James’s amusement had gone. There was a little roughness in his voice when he said, “So I am the one who cares the most, is that it?”

“You have a great power of caring in you,” Cordelia said, and for a moment, it was a relief to say those words, to say what she had always thought about James. Even when she had watched him loving Grace, and felt the pain of it, she had thought, too, of what it would mean to be loved by someone with such a capacity for loving. “It is your strength.”

James looked away.

“Is something wrong?” she asked.

“That night at Battersea Bridge,” he said. They had reached Cordelia’s house but remained on the pavement, in the shadow of a beech tree. “Grace asked me if I would run away with her. Cut my ties with my family, marry her in Scotland, and start over as mundanes.”

“But—but your parents, and Lucie—” Cordelia’s thoughts went immediately to her friend. How shattered Lucie would have been to lose her brother like that. As if he had died, but worse almost, because he would have chosen to have left them.

“Yes,” said James. “And my parabatai. All my friends.” His tiger eyes glittered in the dark. “I refused. I failed her. I failed to love as I should have. I am not sure caring could be my strength.”

“That was not love she asked for,” said Cordelia, suddenly furious. “That is not love. That is a test. And love should not be tested like that.” She paused. “I am sorry,” she said. “I should not—I cannot understand Grace, so I should not judge her. But surely that is not the reason your understanding has ended?”

“I am not sure I do know the real reason,” James said, locking his hands behind his back. “But I know it is final. She took back her bracelet. And she is marrying Charles.”

Cordelia froze. She must have heard wrong. “Charles?”

“Matthew’s older brother,” said James, looking surprised, as if he thought perhaps she had forgotten.

“No,” Cordelia breathed. “She cannot. They cannot.”

Somehow James was still explaining, saying something about Ariadne, about engagements being called off, but Cordelia’s mind was full of Alastair. Alastair and Charles in the library—Alastair in agony over Charles’s engagement. Alastair saying that at least it was Ariadne—he could not possibly have known of this.

Oh, Alastair.

“Are you all right?” James took a step toward her, his expression worried. “You look very pale.”

I ought to go home, she was about to say. James had moved closer to her; she could smell the scent of him, of sandalwood soap and a mixture of leather and ink. She felt the brush of his hand against her cheek, his thumb softly tracing her cheekbone.