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“Oh no. I’m so sorry.” She reached out her hand and laid it on his arm. “My sympathies, Cyrus.”

He nodded. “My thanks, but it wasn’t anyone I knew. Just an unfortunate and rather unpleasant incident.”

“Someone was killed.”

He raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t say that.”

“You didn’t have to. I could see it in your eyes.”

“Well...” He fought for composure, slightly stunned at her words. “Well, yes. It was indeed a murder.” He sighed. “We’ve had too many of those recently.”

“Are the authorities looking into it?”

Cyrus shook his head. “My dear girl, there are no authorities to speak of in the Gloamtide.”

“The Gloamtide?” She blinked.

“That’s where I help out when I can, yes.” He straightened and looked at her. “Does that disgust you?”

“Great coggles, no.” She frowned at him. “That’s an insulting question.”

“Forgive me, Maelin.” He touched her hand again, then gave in to an impulse and folded it in his. To his delight she let their fingers intertwine. “There are so many facets to Caelemar. Some are less pleasant than others.”

“You aren’t telling me anything I didn’t know, Cyrus. My time at the Tidehold Conservatory was illuminating in many ways, and not all of them shining or wonderful.”

“I would love to hear about that sometime,” he answered. “It must have been fascinating.”

“I did have some quite amazing experiences while I was there, I’ll admit.”

Her grin intrigued him. “I’d like to hear about those.”

“Unfortunately, they’re not for public review, so at the moment I’m not at liberty to discuss them. But sometime in the future, I hope I can share them.”

“Well, I hope that I will be lucky enough be the first.”

“This wine is delicious,” she changed the subject. “An excellent choice.”

She reached for her glass, and Cyrus let go of her other hand. He watched and then carefully reached out with one pointed finger. “This sigil, Maelin. It’s your whisperseal?”

She nodded. “It is. It’s based on the Theryn sigil. A small wave of white on a blue ocean. We have a variety of ways to display it.” She chuckled. “It’s even in the tiles on the floor of the conservatory at Theryn House. A bit overdramatic, in my opinion, but still very pretty.”

Cyrus reached in his pocket. “So it would look rather like this?”

He held out the small pin, shaped like a wave. It was clean, there were no traces of the blood that had surrounded it amidst the remains last night.

Maelin’s eyes narrowed as she looked at the pin, and then at Cyrus. “Yes, that’s the Theryn sigil. It couldn’t be anything else, I don’t think, even though it’s all blue. Where did you find it?”

He took a breath. “I found it in the middle of what was left of a Velvet House shifter. Last night.”

*~~*~~*

Maelin fought for control as the import of his words sank home, and she managed to school her features enough, she hoped, that he wouldn’t know what a shock those words had brought with them.

“I think you’re going to have to explain that, Cyrus,” she said quietly. “But perhaps not here...”

He began to nod, then frowned and swore softly, raising his wrist and glancing at the Whisperseal message that had flashed up.

She couldn’t see it this time, but her spine straightened, and she focussed on his face. It told the story quite clearly.