There was a squeezing feeling in her throat, and her feet were bumbling over the uneven ground with shock. Orion reached out for her, but she threw his hands off blindly. Undeterred, Orion reached for her again and clamped a hand over her mouth when he’d captured her. “Take it easy! It’s not what you think,” he hissed in her ear. He led them both away from the house, and as far back across the top of the promontory as he dared without shoving them both off the cliff before he continued. “Daphne helps my father handle my mother when she has one of her spells. She must have had one tonight, probably because my dad has to go to the meeting of the Houses. My mom hates all the Houses, even her own.” He paused in the middle of his rushed explanation, looking to see if Helen was keeping up. “There was a Scion war before we were born,” he said. Still muffled behind Orion’s hand, Helen relaxed her muscles and nodded, both in answer to his tacit question about the war and to let him know that she wasn’t going to barge into the house or start yelling.
