Did her father even care that she was imprisoned here, dressed in an odd tunic of bedsheets? Clearly not, except to take advantage of the leverage that provided. She had to finally face the reality that her own father was her enemy, and act accordingly. Which meant using everything she knew about him against him. Putting on a disdainful tone, playing spoilt Elal princess, she waved off the possibility of an arcanium. “If there ever was an arcanium, Lord Phel doesn’t know where it is. And I doubt he’d know how to use one—or have the wit to know what it was—if he managed to find it. I can’t see that happening, as the manse is a disaster. Most of it sank long ago. The parts that are above water are dilapidated and moldering. If there was a tower, it rotted away with the last of the old family.”

Her father frowned. “I have reports that the manse has been at least partially restored.”

Aha! He didn’t know everything. Careless of him to let slip his incomplete knowledge. Nic shook her head, feigning contempt and flopped herself down in a chair as if exhausted. “Phel drained me dry trying to restore that lost cause. It doesn’t help that he has no idea how to use magic.” She rolled her eyes, looking to both men for sympathy, grimly pleased when they nodded eagerly. So keen to believe in Gabriel’s incompetence. “You’re so right that it’s probably that’s why he botched the bonding, too. Maybe if he’d been able to use an arcanium, it would’ve helped.”

Her father watched her closely, not entirely convinced. “Think! Are you sure you have no idea where it could be hidden? I have records that clearly indicate the presence of an arcanium. Indestructible, an arcanium constructed with the lost arts of the ancients, one like no other.”

Nic looked as innocent and befuddled as she could, though that might be a hard sell. Still, her father seemed willing to believe his sharp-witted former heir had lost the mind he’d once praised when she failed to manifest with wizard abilities. “Records?” she repeated. “How would you have access to records about another house’s arcanium?”

It was a really good question, given that wizards and their houses guarded the locations of and access to their arcaniums zealously. She supposed all information leaked. After all, she knew the location of the House Elal arcanium, though not how to enter it.

Her father looked smug rather than defensive. “Even after all that time under my tutelage, you still don’t understand that I have ways of uncovering information. Knowledge is power, pet. And there’s a reason I’m the most powerful wizard in the Convocation.”

“My father would disagree,” Sergio put in defensively.

Lord Elal eyed him with pity. “If Lord Sammael is so powerful, why am I in his house without his knowledge, conspiring with his son and heir to have him ousted and replaced?”

Sergio subsided, having no argument to that. But when Lord Elal turned his back, Sergio sent him a fuming glare. Nic filed that away as potentially useful. It was easy to dismiss Sergio as weak-willed and petulant. She certainly had, not without reason, but she was also surprised that Sergio had been bold enough to rebel against his father. He was sneaky, which bore remembering.