The look he gave her was resolute and sober. “To visit with Montpierre.”

Weysh had to hold back a grimace upon entering his parents’ bedroom. Montpierre was sitting up in bed, supported by a pillow. His face was pale, marked by blue-black shadows under his eyes, and the white duvet covering him was speckled with flecks of blood. On the left-side night table a stick of incense sent wispy trails of smoke into the air, and Weysh knew that if he could smell, his nostrils would be clogged with the herbish bite of cam-cam weed.

Montpierre’s eyes went wide when he spotted Weysh, then narrowed.

“Do you not knock before entering a room?” Montpierre rasped. “I was under the impression that your Given was engendering within you some much-needed civility, but apparently I was wrong.”

Weysh met Montpierre’s eyes boldly, refusing to be cowed, and for the first time in his life he saw something in the man’s face he’d never seen before. Perhaps it had always been there, and it was Weysh’s own brush with tragedy—his fears of a future with no sense of smell—that finally allowed him to see the stark reality. Behind that rage-filled glare was raw, agonizing terror.

Weysh felt slim fingers close around his wrist. “Now is not the time, my heart,” said his maman, trying to tug him away. But Weysh stood firm, his eyes never leaving Montpierre’s.

“Why are you just standing there, staring like a lackwit?” Montpierre barked, and though such disrespect normally caused Weysh’s blood to rise, today it provoked only pity, because Weysh knew instinctively that the terror eating Montpierre alive was not directed at him. It was far too sinister for that. It was the terror of a man about to lose everything he’d ever worked to build, and everyone he’d ever deigned to love.

“Weysh!” his mother said firmly, tugging him again. But he put a hand over hers and turned to her.

“It’s all right, Maman,” he said softly. “I’m not here to cause trouble.” He focused once more on his stepfather. “Montpierre, I only wanted to say this: whatever may happen, Maman and Sylvie can always count on me for protection and support. I would never abandon my family. So, on that front, at least, you have nothing to fear.”

That gave Montpierre pause. The tension fled him, leaving him sagging against his pillow. “You had better not,” he grunted.

Weysh crossed his arms. “Maman told me everything,” he said to Montpierre. “I know now why you hate me.”

“Montpierre doesn’t hate you, lovely—”

“Yes, I do.”