Wine.

I sat before a glass, tracing my finger around its rim, lost in thought. The smell rose sweet and coy and heartbreaking, because even as I sipped all I could think of was her. And her victims.

My papa. My teacher. My friend.

Papa and Falrung felled together - it must have been the wine, the wine I poured for them in the brass tankard. Poisoned. Sirius, sweet, silly Sirius murdered because he got too close to the truth. I swirled the wine, never drinking, only watching it gleam and ripple. The letter-opener I'd cut my finger on as a child was a weapon, a weapon of an assassin with my mother's face, who knows how many lives she took with it? My own poisons - brewed in the safety of the university, for testing, for research. All I ever saw die was rats, but when they left our hands - how many innocent lives have they ended?

It made me sick at heart, a sickness I couldn't cure. I grimaced, raising the glass and peering through it, a shiver creeping up my back.

"You'd better drink that, you know. That's Vicente's good wine."

I jerked in surprise, sloshing the wine on the table and cursing. A giggle followed Antoinetta as she sat beside me.

"Oh, he'll be furious if he finds out you spilled some. Anyway, you should have something to eat." She smiled brightly, presenting a basket of bread, still steaming. "I made this, you know. I love to cook. And don't tell Vicente, but there's garlic in it."

"Um. Thanks." Hesitantly I took a piece, wincing as I burned my fingers but grateful for something to eat. I chewed slowly, carefully watching her out of the corner of my eye.

"Good, isn't it? Everyone loves my cooking. Well, except for him." She pointed her delicate chin at the wine, as though it were to blame. "I don't know why he's being so damn nice to you all of a sudden. He said to treat you like one of us."

"...He did." A flick of my fingers and the spill was gone, but the scent lingered. I pushed the glass away. "... I didn't know. I don't know why, either."

"He won't even let me drink his good wine." She pouted, snatching a hunk of bread for herself and sighing. "And I've been here for years. So you must be special. Who are you, again?"

Special. Daughter of a dead man and a murderer, ex-lover of a necromancer, guest of a band of assassins. I gave a harsh laugh. "Nobody. But you can call me Dust."

"That's a weird name. Suits you, though. Look, if you aren't drinking that, I will." She sipped, then frowned, watching me. "You're an alchemist?"

"Yes."

"Wait." Antoinetta flushed, grinning ear to ear before fumbling with a pouch on her side. "I don't believe it - you made this, didn't you? Dust's J'adore aphrodisiac?" I blanched, pursing my lips as she brandished a rose-coloured vial.

J'adore. Bolor must have named it that, before he attacked me - before he left. Love. My belly lurched. "...Yes."

She cackled, a bell of a laugh almost to pleasant to be mocking. "You. You made this, of all people. By Sithis!"

I scoffed, half-heartedly praying. Mara, mother of mercy, get me the out of here.

"I've used it in a contract, even. Poor bastard was still horny when I slit his throat!"

Mara, if you have any goddamn mercy, you will strike me dead now.

"Could you make some? We have a little alchemy laboratory here, and I could so use another batch. Please? Pretty please?"

...If I ever get back to a chapel, I'm throwing dead slaughterfish through the windows.

"Antoinetta, that is quite enough."

"Oh, damn it." I clutched my head as she spoke. "Now look, you've got me in trouble. I'm not doing anything wrong, Telaendril, I just want - "

"You have a mess to clean up in the kitchen. Vicente can still smell the garlic." I glanced up to see the Bosmer - Telaendril, usher Antoinetta away, giving an exasperated sigh before turning back to me. "You are Dust, yes?"

Slowly, I nodded.

"My apologies. Vicente explained the situation to me." She gazed at me with heavy-lidded eyes. "Abelle - your mother - will arrive with Lucien very soon."

Mother. I held the word against my teeth, almost able to taste what it had once meant. "...Thank you."

"I suppose I should have known." She smiled almost sweetly, tilting her head and gazing at me with something a little too close to familiarity. "You look like her."

I hoped I gave no sign of disgust. "...So you knew her."

"Vicente, the Speaker and I, we all did. She was very dear to us." She laughed softly. "When she left, we missed her terribly. She was part of the family, after all."

Something boiled in me, seething and painful. I hissed, spitting and blinking back sudden, stinging tears. "But she didn't rip your family apart."

The echo of a door, and footsteps. Telaendril glanced beyond, then looked back at me with a twisted frown. "That will be her. Are you going?"

What choice did I have? I stood, slowly making my way to the doors, every step pounding in my head. No thought - there was nothing to think of. For once in my life, there was a mystery I could not solve, a tangle I could not unravel.

Maman, a murderer. A paradox that made my head spin.

The door creaked under my weight, and I blinked blearily under the brighter lights of the commons. Some desperate part of me clung to hope. Don't let it be her. Let it be a mistake. I don't care if I die, let this...

The world moved slowly, as though made of liquid, rippling. Lucien stood at the entrance, head held high, catching my gaze for an instant before I tore it away. And at his side.

Her hair spun tight in a bun, ink black as it had always been. Eyes bright and lips pursed, jewels hanging from her ears and a hand to her lips. The hands that rocked my to sleep and choked the life out of innocents, the hands that stroked my hair and killed my father. Something clambered up my throat, a single word bitter-sweet and ragged sharp tumbling from my lips.

"Mum."