Marcus Courtenay.
My smile froze. What was he doing here?
“We thought it would be nice if Marcus could join in the celebrations.”
My mother flashed her teeth at the room. The perfect smile. But her eyes didn’t meet mine. My slight trespass all those weeks ago had not been forgotten and my behaviour since had done nothing to smooth over the turbulence caused by Camilla witnessing Devyn and me standing a little too closely together. If only she knew.
“Hello, Marcus.” I looked at him and then quickly dropped my lashes, concealing any emotion that didn’t belong in my eyes.
“Cassandra.” He greeted me in the modulated, well-educated tones one would expect from Senator Dolon’s son.
I knew he was handsome; this was a well-established fact in the city’s high society gossip feeds. Marcus was occasionally photographed attending the theatre or the opening of a glitzy restaurant with his close circle of friends. His athletic form was impeccably suited and booted, his chestnut-brown hair holding the most delectable wave that occasionally looked like it would break free of the perfection of its cut. But it never did. His clear green eyes were warm when in conversation with his friends and disdainful when looking directly at the camera.
Now his eyes were politely warm as he gave the most courteous semi bow.
I inhaled deeply – this man was well outside my experience. I knew I looked the part, my delicate appearance a fitting foil to his burnished golden-boy looks, but I felt like an imposter as we exited my parents’ apartment and stepped into the waiting town car – a luxury even for my parents.
My parents’ chit chat with Marcus took us across town as we smoothly moved through the streets, neatly passing the trams and the hackneys which were our more usual form of transport.
My father took my mother’s hand to help her out of the car as Marcus came around to extend the same immaculate manners to me. My wrap slipped and he lightly lifted it around my shoulders again; as I looked up to thank him, the flashes started. The paparazzi. Now that I had graduated, like any child with parents considered high society I was officially fair game. My parents were just about in that bracket and my match with Marcus would guarantee it once it became known.
I grimaced and heard my mother tsk, reminding me that I had a duty if not to myself then to the parents who had raised me. I smiled my most dazzling smile directly at her.
Marcus’s bright eyes lost a little of their warmth as he took in our exchange. Great. Not off to the best start there then. I turned, tucking my arm into my father’s as he entered the restaurant.
“Not a fan of the paps?” Marcus leaned down to murmur as my parents stopped to talk to yet another couple as we made our way through the buzzing lobby. I wasn’t the only graduate of the Basilica Varian class being treated to a celebratory meal at the city’s most exclusive restaurant tonight.
“Just not used to it,” I responded softly, grateful he had chosen to interpret my behaviour as dismissive of the photographers rather than disrespectful of my mother.
He sighed ruefully.
“It’s not so bad, and unless you give them regular fodder, they won’t bother with you unless you happen to be in their direct path.”
“Like dining at the Ritz on graduation night with the one and only Marcus Courtenay?” I delivered breathlessly in my best impression of a gossip reporter.
“Yeah, like that.” His eyes were warm again as he put his hand in the small of my back to propel me forward in my parents’ wake.
My body flinched. It was a small flicker really, a reaction to his touch, a memory of another man directing me. One whose merest touch could persuade me to follow him anywhere. His sheer existence gave me polarity, reducing me to a satellite happy to orbit wherever he happened to be.
We made our way through the hall towards the dining room, our footsteps sinking into the deep pile of the Persian carpet. The murmured conversations and tinkling laughter of the elegant crowd bounced off the exquisite décor which was nothing to the decadence of the dining room with its lush artwork, gilded wall carvings, immaculately laid tables, and entirely handcrafted china and silverware. My spine tingled as my head turned to take in the room and I realised the music was actually live. One corner held three musicians, their fingers moving lightly across ivory and string sending a waft of melody across the room. My fingers lifted as if to touch it. I snapped back at the realisation. How odd.
We followed as the maître d’ led us across the room and we were formally seated at our pristine table. I looked down at the menu blankly. I could still feel the music, its tangle swirling around the room as a beautiful lilting tune danced like a giddy child around our heads, first a merry toddler before emerging like a graceful dancer with her arm stretched out, one note reaching for the next. I had to concentrate fiercely to read the list in my hand My attention was finally caught by the fact there were three different types of fish on the menu, at least two of them unfamiliar to me. Salt-water fish… my mouth watered in anticipation.
My father politely questioned Marcus about his experiences in the hospital he was working in with various accident victims and the like. I tuned back in at his mention of the mysterious illness among the poor.
“We’ve tried everything,” Marcus was saying. “We aren’t really equipped to deal with a virus of this type. Most of the work to eradicate or contain viruses like the common cold was done centuries ago. We’ve figured out how the research was done but it’s not been the province of medicine to do this kind of work in generations.”
Father nodded gravely. “There’s talk that this is plague,” he said, “that Governor Actaeon and the council are trying to keep it quiet.”
Marcus smiled. “No, plague it most certainly isn’t. The Great Plague was caused by external factors, fleas on the rats that came in off the boats. It then passed from patient to patient; once someone was infected, it was virtually impossible to contain it, particularly in the outer wall area which is so congested and next door to the Docklands.”
He rubbed his jaw in a gesture that spoke of frustration and fatigue.
“Similar symptoms have popped up here and there for years in different parts of the Empire but this wave is worrying. It’s never been seen in these numbers here before,” he said. “We’ve ruled out external factors and there just isn’t a clear pattern in those who start to exhibit symptoms. The cells start to die and each one sets off the next and the next until they finally come in to the hospital, too far gone for us to do any more than make them comfortable.”
I had, by this time, read as much about the illness that was popping up throughout the city as I could manage discreetly. There had been sporadic reported cases over the last few years but the number of instances had grown dramatically over the last couple of months, while at the same time the official press had toned down their reports. It had gone from being big news with accompanying pictures of grieving families, since the stricken nearly always died, to being rarely, if ever, reported. Still, the chances were if somebody in the inner walls died under the age of ninety it was the illness that had done it.
I searched my mind for something to ask, Mother’s eyes boring a hole in the side of my head as she mentally urged me to take an interest in Marcus’s depressing work. Little did she realise I was very interested, mostly in the patients who disappeared, but how to find out more without raising suspicions…
“Do you ever catch it in time?” I asked. My question was inane as he had just said it was a death sentence. Even I knew that much.
He looked over at me and smiled politely.
He bowed his head before finally responding in a voice so low it was nearly impossible to hear him over the background din.
“I’m not really supposed to say,” he said before adding, “but we’ve had some successes recently. It’s early, so we aren’t quite sure what it is we’ve found, but it’s hopeful.”
“Oh.” I was honestly a little shocked; this was most certainly not publ
ic news.
My parents’ display of delight was immediate though it was hard to tell with my mother if she was pleased a cure had been found or that she was one of the first to know.
“Have there been many cases?” my father asked.
Marcus shook his head. “Only a handful so far, and those patients were caught in the very early stages, but any progress is great.”
“I should say so,” my father affirmed, as pleased and proud as if Marcus himself had come up with the cure.
“Which hospital has recorded the successes?” Mother asked – she had friends on the boards of some of the few hospitals in the city. Knowing my mother, she would now hold it against those who had failed to bring her the news first hand.
“Uh, Barts,” Marcus answered, starting to look like he wished he could take back the revelation he had shared more freely than he should.
St Bart’s was the hospital where he worked, the name a relic from the phase of Christianity the Empire had gone through in earlier centuries. I might not have been in the same room as him in over ten years, but I had kept up with what was going on in his life. He was, after all, my match, the mate I had been promised, the husband I would have for the rest of my life. “Have you seen some of these cases?”
I knew he didn’t want to talk about it any more but it was impossible to pass up the opportunity to get more information. Perhaps it could help Marina if we could get a message to her.
He nodded.
“Did you work on any of them?”
Another nod. No further explanation offered. He was clearly trying to back out of the conversation. After spending so many weeks with Devyn, it was a technique with which I had grown all too familiar.
“Did you treat them with something in particular?” I followed up.
Marcus shook his head lightly, straightening his shoulders and sitting back in the chair. “I’m afraid not. We tried several things, but success in one case wasn’t always repeated in the next. It’s hard to identify what’s actually working. We’ve repeated treatments which seem to have no effect, only for the patient to take a turn for the better just as we were giving up.”
He reached for his glass and took a long drink.
“So you have no idea how to cure it?” My voice clearly conveyed my disappointment, which earned me a glare from my mother and a rueful flash of pearly teeth from my date.
“I’m afraid not. Most of the successes are moved to a different hospital for further study,” he replied civilly before smiling in obvious relief at the arrival of our next course.
As I ate the expensive meal, I wondered whether those successes were also latents with hidden magic and if that was why they were moved. I wondered what had cured them, and whether Marina was healed now, wherever she was, or whether she would have been better off staying here where at least some were recovering. Though it didn’t sound like those who recovered got to go home precisely, so maybe she was better off where she was. Free.
My parents moved quickly to the door of our building when we got home, hurriedly calling goodnight as they went through the doorway before Marcus had finished helping me out of the car.
My breath hitched. How embarrassing. My cheeks felt warm as I took a quick glance at Marcus to see if he’d also seen through the not-so-subtle removal of their chaperoning presence.
Marcus’s fingers held onto mine as he pulled me towards the shadier part of the sidewalk. Yeah, he’d noticed.
“It was nice to meet you again, Cassandra.” He really did have the loveliest velvet tones; his bedside manner must practically heal his patients through speech alone.
I gnawed on the side of my lip.
“I’m better company now than I was at twelve?” I asked, laughing up at him, at the recollection of our match celebration on my twelfth birthday. I’d barely looked at him all night, thoroughly intimidated by his seventeen-year-old sophistication.
“Slightly.” His lips quirked in a half smile as he lowered his head and softly pressed his perfect lips to mine.
I gasped as he lifted his head again.
When Devyn looked at me, my connection to reality wavered; when he touched me, I knew I would follow him into the pits of Hades without ever questioning why; when he kissed me, the universe trembled and blinked out of existence.
When Marcus, my match, my fated soulmate, kissed me for the first time, I felt…
Nothing.
Chapter Eleven
I was adrift. Marcus was my reward for walking the line laid out in front of me. My fingers worried at my promise ring. Our intended partnership was part of the Code that made up my existence. This didn’t make sense.
After a restless night, I slipped out early. Devyn would have the answers. At least, he bloody better have. I didn’t have the address to the apartment that was his official residence. I couldn’t contact him online because he’d have a fit if I put something out there that connected us. I played with my mobile device, idly flicking through my feeds, scanning photos of my friends’ graduation parties hoping for a glimpse of someone barely there in the background, dark head averted from the camera. But there was no sign of him. There were plenty of comments about me and the papped pictures with Marcus before dinner though. We looked like the perfect couple. No one looking at these pictures would think we were anything but matched. The speculation was rife that this was the case and it easily made the—
Oh no. There was one of us outside my building. I was half hidden in Marcus’s arms as he bent down to kiss me; I looked like I was in heaven, eyes half closed. Little did anyone know it was in rejection of the man kissing me, in the faint hope that when I opened them, it would be to the face of—
Linus’s place.
Devyn would have gone to Linus’s place if he didn’t want to see anyone. If I had seen him kissing someone else, I would have wanted, needed, to be alone. Besides which I didn’t have any better idea.
I changed into the shabbiest, most nondescript clothes I could find before packing the cloak I had procured at the outer walls into my bag. I raced across town and despite my building anger at Devyn, I kept to the protocols he had taught me before Oban and Marina’s escape.
As I passed through Bishopsgate, I put on the cloak, pulling up the deep hood to hide my face, a face that was now splashed all over the society feeds, which were as avidly consumed here between the walls as they were in any other part of the city.
I was out of breath as I finally crossed the threshold of the dilapidated building, making my way hurriedly up the rickety stairs before pounding on the doors.
No sound inside. Yet I could feel him; I knew he was there.
I banged again.
“Devyn, open the cursed door,” I whispered urgently holding on to the pendant. The flat inside was protected to prevent listeners but I was less sure about the landing.
The door opened and I went in.
Devyn was moving towards the small kitchen area.
“Chamomile?” he offered, not turning around.
“No, no chamomile,” I gritted out.
I waited in mutinous silence while he busied himself with making his cup of the hot tea so prevalent in the stews, his movements unhurried. He wasn’t as casual about my arrival as he let on though. He still hadn’t managed to look at me.
Finally, he turned, his face unreadable, and indicated that I should sit as he took a seat at the small table.
I glared at him.
“What did you do?”
“Do?” he repeated, surprise colouring his voice. “I haven’t done anything. You wanted me to stay away, I’ve stayed away.” He raised his cup in a toast. “Happy graduation. I see you celebrated in style. Is Marcus Courtenay everything you thought he would be?”
If only I had said yes to that chamomile. A hot cup of scalding liquid would make for such a satisfying missile right now.
“No, no, he isn’t. Someone somewhere has made a mistake. He’s everything any girl could want but he’s not for me… We’re
not actually a match at all. They’ve messed up. The matching system failed. I’m going to have to go to my parents and let them know just how wrong it is. They have to get me out of it. They have to.”
Devyn cut across me. “You can’t do that, Cass.”
“What do you mean I can’t do that? We are not a match.” I halted. Devyn had that intense, determined look on his face again. “I don’t understand. What difference does it make to you? You’re leaving, aren’t you? In search of this girl. What does it matter to you who I spend my life with?”
“This time it’s not about you,” he offered bitterly.
I was missing something here. If it wasn’t about me then it had to be about Marcus, who Devyn had explicitly told me he didn’t care about. “Why are you so interested in Marcus all of a sudden?”
“He has Briton blood from a high family. A bloodline that has power. The council know all about it which makes him impossible to get to. I’ve been trying to get more information on him for weeks. All his data is locked down. I need your help; you’re my only way in.”
“I’m your only way in? What are you talking about? I thought you were looking for some girl. What does Marcus have to do with you?”
Devyn’s only answer was to run his hand through his hair and stare at me tight-lipped. It wasn’t the inscrutable mask he usually showed me when he didn’t want to answer something. I could see the internal battle waged in his dark eyes.
He turned away and looked out the window onto the bustling street below.
“You remember the men on the dock who took Marina?”
I nodded.
“I had sent word out of the city for help in getting Marina out. She’s barely more than a child so she needed more help than Linus did. I believe she has abilities and I had to be sure she would make it well beyond the reach of the council. I had to seek help from people who could help her, people from my past.”
He’d argued with those men on the dock. Was that what this was about?
Secrets of the Starcrossed Page 14