it. Your own eyes found the pocket."

"You put the brooch in that glove."

That landed hard in her chest.

He had seen it.

Of course he had. He was the man who watched the whole harbor for a living.

"Did I?" Perrine said.

"I was watching your hands."

"Then you watched Miss Merrin's hands drop it in my bag first, I hope. Or did you only start looking when I moved?"

His mouth went flat.

He was twenty-eight, she remembered from the book, the youngest Lord Warden in the history of the port.

A man whose entire manner said he had never in his life been argued with by a woman in a borrowed hat.

Her hat was not borrowed.

It was hers, apparently, and it was ugly.

"Miss Valmorin," he said. "Aurelie has been your friend since you were both fifteen. She has never had an unkind word for you in her life."

"I know."

"And you stood in her mother's garden and made a show of her," Lucan said.

"I made a show of the girl who planted the brooch. Your angel forgave her. Did you see that? The thing was stolen from her and she forgave the thief before anyone asked her to."

"That is who she is."

"Yes," Perrine said. "That is very much who she is."

She hadn't meant it to come out so grim.

He heard it anyway, and his eyes sharpened.

"What does that mean?"

She should have walked away.

In the book she would have curtsied and begged his pardon with her head down and her ugly hat in her hands.

He would have forgiven her because Aurelie asked him to.

Perrine looked at his left wrist instead.

It was bare skin and shirt cuff, and a strip of old blue twine.

It was tarred, and stiff with salt, and tied around the bone in a knot.

He saw where she was looking and turned his hand over, quick.

"Who lit the lantern?" she said.

"I don't take your meaning."

"The breakwater lantern. Six years ago, in the gale, when your cutter went down and you were in the water. The book says somebody lit it." She heard herself and corrected. "Everyone says somebody lit it. Who was it?"

He was very still.

"You know who."

"Tell me anyway."

"Aurelie," Lucan said.

He said the name flatly, as a thing settled.

"She was sixteen. She ran out along the breakwater in the dark and lit it with her own hands, and when they pulled me out she was the first one at the water with a blanket."

Perrine looked at the twine.

She didn't know why her fingers had begun to move.

Her right hand had lifted a little from her skirt.

Her thumb and two fingers were pinching the air, curling, crossing, drawing a loop through a loop.

Her hands knew a knot.

She had never in her life tied a knot like that, and her hands knew it as well as they knew her own name.

A double bowline.

Sailmakers tied it to join two heavy lines that had to take a strain without slipping.

She put the hand behind her back.

"That's a good story," she said.

"It isn't a story."

"I'm sure it isn't," Perrine said.

"Miss Valmorin."

He had gone cold and clipped.

"I'll say this once. I know the Dowager's house holds your family's debt. I know your loft on the quay lives from month to month. I would take it very ill if I heard that you had made Aurelie's life harder because she was kind to you."

"Is that a threat?" Perrine asked.

"It's a warning."

"Then here's mine," Perrine said. "Don't ever tell me what she is. Watch."

She walked past him, and the sea wind shoved at her hat, and she let it.

She was halfway along the terrace before he said behind her, almost to himself, "Watch what?"

She kept walking.

At the end of the terrace stood a woman in a plain brown dress with her sleeves rolled up, freckled, arms folded, face shut.

"There you are," Garance said. "I've been standing here since the shouting."

"You're my maid."

"I'm your forewoman. The maid's a courtesy. I carry your bag because you used to forget it." Garance looked her over. "You've changed your walk."

"Have I?"

"You used to walk like you were sorry. Now you walk like you're late for a fight."

"I have an appointment," Perrine said.

"With who?"

"Everyone."

Garance snorted.

She fell in step, and together they went down the stone steps to the quay.

At the bottom, Perrine looked back.

The Lord Warden of Saltmere was still standing alone on the terrace.

He was looking at his own left wrist, turning the blue twine around and around on the bone.

And her right hand, hanging at her side, was still tying the knot in the air.

← Chapter 1 · All chapters · Chapter 3 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend