“What?”
I licked my lips, and not just because there was jam on them. She had that weird elfin thing going on suddenly, with the too-translucent skin and the hair color not found in nature—not outside of a bonfire, anyway—and the too-bright eyes. I tried telling myself it was just the light streaming through my sheers, but I knew I was lying.
I had a theory about it, too. I didn’t know if I looked any different when Dorina was around, except for a weird, glowy-eye thing I’d glimpsed once and tried not to think about. But I suspected that Claire’s looks changed when her twin was awake.
Which meant that she was awake right now.
Making this not the time for this particular conversation.
But, as usual with my luck, it was already too late.
“You are not going to tell me that you still don’t think it was her!” Claire demanded.
“Yeah, well. That would certainly be easier.”
“Dory!”
“Look. I would love for Efridis to be guilty, okay? She’s a threat, if not now then later, and it would make things nice and tidy since she’s already in custody—”
“As she ought to be!”
“—but what I want is less important than the facts, and I’m sorry, but they just don’t fit.”
“What facts?”
I held up a buttery finger. “One. Efridis is a well-known vargr, and she wants Aiden dead. Neither of these things is a secret. Yet she uses her best-known skill to attack us, and does it when her brother is here, who will almost certainly recognize it? And possibly recognize her?”
Claire frowned. “She might not have known Caedmon was here. It wasn’t a planned visit and he only arrived that afternoon.”
“And stayed outside most of the day,” I reminded her. “Where any little passing birdie could have seen him. Unless she’s a complete idiot, she’d do some recon before the attack, and Caedmon is hard to miss.”
“But she used the manlikans first. She only came in herself after that didn’t work!”
I nodded. “And the manlikan part I can understand. It could have been blamed on Aeslinn—it’s his element, after all—and he hates Caedmon. Killing his rival’s heir would give him revenge on an old enemy, and might make Caedmon less likely to support the Senate in the war. The fey lead their armies, and Caedmon would be less willing to risk himself without an heir.”
She frowned. “So you think it was Aeslinn?”
“I don’t know. I’m just saying that the manlikan attack didn’t point the finger directly at Efridis. She could plausibly claim to have had nothing to do with it, and try her luck again later if it didn’t work. Only . . . that’s not what happened, is it? Instead, she charges in using her vargr abilities, despite knowing they would put a glowing neon sign over her head.”
Claire shook her head. “It sounds crazy when you put it like that. But when it’s your child . . . it’s not that simple, Dory! You try to think clearly, but emotions get in the way. And she was so close—”
“Okay,” I agreed. “Let’s say she saw her best chance to make ?subrand heir to two kingdoms slipping away, and decided to go for it. I had a similar thought that night: that the first attack had failed so a second method was being tried. Or that the first was just a feint to get the stairs cleared for the second—”
“And what’s wrong with that?”
“What’s wrong with it is that Efridis didn’t need them cleared. She already had a potential avatar in the room with Aiden, and she knew that.”
“Dory, what are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about the night a couple weeks ago, when she and ?subrand came here to warn us about Aeslinn’s attack on the Senate. They kidnapped the kids so I’d listen to what they had to say, and Efridis was actually holding Stinky when I got here. So she knows he lives here, and since she had plenty of time to look around before I showed up, she probably knows he shares a room with Aiden.”
Claire was looking seriously skeeved out. Probably at the reminder of her safe place being violated by the two people she hated most in the world. And of ?subrand actually having his hands on Aiden, which, yeah.
But she got it together quickly.
“So they were here. What difference does—” She suddenly stopped, because Claire is not slow.
“It makes a difference,” I told her, “because Efridis could have used Stinky instead. He was in the room with Aiden already, and while he’s small, he’s strong—all the Dark Fey are. Yet instead of taking over the kid lying a few feet away, she went all the way to the basement for an avatar, one who fought her viciously the whole trip, and came close to giving everything away. Why?”
Claire didn’t say anything, although her jaw had a mulish set to it that I knew only too well. But she also hadn’t walked away. She was listening.
I held up another finger.
“Two. The rune. If the attacker was Efridis, and she thought she was stabbing Aiden, she’d have had Ymsi remove the rune first. You told me yourself: it’s her family heirloom. She knows how it works. She couldn’t take it off when she and ?subrand were here, because he’d already decided that his honor wouldn’t allow him to kill a child—”
Claire scowled. “Or he’s afraid it would damage his reputation as the great, purebred hope!”
“Maybe. But whatever the cause, he didn’t allow it. He was holding Aiden when I showed up; Efridis was holding Stinky. He didn’t trust her enough to let her touch him, even then, when they badly wanted our help, because he knew she could remove the rune. Yet, after going through so much trouble to get back in here, without her son this time, she still doesn’t remove it? When she knows Aiden would survive any attack as long as it stayed on his person?”
Claire shook her head. “She was nervous. She thought Soini was the only vargr here. She didn’t expect you—Dorina, I mean.”
“No, she didn’t. But I’d think somebody thousands of years old could handle a few surprises. And Dorina and I didn’t start chasing her until after the child was stabbed. Yet, Efridis still didn’t remove the rune, despite having time. And despite the fact that not doing so rendered the whole trip useless.”
Claire frowned some more.
I held up a third finger. “Three. She didn’t stab Aiden.”
The frown deepened. “You know damned well—”
“That trolls have lousy eyesight. And that the room was dark. And that Efridis wasn’t supposed to know the troll kid was in there, because he only arrived that afternoon. And Stinky was snoring up a storm, as usual, so the nonsnoring kid had to be Aiden, right?”
“Yes!”
I ate some more omelet. It was cold, but still good. I swallowed.
“What about smell?”
Claire blinked. “What?”
“Trolls are used to living in darkness. Those caves that some of them call home are pitch-black, much worse than a bedroom with streetlight sifting in. Yet they navigate them just fine.”
Claire crossed her arms at me. “I had doctored him. Bulsi, I mean, or whatever we’re calling him. I wanted to make sure he didn’t get an infection, since he still had open wounds. So the room reeked of medicine. Maybe Ymsi got confused.”
I stuffed down some toast. “Wouldn’t have mattered. Dorina woke up at the consul’s in an unfamiliar room, and she knew exactly who had been in there—going back hours—what they were and how long they’d stayed, as sure as if she’d watched a film of it. And one of them smelled of medicine, too.”
“Dorina is a first-level master. Ymsi is not!”
I shrugged. “So put a bunch of people in the basement and turn off the lights. Then send Ymsi in, and ask him who was there when he comes out. I’ll bet money he can tell you.”
Claire didn’t say anything, so I worked on finishing up the omelet and toast and fresh fruit and coffee she’d brought me. And was still hungry when I had, because my stomach thinks it’s fey. But at least I managed to clean the plate before Claire spoke again.
“Okay, now I’ve got a point.”