by Lish McBride
Val frowned. “What? We don’t need to pay a fine? Sign something? Why do we have to wait?”
The guard’s eyebrows rose, and he looked at Florencia, then the family, and back to Tevin’s mother. He laughed, a deep bass sound. “Of course you didn’t tell them.”
Tevin looked at his father. “What didn’t you tell us?”
Brouchard’s face was placid, though he tapped his foot, eager to be gone. “In order for your mother to be free, someone must take her place.”
Somehow Tevin knew without asking who it would be. “You’re trading me?”
Brouchard rolled his eyes. “We couldn’t very well leave your mother here, now, could we?”
Florencia’s gaze was hard. “The beast wouldn’t make a deal until she took a good look at you.” She scowled at Tevin’s rumpled appearance, her gaze lingering on the tears and the two missing buttons. “You couldn’t tidy yourself?” When Tevin went to argue, her scowl deepened. “You’d best hope she likes rumpled and scruffy. If she turns the deal down, I’ll have to offer something else.”
Tevin didn’t have to ask what she meant. He had to stop himself from pushing his brother and sister behind him. “You can count on me.”
“Such a good boy.” Florencia patted Tevin’s cheek through the bar. “Don’t kick up a fuss. We’ll handle everything.”
He hated the small part of him that gobbled up her scant praise. He glanced at Val.
“Then we’ll all wait for Lady Merit,” Val gritted through her teeth.
The guard shrugged and opened the cell, letting Brouchard in to sit with his wife. When no one else followed, he sighed, locked the cell, and opened up the second one for everyone else to use.
The guard grimaced at them, turning the key in the lock with a decisive click. “Welcome to Veritess Jail. We hope you enjoy your stay.”
Amaury shook his head. “Absolutely no gravity at all.”
CHAPTER 5
IT’S PRETTY, BUT WHAT DO I DO WITH IT?
The Cravans’ city home was a confection of wrought iron and red brick, nestled in a piece of land on the corner of a street lined with large oaks. Their parcel was large enough for stables and a decorative garden, while the house had enough rooms to host not only Merit and her mother, but several guests and the small flotilla of staff such a household required. Merit always stayed the night after one of her gatherings, keeping a suite of rooms on the second floor for her own use. The morning sun was bright, the day promising to be warm, when Merit joined her mother for breakfast at a table set out on the garden terrace.
Lady Zarla, baroness of Cravan and Merit’s mother, sat across from her at the exquisitely laid out table and slid the snowy linen napkin into her lap. Her rich ebony hair was swept up in a complicated knot, the whole thing kept in place by a thin silver netting interspersed with pearls. With her hair up, there was no missing the delicate tipping of her ears, or the way the deep brown of her eyes and hair set off the pearlescent sheen of her skin. Lady Zarla dressed for a day about town with the careful deliberation of a warrior choosing armor. Merit, conversely, had barely looked at the dress her maid had put out—a cotton day dress, cream-colored, with a lilac print.
“I wonder,” her mother said, pouring coffee into both of their cups, “if you’re ever going to stop being childish about this.”
Merit added cream and sugar to her coffee, pretending ignorance. “Childish?” Her relationship with her mother, always a little strained, had worsened after her curse. In Lady Zarla’s mind, Merit had failed by refusing to marry her betrothed. That refusal had led to her curse, and seeing Merit’s beastly shape only reminded her of the failure. On her end, Merit felt that her mother should have listened to her complaints about the betrothal in the first place. Which meant these weekly breakfasts were a frequent—if quiet—battleground.
Lady Zarla sipped coffee from the delicate china in her hand and raised one elegant brow. If someone were to apply one word to her mother, it was elegant. Lady Zarla embodied everything one expected from the fairyborn—grace, beauty, wealth, style—and she was not to be trifled with.
“If you had an issue with me showing up to breakfast as a beast, then perhaps you shouldn’t have let Godling Verity curse me.” Merit gave her a tight-lipped smile. As an opening salvo, it lacked subtlety. Merit had found that if she swung in, conversationally ham-fisted, it would escalate the argument faster and save them both time. She couldn’t avoid the fight, but she could at least make it more efficient by drawing first blood.
“One doesn’t say no to a godling, daughter.” Lady Zarla placed a bottle on the table, the brown glass making the contents look darker than they were. “Drink.”
The beast wanted to growl. She wanted to knock the table over, screeching until her mother had to cover her ears. The restraint it took to keep the beast in check made her movements slow and precise. She set her coffee down just so before taking the napkin from her lap and dabbing at each side of her fanged jaw. When the skin around her mother’s eyes tightened, the first warning sign that her patience, such as it was, had almost evaporated, Merit caved. She unstoppered the bottle and tossed the tonic into the back of her throat.
Tincture of Caen’s bloom tasted peppery, earthy, and unpleasantly biting, and its effects left her feeling like she had been pulled inside out through her own belly button. Merit’s horns receded, her tail disappeared, and her fur melted away to reveal a fine spray of freckles across her strong nose. Her fangs became white teeth, and when all was said and done, she was once again a young woman of seventeen, somewhere between awfully plain and almost pretty. She had her father’s stubborn chin, her mother’s wavy brown hair and pointed ears, but the almost overwhelming anger at this moment was a thing all her own.
“Was that so difficult?” Lady Zarla asked.
Merit ignored the question. “I’m here, as promised. And changed, as demanded.” She fished her father’s old pocket watch out of her dress pocket, making note of the time. She set the dial, which would sing a warning to her when her time was up. “You have me in human form for four hours, though in reality you only have me for breakfast. Tick tock.”
“Except I have more than breakfast now, don’t I?”
Now it was Merit’s turn to arch that single brow. “I’m not sure what you mean.” They both smiled politely as a young maid deposited a tray of scones onto the table along with sweet cream and artfully arranged berries. Merit’s stomach rumbled, and she helped herself to the offerings. She wasn’t so stubborn as to turn down a good meal.
“I spoke to Ellery.”
The words made Merit still, even though it wasn’t a surprise. Last night Merit had given the healer permission to share pertinent health details with her mother—but for some reason her mother having that knowledge made her feel naked. Vulnerable. “Oh?”
Her mother filled her own plate. “Your birthday approaches.”
Merit broke the still-warm scone in half. “That it does.”
“You can hardly go gallivanting back to the country now. So I have you for more than this morning. I have you for six weeks.” She would never smirk, considering the facial expression beneath her, but her satisfied smile flirted with smugness. “Have you given any thought to resolving your curse? You’ll not find anyone with the right qualifications skulking about the manor house.”
“I’ve thought of putting out an ad in the paper so they’ll come to me,” Merit said, silently marveling at how much easier it was to sip her coffee with human hands. “Prize heifer to the highest bidder. Fairyborn aristocracy only.”
“Really, Merit.” Lady Zarla stacked pounds of disapproval on only those two words. “This is hardly the time for sarcasm.”
“I disagree,” Merit said, sipping her coffee. “It’s the perfect time for sarcasm.”
“Six weeks, Merit.” Lady Zarla speared a piece of strawberry with her fork, then place
d the morsel daintily in her mouth. “That’s not a lot of time.”
After that, the curse became permanent. After that, she was a beast, mindless and snarling until her last breath. This hadn’t bothered her before, not really. Her birthday had seemed so far off, the repercussions nebulous and far away. But then she’d started having her episodes. Stretches of time where the beast took over and her mind went away. She could cope with the physicality of the curse, but she refused to let her mind—her self—slip away.
When Merit didn’t respond, a muscle in her mother’s temple began to twitch. “Someday, Merit, I will die. You will take over my barony. There’s no one else. No cousins or kin. It’s time you stopped this childish nonsense and started accepting your responsibilities.”
Merit dipped a piece of scone into the cream. “Have I shirked my duties? Learning how to govern our people? The land or the ledgers?”
Her mother ignored her. “Someday, sooner than you think, it will be your turn to rule.” Lady Zarla set her cup down firmly, her voice dry. “I’d like to dandle a few babes on my knee before I go to the summer lands, daughter.”
Merit choked on her scone.
“You will get married, my child. You will break your curse, and you will do your duty and create the next heir for the Cravan barony.”
Merit couldn’t help it—she pictured them. Fat-cheeked, brown-eyed babies with Jasper’s nose and mouth, their mother’s stubborn chin, and the diluted blood her mother had so despised. Oh, Merit had known for three years now that he was a fortune hunter. She wanted to forget. She’d been so foolish, and somehow part of her still loved him with an intensity that burned. Which made her feel even more the fool.
“You could have had that marriage, those babies.” Merit stared at her scone, no longer hungry, the old pain rising up and howling. She crushed the remaining scone with her fingers. “You chose the beast.”
“He was unsuitable.” Her mother’s face remained serene, but Merit knew those signs. Knew the pulse point of Lady Zarla’s anger. Good. We’ll see whose anger is bigger, mine or yours. Even though she hated herself, too, for still loving him. Hated herself for still wanting her mother to tell her that she was worth loving, instead of reminding her that the one boy who’d promised his heart had loved only her wealth. Not even all of it, either. A smart man would have held out for the marriage and taken it all. No, he’d been happy with a bag of coins, which made it all worse somehow.
“I loved him.” Merit said the words unthinkingly as she stared at the remaining crumbs of her scone. A treat lovingly constructed that had taken a sweet second to destroy.
“He was a fortune hunter!” Lady Zarla paused, smoothing the napkin in her lap with shaking fingers, reining in her temper.
“I chose him all the same.” Merit kept her own hands folded so her mother couldn’t see how tightly pressed they were, how white her knuckles. “And what does it matter? I choose either someone after my coin or someone after my blood. What’s the difference?”
“He never would have respected you, that’s the difference. Or understood you. How could he? You need someone of your own class. Someone you can build a relationship with rooted in common bonds, respect, and good breeding.” Lady Zarla’s eyes flashed. “Your conjecture is wasted breath. He chose the money and ran. Let the past fade, Merit.”
“How can I when the past has shaped my present?” She would not cry. Would not give in to that old, scarred pain, or let her mother win this piece of her. This battle was hers, even if she’d lost the war.
“You can decide how much it affects you,” Lady Zarla said, her chin up. “You’re a Cravan. We’re the ones who do the shaping, not the common clay.” Her lip curled. “For godling’s sake, Merit, the choice was you or the money, and he made his decision.”
Merit looked at her mother then. “And you made yours. I chose him, he chose coin, and you chose the beast. Everyone lost, and no one is happy.” She stood and threw down her napkin.
“Merit, sit down!”
Merit walked away, striding through the foyer and toward the front step where her carriage waited. She only had to keep it together until her carriage. Her mother’s voice followed her, not yelling, but carrying with authority. “You will wed, Merit. There isn’t a lot of time. Do not remain cursed simply to spite me.”
Merit paused, her eyes closing. She wanted to outstubborn her mother—oh, how she wanted to win. But she didn’t want to be a beast forever, not when it took her mind. She might have Caen’s bloom for now, but even that would stop working after her birthday. Merit dropped her chin. “Yes, Mother.”
“You will start making the rounds.” The voice came from close behind her, meaning her mother had followed her in. “Attending dances, clubs, and other social events where acceptable suitors are available. I will find you someone worthy of our house. I’ll make a list.”
You mean you will find an entitled, pompous ass, but one of proper lineage. She kept those words to herself. “Of course. What am I if not your dutiful heir and daughter?” Merit didn’t wait for a response, pushing open the front doors and stepping out into the sunshine.
She almost bumped right into the messenger.
The young lad looked at her skeptically. “This where the Beast of Cravan lives? Only, I got a message for her.”
“I’m the beast,” Merit said.
The boy was even more skeptical now. “You don’t look like one.”
“I’m only a beast in the afternoons. You have a message?”
“You’re to come to the jail. Guard says someone’s waiting for ya.”
“Thank you,” Merit said, handing him a copper. “If you go around to the back door, the cook will give you breakfast.” The boy took off for the back before Merit even finished speaking. She wished her own problems could be as easily fixed.
* * *
• • •
Merit stepped through the front doors of Veritess Jail, hailed the guard, and identified herself.
The man stood up from his chair. “It’s about the prisoner your people brought in. Florencia DuMont.”
Merit rubbed her temples. With everything else going on, she’d forgotten about the DuMont woman. She hadn’t decided what to do with her yet. “Ah, yes. The horrid woman who wanted to trade her child.” Exactly what today needed. She squared her shoulders. “What does she want?”
“Her family is here. The whole gaggle of them is in the back cell,” the man said.
“Gaggle?” Merit was beginning to wish she’d stayed and argued with her mother long enough to have a second cup of coffee. She was exhausted, and it wasn’t even lunchtime yet.
The guard pulled out his keys. “It’s best if I show you.” He led her down to the last cell. Merit pulled up short. There was a man with Florencia in her cell who looked like he’d stepped out of a painting—the romantic kind with lush colors and fat cherubs cavorting in disheveled bedding. From the way he was holding Florencia’s hand, Merit assumed it was her husband. They were talking softly to one another and pointedly ignoring the cell next to them. That cell held four younger people, three of whom were probably DuMonts. She wasn’t sure about the freckled young woman in the trousers.
The four occupants, oddly enough, weren’t the interesting part. Every other cell was clean but spare—wooden planks attached to the wall for sitting and sleeping, bucket for necessities, straw-covered floor. The young DuMonts’ cell had a rug. Their planks had blankets and pillows. They had a lantern, a basket full of food, and a mostly empty bottle of wine. The four people in the cell were playing cards, sitting on the rug, and sipping from delicate glasses. By their empty plates, she could guess that they’d already eaten their fill.
“Where,” Merit said, her tone deceptively calm, “is their bucket?”
The guard shuffled his feet. “They said it smelled. We’ve been letting them use the guards’ lavatory.”
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Merit covered her mouth with one hand. Dropped it. “And the other goods? Where did those come from?”
“The guards, mostly.” He paused, licking his lips. “They seemed like reasonable requests at the time. And it’s not like they’re real criminals. They’re being traded for the criminal, or at least that one is.” He pointed at the card player who had his back to her. “It seemed wrong to leave them in there without . . .” He looked at Merit, his eyes wide. “It’s just, they’re so charming, ma’am.”
“We’re only defenseless children,” the young woman with the freckles drawled, throwing down an ace. Merit could just make out tipped ears from where she stood. “Well, Kate is, anyway.”
“Defenseless?” the DuMont girl—apparently named Kate—asked.
“No, a child,” Freckles corrected her. “As you haven’t reached your majority yet.”
Merit took the guard’s keys, sending him back to his station without looking away from the game. She wondered briefly if she should simply leave them all in the cell and throw the keys in the garbage.
Kate frowned at the ace. She plucked it off the pile and handed it back to Freckles. “Not that one. Honestly, Val, if you can’t play properly, don’t bother.”
Freckles placed it back into her hand, confused. “I thought I was playing properly?”
Kate shook her head and held out her palm. “Let me see your hand.” She took the cards from Freckles, who was apparently named Val. Kate quickly rearranged them, pulled out a two of clubs, and tossed that into the pile. “There. Trust me.”
Val eyed her warily. “I trust you with my life, cousin, but I’m not sure I trust any of you with cards.”
The taller, leaner young man sitting by Kate threw down a jack. “You’re finally learning.”
“Don’t be condescending, Amaury,” Kate said. “You should apologize.”
“Why? She won’t believe it.”