Fury Axtar sipped delicately from her tea. “Exquisite.”
Pleasure and happiness quietly radiated from her friend, and Bryce smiled. “What are you drinking?”
“Chai with almond milk. It’s good. Spicy.”
“You’ve never been here?”
“Do I look like the kind of person who goes to tea bars?”
“Yes …？”
Fury laughed, her dark hair swaying. She wore her usual head-to-toe black, despite the heat. “Fair enough. So, what’s this urgent thing you need to talk to me about?”
Bryce waited until she’d ordered her matcha latte with oat milk before murmuring, “It’s about Danika.” She and Hunt might need to talk things over regarding Emile, but speaking about this with Fury wasn’t a step toward anything, necessarily. She could learn the truth without being dragged into Ophion’s orbit, right?
At this hour, only the barista and one other patron occupied the bar. The street was empty save for a few cats picking through piles of trash. Safe enough to talk without being overheard.
Fury kept her posture casual, uninterested. “Does it have to do with Ithan staying with you?”
“How did you even hear about that?” Fury smiled smugly, but Bryce shook her head. “Never mind. But no, that’s separate.”
“He’s always had a thing for you, you know.”
“Um, Ithan had a thing for Nathalie.”
“Sure.”
“Whatever.” How to phrase any of this? “You knew about Danika and the synth stuff. I was wondering if there was anything else you might have been … keeping secret for her.”
Fury sipped her chai. “Care to explain more?” Bryce made a face. “That wasn’t really a request,” Fury said, her voice lethally soft.
Bryce swallowed. And so quietly only Fury could hear, she told her about Sofie Renast and Tharion and the River Queen and the hunt to find Emile and all the power he possessed. About the abandoned boat in the marshes and Ophion hunting for the boy as well. About the potential meet-up location that Danika had hinted at three years ago and the vague mentions of Project Thurr and Dusk’s Truth in those emails between Danika and Sofie.
When she’d finished, Fury drained her drink and said, “I’m going to need something a lot stronger than chai.”
“I’ve been reeling since Tharion told me,” Bryce admitted, voice still low. “But Danika and Sofie definitely knew each other. Well enough for Sofie to trust Danika to find her a potential place to hide, should she ever need one.”
Fury drummed her fingers on the counter. “I believe you. But Danika never hinted at involvement with the rebels, and I never picked it up on my usual channels.”
Bryce nearly sagged with relief. Maybe it hadn’t gone too far, then. Maybe their acquaintance hadn’t been related to Ophion at all. “Do you think the meeting location is the Bone Quarter?” She prayed it wasn’t.
“Danika wouldn’t have sent a kid there, even with thunderbird power in his veins. And she wouldn’t be so stupid as to make it that obvious.”
Bryce frowned. “Yeah. True.”
“As for Dusk’s Truth and Project Thurr …” Fury shrugged. “No idea. But Danika was always interested in weird, random shit. She could spend hours getting sucked into an interweb research hole.”
Bryce smiled slightly. Also true. “But do you think Danika might have been keeping anything else a secret?”
Fury seemed to consider. Then said, “The only other secret I knew about Danika was that she was a bloodhound.”
Bryce straightened. “A what?”
Fury signaled the barista for another chai. “A bloodhound—she could scent bloodlines, the secrets in them.”
“I knew Danika had an intense sense of smell,” Bryce acknowledged. “But I didn’t realize it was that …” She trailed off, memory surfacing. “When she came home with me over winter break freshman year, she could pick out the family ties of everyone in Nidaros. I thought it was a wolf thing. It’s special?”
“I only know about it because she confronted me when we first met. She scented me, and wanted to understand.” Fury’s eyes darkened. “We sorted our shit out, but Danika knew something dangerous about me, and I knew something dangerous about her.”
It was as much as Fury had ever said about being … whatever she was.
“Why is it dangerous to be a bloodhound?”
“Because people will pay highly to use the gift and to kill anyone with it. Imagine being able to tell someone’s true lineage—especially if that person is a politician or some royal whose parentage is in question. Apparently, the gift came from her sire’s line.”