“Of course.” He bowed and turned away.
Nate headed out of the library as I waltzed in, and he flashed a quick grin, holding up the latest book he borrowed, then hurried off before I could ask him about the party. I knew he’d come, though, without question.
“Blade,” I called into the open space, searching up, down, and around with my entire body. The curtains were drawn across the great windows, the room dark and empty. I noticed the projector set up on a table across from a whiteboard, and a stack of notes beside it, but Blade was nowhere to be seen. “Blade? You here?”
“Hey, Ara.”
My eyes moved quickly to the bookcases under the balcony, landing on a hunched figure in the armchair. It was so dark that if he hadn’t spoken, even my vampire night vision wouldn’t have noticed him. “Why are we sitting in the dark?” I asked, wandering over.
He smiled up at me where I sat on the arm of the chair. “You spoken to Em today?”
“No, but I heard about her and Mike.”
He stood up, the leather squeaking behind him. “She loves him, you know?”
“I know.”
“Why doesn’t he get it? It’s so simple.” He stopped with both hands propping him up against the oak table. “She just wants his affection, his love, maybe a little attention. It’s like he doesn’t want her, Ara, like he keeps her all to himself because he wants to prove he’s really gotten over you.”
“He has.” I stood, too. “Emily’s not his trophy girlfriend, Blade. He loves her.”
“Not enough. Not enough to have asked her to marry him.”
“Why so sensitive about this?”
“She’s my friend, Ara. I care about her.”
I laughed in the back of my throat. “Does . . . does she know you’re all cut up about this?”
He dropped his hand from his head and looked at me disapprovingly. “I’m not all cut up.”
I smiled, and it made him smile, too. “Then why can’t I feel the pulse of our bind—your never-ending-Curse-of-Lilith-love that you’ve had for me all these months?” I teased.
“Shut up,” he said with a grin and sat down on the chair. “Oh God. Why can’t I fall for someone who isn’t taken by a high-ranking member of my new society?”
I laughed and sat down beside him. “Now, what fun would that be?”
He bumped me softly with his elbow. “Well, all jokes aside, and no disrespect but, I’m glad I don’t love you anymore.”
I leaned my head on his shoulder. “Me too, Blade. And, hey, bright side?” I sat up again. “She’ll be at the party tonight.”
“Party?”
I paused for dramatic effect. “We got approval for the lab.”
“What?”
I just smiled and continued. “We’re going to the lighthouse to eat and drink in celebration. Jason told me to make sure you were coming.”
“He knows I’d never miss it.”
“Yeah, and you have to come anyway. I need a guard.”
“Lemme guess,” he said flatly. “Falcon doesn’t approve of you hanging out with Jason.”
“Not really.”
“They all need to give that guy a break.” He pushed the chair out with the backs of his legs and stood up again. “I’ve never seen anything but the good he’s done for you since he’s been here.”
“I know. But I guess they just find it hard to forgive what he did in the past.”
“Yet they praise the king for more heinous actions.”
“It’s just the way it is.” I shrugged.
“Well, I got his back, Ara, you know that, right?”
“I know.”
“Good.” He clapped once. “Then we have a lesson to get started on.”
The global view from the rooftop spread my little world outward, but the sight of the new greenhouse narrowed it in again, stealing the glamour from the winding beige roads, the unending fields of green grass, and the vast clusters of trees. I half expected it to be a modest, kind of rounded conservatory, the glass maybe frosted and opaque, but I was dead wrong. I was wrong about the rooftop, too. In my mind, I’d pictured a grey, water-damaged cement surface, cluttered up with blackened chimneystacks and broken roof tiles. But it was remarkably spacious and flat, spread wide across the East Wing, dropping at the edges into slanted tiles, peaked at the window points over the attics on the rear face of the building.
Ahead, the large dome marking the manor entrance caught the sunlight, making it glint in my direction, but even with all its glorious colours, it sat in pale contrast to the wall of glass Arthur and David had commissioned. Clearly, they’d been planning it for much longer than I realized. Its sheer magnitude and ambience was probably visible from the furthest bridge connecting Loslilian Island to the mainland. It stood at least thirty feet above the manor, the ceiling forming a long peak down the length of it, so clear and open it was a glistening shrine to the sun, inviting its golden beams down onto the mess of greenery inside. I wasn’t sure where’d they stuffed the lab, but there was no sign of another room anywhere up here.
As I neared the building, I scanned the windows for sight of Arthur. Word had it that he was up here pottering around somewhere, but there were at least four rows of tables and planters inside, and I wasn’t sure I’d spot him once I was in the thick of it all.
I pushed the door open and stared down the barrel of the first aisle: greenery, stacked high up to the ceilings, came face to face with what I imagined were special kinds of lights for growing things. There was a warm buzz in the air with the sound of life, and under the heat that saturated the room there was a gentle sound of dripping water and a rich soil flavour settling on the scent of newly budding flowers. It was beautiful and almost tropical.
A flicker of movement down the end caught my eye then, steering it to the busy-looking figure trimming leaves off a plant and laying them in a tub at his feet. He looked old from back here—hunched and almost weathered, but as I drew closer, my eyes adjusted to his form, and his youthful appearance altered my first impression.
“Arthur?”
He looked up, laying the scissors down. “Amara? What brings you here?”
“Came to see the new lab.”
“Did you now?” he asked in a tone that indicated disbelief.
“Yeah, um—” I stood beside him, wrapping myself up in my own arms. “And to see if you’d heard yet.”