Don't Grow Fond of Her

"I mean it. If it isn't you, every last one of them will die like a dog in the marquis's hands."

Elliot's brow knotted hard. Fredrick, pitched steeply into the back seat, dropped his voice to a murmur.

"The marquis will never give that child up. If he can't find her in Fala, he'll send men to Ron, to Köbel—anywhere a foot can reach. And when he finds the child at last, he'll kill whoever was decent enough to look after that poor thing, and neither mouse nor bird will know of it."

"......"

"But he can't kill you. Elliot Olivier, the Blue Meteor, is Fala's hero. The whole world is watching."

Unease crossed Elliot's face.

"If I'm to get that child all the way clear of the marquis, I need time as well. This came on so suddenly that I haven't prepared a thing."

Fredrick's lips barely moved.

"A season, if it's short. Half a year at the longest."

"......"

"Elliot. If nothing else, think of a poor child abused for a whole life, and lend me your strength."

Fredrick's eyes held a gravity Elliot had never seen in them, as though this were the work of his entire life.

Elliot, who had sat silent and unsettled, let out a low sigh.

"......I wasn't meant to go to church that day."

"Church? Why bring that up now?"

"Because if I hadn't, you wouldn't be in my life."

Fredrick let out a short, incredulous breath of laughter.

"You're saying you regret making friends with me?"

"Did it not sound that way?"

"Live as long as I have, and I never thought I'd hear that from you......"

"You're letting your imagination run away with you."

"Oh, is that so."

Fredrick raised his voice, openly baffled.

"Wake up. You think your father and mine are some ordinary acquaintance? Even if you hadn't come to church that day, we were bound to meet. It was fate."

At that Elliot jerked his head aside, irritation plain on his face. His mouth kept twisting, as if he were swallowing the refusal that had climbed to the back of his throat, but the words never came—the ones that would have told Fredrick to find someone else.

Only then did Fredrick loose a deep sigh of relief and smile as if it pained him.

"So you'll do as I asked?"

Elliot shut his eyes, as though he couldn't bear the sight of him.

"Thank you. If it weren't you, this would have gone badly."

Plainly relieved, Fredrick pressed the back of his hand to his brow.

Elliot's lips, which had been parting, closed at last. A melancholy light crept into the green eyes fixed wordlessly on the dark beyond the window.

The car tore through the night for a long while.

By the time even the streetlamps streaking past the glass had grown few and far between, the automobile slipped onto a side road, dropped beneath a low bridge, and eased to a stop. Elliot opened his eyes a narrow slit and gazed out past the windshield, where the headlights cut the black.

Under the bridge there was only the endless sound of rain. In that smothered dark a shabby automobile sat parked.

"That driver will take the two of you as far as Dallas."

Fredrick's fingertip indicated the man waiting quietly beside the battered car.

"In Dallas, take the train. You'll have to change once, at Solimus."

"A full day, then."

"The connection at Solimus is a night train anyway. The tickets are ready."

A fairly weighty envelope passed into the back seat.

"All third class. Mixing in with everyone else seemed the safest. It won't be comfortable, but bear with it a little."

"I don't mind. I don't know about the child."

"Mm. It'll be all right. Probably."

Fredrick shook his head, not sounding convinced in the least.

"There's an emergency contact list in there, and forged papers for the child. Learn them before you arrive. Your father's line has died out, so I had no choice but to make the child kin on your mother's side—but Winsmore is your mother's home as well. Conduct yourself so it doesn't come out."

"......Until now I thought my mother's people were gone too."

"Fortunately, a few remain."

Elliot could not see what was fortunate about it. He only laughed, emptily.

"Come to think of it, I don't even know the name."

"Whose?"

"Whose do you think. The child I'll be looking after."

Fredrick shrugged and tipped his chin toward the parked car.

"Go and ask."

Elliot opened the door at once and stepped out.

Rain, and a night far gone. The cold before dawn was no small thing, as if the winter that had already withdrawn had come surging back. He turned up his coat collar and climbed into the shabby automobile at a quick stride. He traded a nod with the driver, then turned and let his eyes rest, quietly, on the figure beside him.

The child was small enough that Fredrick's word was no exaggeration.

Perhaps it was only the raincoat, drawn up over the nose and far too dark. Whatever the cause, the frame was slight enough to be taken for a young boy—and to Elliot, who for years had lived shoulder to shoulder with hardened soldiers, that smallness was strange past bearing. Someone with whom he would have to share days he could not see the end of.

He forced down the discomfort rising in his throat. Finding a way through whatever stood immediately before him was a thing he knew to the point of sickness. He had lived that way until now, and he had survived that way.

"......Hello."

The green eyes narrowed on instinct, taking the measure of the other.

"I'm Elliot Olivier."

The figure that had sat unmoving beneath the raincoat stirred at last, faintly. Slowly—very slowly—the head turned. A low breath. The dry rustle of raincoat against raincoat. Headlight, sunk deep into the rear of the car, gradually found the face.

The first thing his gaze caught was faded silver hair spilling from between the folds of the coat. It lingered a moment on that uncommon color, then lifted. Indifferent, it traveled a delicate line of jaw, a full mouth—and stopped all at once, as if nailed there.

Blue eyes that seized a look in a single instant.

Facing that wan face, Elliot only breathed. His heart seemed to buck wildly, and in the next heartbeat the blood seemed to rush to the crown of his head. The feeling would not be caught or named, and that alone was enough to anger him.

Knock, knock.

At the sudden rap he started and looked back. Beyond the glass, Fredrick was waving, insufferably pleased with himself. Elliot hauled the window down.

"Are you joking right now?"

"Hardly."

"What do you think you're doing? That child—"

He forced the anger down and whispered through his teeth.

"It's a girl."

"Well...... I never said it was a boy."

Shameless, Fredrick offered an excuse that was worse than thin. When Elliot, fury surging, made to fling himself out of the car, Fredrick rapped the glass and signaled the driver to go.

"I'll take the anger and the irritation both, later. So do this for me, friend."

"Fredrick!"

"And don't grow fond of her, if you can help it."

Elliot clenched his teeth and glared, eyes burning. Fredrick, who had only been smiling at his ease, suddenly slid a look in through the gap of the window.

"And I'll add this, just in case."

The black eyes curved, picturesque.

"Touch so much as a single hair, and I will not let it pass."

In the moment Elliot lost his words, the automobile began to creep forward. Clear of the bridge, rain hammered loud against the roof. Far off, Fredrick's lightly waving hand sank little by little into the thick mist of rain.

Why?

Feeling the cold air leak through the gap, Elliot slowly rolled the window up.

His thoughts, caught in the confusion, were a tangle. Fredrick coming for him in the dead of night. Driving after him through the rain. Leaving Castleleigh so suddenly. All of it wavered like a dream.

"I'm Anna."

Elliot blinked, and turned his head with a creak. An unfamiliar girl was looking at him, steady and unblinking.

"My name. I'm Anna."

The face trembling in the headlight was pale, and startlingly clear. Without any particular feeling, Elliot only stared at that unfamiliar face, blankly, as if an answer might appear if he only kept looking.

And so, once more, the night that would not sleep only grew deeper.