Page 20 of Song of the Abyss
Her mouth dropped open as another painting fell onto the floor, she assumed because her father had knocked again. Right, she couldn’t stand there looking at what was quite possibly the most amazing thing she’d ever seen in her life. She had to take care of her father.
Whining, she could feel her throat vibrate with the sound. Tucking her shawl around her shoulders, she lunged for Bitsy’s box. She took the wiggling droid out and forced it to wrap around her head. Messages flew so fast she almost couldn’t read them.
“Your father. Anya. More danger! We are in trouble!”
“I know, I know,” she muttered, closing the box and then rushing for the bathroom. She didn’t have a door for the damn thing. Her father said it was just in case she slipped and fell in the bathroom and someone had to save her. She knew the thin beaded curtain was only there to give her a semblance of privacy, though.
Yanking it shut, she turned toward the door and took a deep breath.
Acting. She could act like nothing was happening and there wasn’t an undine in her bathroom. As long as her father didn’t look between the beads, he might think everything was okay.
Other than the wetsuit she was wearing underneath her dress. Because that was... normal.
Breathing in a slow and steady breath, she answered her door.
Bitsy had two columns of text flying by her eyes. One was what her father was saying, although she could easily read his lips. Anya was so familiar with him, she didn’t need to be wearing Bitsy at all.
“What took you so long to answer your door, girl?” Her father’s eyes swept up and down her body. “And what the hell are you wearing?”
Meanwhile, Bitsy had added, “He knows! He knows something’s wrong!”
She didn’t have a second to mutter that her father had no idea what was happening. Even if the meddlesome man did sweep into her room like he knew she had an undine in her bath.
He didn’t. He couldn’t. Bitsy was very good at dismantling the cameras, and besides, who would dare watch the General’s daughter bathe? No one knew there was an undine in her room.
Not even the man with all the eyes and ears of the city at his disposal.
Her father’s gaze swept over her room before landing on her. She was always shocked by how old he appeared these days. With his bent spine and wrinkled features, he hardly looked like himself at all anymore. She’d even asked recently if he was feeling okay, but that hadn’t gone over well at all. He’d yelled at her for the better part of ten minutes, even if she couldn’t hear him.
Even though he was turned away from her, Bitsy still ran his words over her lens.
“I’m sure you’ve heard about the security reports lately.”
“I have.” She tried to move so she could see his lips, but her father knew what she was doing. He didn’t like that she analyzed his face, his words. He didn’t like her looking at him at all, really. Which made this all that much more difficult.
“Your security detail is going to be tripled. I want nothing threatening your safety, do you understand?” He turned toward her then, the false worry on his face almost comical. “We can’t have the songbird of Alpha getting harmed, can we? Not after the last... mishap.”
Because that’s all his worry ever was. His image. His city. They couldn’t trust a man who didn’t even keep his own daughter safe. Let alone have her injured twice. And if he didn’t know how to take care of his children, then he certainly couldn’t take care of them.
An image. That’s all this was about. And that meant she had to play her part.
If that didn’t cut right through her heart, she didn’t know what would.
Sighing, she nodded. “I’ll stay in my area of the city then.”
“You’ll stay in your room until we’ve caught this monster. Once it’s dead, then we can talk about letting you out again.” He reached for a lock of her hair, gently twisting it between his fingers. “My greatest creation. It’s such a shame you listen as poorly as your mother.”
What was she supposed to say to that?
Her mother was apparently a paragon in this city. Everyone always told her how much Anya looked like her mother. How everyone had always loved her mother. That if only she was a little more graceful, she’d have been the spitting image of the woman that had made all of Alpha fall in love.
But her father? He hated the mere mention of the woman. If anyone even brought her up in front of the General, he lost his mind. He grew red in the face and that vein on his forehead popped out far more than usual.
Anya didn’t even know her mother’s name. It was like he had scratched it from the history books and terrified anyone who thought to maybe mention her name to her daughter. Not that her father ever went by ‘Jonathon’. He went by ‘General’. That’s the only thing that anyone ever called him.
She stood there, letting him tug on the lock of her hair before he started back to the door. His words flashed in front of her eyes.
“Just try to be good for a few more weeks, would you? Can’t have anything happening to my daughter. The undines would tear such a little thing apart.”
