Star Cursed

by Jessica Spotswood

Page 32

 

  He’s a good man. Honorable. I stare at him, struck all over again by how very lucky I am.

  Maura takes it all in. “You never said you were in love with him. ” Her voice is small, hurt.

  I take a few steps toward her. “I should have told you from the beginning. I’m sorry. ”

  Maura shakes her head, tears brimming in her blue eyes. “Everything comes so easily for you, Cate. It’s not fair. ”

  Without giving me time to respond—to argue against the obvious untruth of it—she picks up her skirts and hurries out the door into the snow.

  I turn back to Finn, burying my face in my hands. I should have told her and Tess the truth about him yesterday. No matter how much Maura claims to be over Elena, it’s obvious that she isn’t. Not if seeing me happy affects her this way.

  Finn puts a hand on my shoulder. “Should you go after her?”

  “No. I’ll try and talk to her tomorrow. She’s had a—disappointment. Perhaps she’s not as past it as she thought. ” How did everything become a competition between us? How does my relationship with Finn take anything away from her?

  “Sometimes it’s better to let them cool off,” Finn agrees. “It might all be forgotten by tomorrow. ”

  Somehow I doubt that. “Do you and Clara get into rows?”

  Finn nods, his lips twitching. “Loads. She accuses me of being a bossy know-it-all, if you can imagine. ”

  “Never. ” I laugh, taking his hand. “I want to discuss this spying a bit more. I’m not quite comfortable with—”

  “What would you do if I forbade you to go back to Harwood?” he interrupts, raising his eyebrows at me.

  “You would never forbid me anything,” I say, wrinkling my nose. It’s one of the things I love best about him.

  “Rightly so. I need you to afford me the same respect,” he says.

  “Of course I respect you. Don’t be silly. You’re the cleverest person I know, except maybe Tess. ” I take a deep breath, straightening his vest. In his hurry to get it back on, he’s done up the buttons crooked. “I’m just scared. I don’t want to lose you. ”

  “You won’t. You have to let me take the same risks you take yourself, Cate. ” He pulls me into his arms, and this time I cling to him. Anxiety blooms through me, dark and dreadful.

  I didn’t think anything could compare with the fear of losing one of my sisters, but this cuts just as deep. What if I never get to hear the warm rustle of his laugh again, or talk through my problems with him, or kiss him?

  The terrible notion of a world without Finn Belastra in it slices through me. I love him. I knew that. I mourned the marriage that wasn’t; I worried he wouldn’t forgive me or that I might not see him again for years. But I knew he was safe in Chatham; I could picture him going about his day, teaching in the boys’ school, sitting through Brother Ishida’s sermons, eating supper in his mother’s flat. I could picture the geography of his life, even though I was no longer part of it. But the awful image of him, dead and pale like my mother, buried in a graveyard somewhere—it’s more than I can bear.

  I can’t breathe, can’t think past the sudden panic. I cannot lose him. I cannot.

  “Cate. ” Finn tilts my chin up with one finger, and I kiss him. I kiss him as though I will break into a thousand tiny pieces if I don’t; I kiss him as though my lips on his can protect him from any possible danger.

  When he pulls away, there are tears gathering in my eyes. I tilt my head down so he won’t see them.

  “You have to go in,” he says. “I’ll see you soon. I promise. ”

  I curl my little finger around his. The smallest brush of warm, freckled skin against mine.

  I nod, and I pretend to believe him. But he can’t make promises like that.

  None of us can.

  Chapter 9

  THE NEXT AFTERNOON, ALICE AND MEI and I go out to deliver food to the poor. A cloud of discontent seems to have settled on each of the flats we visit. The mothers look drawn and worried, and though they don’t dare utter a word of complaint, they wonder aloud how they can stretch these vegetables in soups. Daughters who worked as shopgirls last week glare at us over their sewing and pace like pent-up cats.

  I feel a pang of guilt, knowing some of them may go to bed hungry by the end of the week. For all my worries, that’s never been one of them. Is there more we could do to help? If we waged war against the Brothers, would these families be better off?

  The men who are home don’t hesitate to speak up. Fathers grumble about the extra burden the Brothers’ new measures put on their pockets; aged grandfathers joke about having to return to work. I see more than one man stuff a newspaper beneath the sofa cushions when we enter, and I know it’s not the sanctioned New London Sentinel, the Brothers’ mouthpiece, that they’ve been reading. Part of me is afraid for them, but their complaints make me hopeful, too. Perhaps they’re finally seeing the cruelty of the Brothers’ whims.

  “They’ve got plenty of money in their coffers, thanks to our tithes!” Mr. Brooke is usually jolly, despite the broken leg that keeps him home from his factory job—but not today. He sits in a sturdy blue armchair, leg propped on an ottoman, with his wooden crutches leaning in the corner behind him. He and his family occupy one half of a brownstone duplex just outside the market district. “I ain’t suggesting girls should be prancing around the city, mind you, or working jobs what aren’t decent. My Molly worked at the flower shop around the corner, you know. And if she flattered the men a little to get ’em to buy flowers for their wives, that’s just good business, ain’t it? She sold more flowers than any other girl. ”

  “Papa, hush!” Molly’s a pretty girl, with frightened cornflower-blue eyes. “Are you trying to get me arrested?”

  “We won’t say anything,” I promise her, and her knitting needles flash to work again.

  Mr. Brooke frowns. “I didn’t mean anything by it. Molly’s a good girl. ”

  “Course she is. ” Mei grins. Alice just sniffs, as usual.

  There’s talk of more disappeared girls, too—girls the Brothers suspect of being the oracle. The Chen sisters whisper about their friend’s cousin across the city. They say the Brothers heard neighbors gossiping about a strange dream she had, then took her away and told her family to forget her. As if it’s as easy as that.

  By my count, it’s up to ten girls now.

  All afternoon, we walk a fine line between sympathizing with the families we visit and criticizing the Brotherhood. After we visit the last house and pile back into the carriage, I turn to Mei. “Do you think it’s like this all over the city?”

  Mei nods. “My brother says people have been talking about a protest. ”

  “That’s never happened before, has it?” Would I have known, tucked away in Chatham?

  “Not since the Daughters of Persephone were in power,” Mei says. “And we all know how that turned out. ”

  • • •

  We’re nearly home when the carriage slams to a halt. Mei slides right onto the floor. I imagine Robert’s had to yank on the reins to avoid plowing into the back of a wagon, and I pity the horses’ poor mouths and think no more of it, until—