She felt a small surge of outrage and tried to ride it into something larger and more determined, but it dwindled and flickered out again, leaving her feeling . . .
Why on earth should she submit to an outdated, rigidly traditional obligation? It wasn’t as though she and her father enjoyed any particular privileges. She hadn’t asked to be born to the lineage of some overachieving, bloodthirsty Fleet admiral, no matter how respected a role he played in the history of Spire Albion. They lived no better than anyone else in Habble Morning. She and her father were the only remaining members of the Tagwynn line, for goodness’ sake, and it wasn’t as though they were running out buying new ethersilk outfits every other week. Her family wasn’t one of the High Houses, except in a fussy technical sense.
She’d rather starve-to death, if necessary-than eat that ridiculous rubbery chum that Camden’s Vattery produced. Or at least eat inferior meat, she supposed. Without someone to tend them, people would starve. Her father’s vats provided the finest meats in all of Habble Morning, after all. She was perfectly happy doing exactly what she’d done ever since she was a small child. She heard the doors to the chambers shut, leaving her with the quietly gurgling vats and the faint glow of a few scattered secondhand lumin crystals. And then I want you to come out, please.” Her father’s voice, gentle and deep, came again. She leaned her head against the cold, reassuring solidity of the cinderstone wall and closed her eyes. The rows and rows of vats scattered the sound of his voice, sending it bouncing around the chamber. “Bridget, are you back here? It’s time.”īridget hugged herself harder and pushed a little farther back into the corner. “Bridget?” called her father’s deep voice from the entrance of the chamber. She noticed only when she paused to think about it: She’d lived too much of her life in this room for it to be truly uncomfortable. She wedged her back against the corner and held her knees up close to her chest. Spire Albion, Habble Morning, Tagwynn Vatteryīridget sat in the dim vaults of the vattery, back in the shadowy corner where the cracked old vat had been removed.
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