“No.” I stepped in front of them, and Blaise snarled. “Peace, Blaise. I—I can heal your son.” Reaching into my pocket, I withdrew the vial of blood and honey.
A ghost of a smile touched Coco’s lips. She nodded. “His injuries are internal. He needs to drink it.”
Blaise didn’t stop me when I approached. He didn’t halt my wrist when I lifted the vial to Terrance’s lips.
“Drink,” I urged, tipping the liquid down the boy’s throat. He struggled weakly against me, but Blaise held him firm. When he swallowed the last of it, we all waited. Even Jean Luc. He watched with an expression of fascination and disgust as Terrance’s breathing grew stronger. As the color returned to his cheeks. One by one, the bones of his ribs snapped back into their proper places. Though he gasped in pain, Blaise stroked his hair, whispering comforts.
Tears poured down the old man’s cheeks.
“Père?” Terrance’s eyes fluttered open, and Blaise wept harder.
“Yes, son. I am here.”
The boy groaned. “The witch, she—”
“Will not be harmed,” I finished. Blaise and I locked eyes. After a tense moment, he dipped his chin in a nod.
“You have saved my son’s life, Reid Diggory. I am indebted to you.”
“No. I am indebted to you.” My gaze dropped to Terrance, and my gut twisted once more. “I know it changes nothing, but I am sorry. Truly. I wish—” I swallowed hard and looked away. Lou clutched my hand. “I wish I could bring Adrien back.”
“Oh, good Lord.” Jean Luc rolled his eyes and motioned to the Chasseurs from his position on the ground. “I’ve heard enough. Round them all up—even the Beast. They can bond in the Tower dungeon before they burn.” He turned his glare on Lou. “Kill that one now.”
Blaise’s lip curled. He stepped beside me, and the wolves stepped beside him. Growls built deep in their throats. Their hackles rose. I drew my own knives, as did Ansel, and though her face was still pale, Lou lifted her free hand. The other supported Coco. “I think not,” Blaise said.
Beau sauntered in front of us. “Consider me on their side. And as my father isn’t here to throw his weight, I’ll speak for him too. Which means . . . I outrank you.” He grinned and nodded curtly to the Chasseurs. “Stand down, men. That’s an order.”
Jean Luc glared at him, trembling with rage. “They don’t answer to you.”
“Without your Balisarda, they don’t answer to you either.”
The Chasseurs hesitated.
“We have a proposition,” Lou said.
I tensed, wary once more. We’d just defused the greatest danger. A single word from Lou could exacerbate it again.
At the sound of her voice, Blaise’s lip curled over his teeth. One of the werewolves growled. Lou ignored them both, focusing only on Jean Luc. He laughed bitterly. “Does it end with you on the stake?”
“It ends with Morgane on one.”
Surprise stole the scowl from his face. “What?”
“We know where she is.”
His eyes narrowed. “Why should I believe you?”
“I hardly have reason to lie.” She gestured around us with his Balisarda. “It’s not like you’re in any position to arrest me now. You’re outnumbered. Vulnerable. But if you return to Cesarine with us, you’ll have a good chance of finishing what you started on Modraniht. Just think—she’s still injured. If she dies, King Auguste is safe, and you become the kingdom’s new hero.”
“Morgane is in Cesarine?” Jean Luc asked sharply.
“Yes.” She glanced at me. “We . . . think she’s planning an attack during the Archbishop’s funeral.”
Heavy silence descended. At last, Blaise asked coldly, “Why do you think this?”
“We received a note.” She bent to retrieve it from her boot. “It’s in my mother’s handwriting, and it mentions a pall, and tears.”
Blaise regarded her with suspicion. “If your mother delivered this note, why did she not take you then?”
“She’s playing with us. Baiting us. This is her idea of a game. It’s also why we believe she’ll strike amidst the Archbishop’s funeral—to make a statement. To rub salt in the wound of the kingdom’s grief. La Voisin and the Dames Rouges have already agreed to stand with us. With all of your help, we can finally defeat her.”
“We need your help, frère.” I hesitated before finally extending a hand to him. “You’re . . . you’re a captain of the Chasseurs now. Your support might sway King Auguste to our cause.”
He knocked my hand away. Bared his teeth. “You are no brother of mine. My brother died with my father. My brother would not defend one witch to condemn another—he would kill them both. And you’re a fool to believe the king will ever join your cause.”
“I’m still the same person, Jean. I’m still me. Help us. We can be as we were once more. We can honor our father together.”
He stared at me a beat.
Then he punched me in the face.
I staggered backward, eyes and nose streaming, as Lou snarled and tried to leap forward, caught beneath Coco. Ansel and Beau stepped to my side instead. The former attempted to subdue Jean, who lunged for another attack, while the latter bent to check my nose. “It’s not broken,” he muttered.
“I will honor our father”—Jean Luc struggled to free himself from Ansel, who held him with surprising strength—“when I lash you to the stake for conspiracy. As God is my witness, you will burn for what you’ve done. I will light your pyre myself.”
Blood poured down my mouth, my chin. “Jean—”
He finally shoved Ansel away. “How disappointed he would be to see how far you’ve fallen, Reid. His golden son.”
“Oh, get over it, Jean Luc,” Lou snapped. “You can’t win a dead man’s affection. Even alive, the Archbishop saw you for the sniveling little rat you are—”
He launched himself at her now, completely out of control, but Blaise rose up to meet him, his expression hard as flint. Liana, Terrance, and a handful of others closed in behind him. Some bared their teeth, incisors sharp and gleaming. Others shifted their eyes yellow. “I have offered Reid Diggory and his companions sanctuary,” Blaise said, voice steady. Calm. “Leave now in peace, or do not leave at all.”
Lou shook her head vehemently, eyes wide. “Blaise, no. They can’t leave—”
Jean Luc swiped at her. “Give me my Balisarda—”
The wolves around us growled in agitation. In anticipation.
“Captain . . .” A Chasseur I didn’t recognize touched Jean Luc’s elbow. “Perhaps we should go.”
“I will not leave without—”
“Yes,” Blaise said, lifting a hand to his wolves. They pressed closer. Too close now. Close enough to bite. To kill. Their snarls multiplied to a din. “You will.”
The Chasseurs needed no further encouragement. Eyes darting, they seized Jean Luc before he could damn them all. Though he roared his protests, they pulled him backward. They kept pulling. His shouts echoed through the trees even after they’d disappeared.
Lou whirled to face Blaise. “What have you done?”
“I have saved you.”
“No.” Lou stared at him in horror. “You let them go. You let them go after we told them our plan. They know now we’re traveling to Cesarine. They know we’re planning to visit the king. If Jean Luc tips him off, Auguste will arrest us the moment we step foot in the castle.”
Grimacing, Coco readjusted her arm on Lou’s shoulders. “She’s right. Auguste won’t want to listen. We’ve just lost the element of surprise.”
“Maybe”—Lou’s eyes swept the pack—“maybe if we show up in numbers, we can make him listen.”
But Blaise shook his head. “Your fight is not our fight. Reid Diggory saved my second son after taking the life of my first. He has fulfilled his debt. My kin will no longer hunt him, and you will leave our homeland in peace. I do not owe him an alliance. I do not owe him anything.”
Lou stabbed the air with her finger.
“That’s horseshit, and you know it—”
His eyes narrowed. “After what you’ve done, be grateful I do not demand your blood, Louise le Blanc.”
“He’s right.” I took her hand in mine, squeezing gently when she opened her mouth to argue. “And we need to leave now if we have any hope of beating Jean Luc to Cesarine.”
“What? But—”
“Wait.” To my surprise, Liana stepped forward. She’d set her chin in a determined expression. “You may owe him nothing, Père, but he saved my brother’s life. I owe him everything.”
“As do I.” Terrance joined her. Though young, his flinty countenance reflected his father’s as he nodded in my direction. He didn’t make eye contact. “We will join you.”
“No.” With the curt shake of his head, Blaise lowered his voice to a whisper. “Children, I have already told you, our debt is fulfilled—”
Liana clasped his hands together, holding them between her own. “Our debt is not yours. Adrien was your son, Père, but we didn’t know him. He’s a stranger to Terrance and to me. We must honor this debt—especially now, beneath the face of our mother.” She glanced up at the full moon. “Would you have us spurn this obligation? Would you disavow Terrance’s life so quickly after she restored him to us?”
Blaise stared down at them both for several seconds. Finally, his facade cracked, and beneath it, his resolve crumbled. He kissed both their foreheads with tears in his eyes. “Yours are the brightest of souls. Of course you must go, and I—I will join you. Though my debt as a man is fulfilled, my duties as a father are not.” His eyes cut to mine. “My pack will remain here. You will never step foot in our lands again.”
I nodded curtly. “Understood.”
We turned and raced toward Cesarine.
A Promise
Reid
Blaise, Liana, and Terrance outdistanced us by the next morning, promising to return with reconnaissance of the city landscape. When they found us again—a mere mile outside of Cesarine, hidden within the trees near Les Dents—they delivered our worst fear: the Chasseurs had formed a blockade to enter the city. They checked each wagon, each cart, without bothering to hide their intentions.
“They’re searching for you.” Liana emerged from behind a juniper in fresh clothes. She joined her father and brother with a grim expression. “I recognized some of them, but I didn’t see Jean Luc. He isn’t here.”
“I assume he went straight to my father.” Beau readjusted the hood of his cloak, eyeing the thick congestion of the road. Though his expression remained cool and unaffected, his hands shook. “Hence the blockade.”
Lou kicked the juniper’s branches in frustration. When snow fell into her boots, she cursed viciously. “That sniveling little shit. Of course he isn’t here. He wouldn’t want an audience to watch him piss down his leg when he sees me. An appropriate response, mind you.”
Despite her brazen words, this crowd made me uncomfortable. It’d grown worse the nearer we’d drawn to the city, as Les Dents was the only road into Cesarine. Part of me rejoiced so many had come to honor the Archbishop. The rest didn’t know how to feel. Here—with every face and every voice a reminder—I couldn’t properly dissociate. The doors to my fortress rattled. The walls shook. But I couldn’t focus on that now. Couldn’t focus on anything but Lou. “Are you all right?” she’d whispered earlier when we’d hidden amongst these trees.
I’d studied her face. It seemed she’d reversed her disastrous pattern, yes, but appearances could be deceiving. Memory lasted forever. I’d certainly never forget the sight of her braced within that frozen swamp, fingers contorted, expression cold and hard as the ice at her feet. I doubted she would either. “Are you?” I’d whispered back.
She hadn’t answered.
She whispered to her matagots now. A third had joined us overnight. A black rat. It perched on her shoulder, eyes beady and bright. No one mentioned it. No one dared look in its direction—as if our willful disregard could somehow make it less real. But the set of Coco’s shoulders said the words she didn’t, as did the shadow in Ansel’s eyes. Even Beau cast me a worried glance.
As for the wolves, they wouldn’t go near them. Blaise’s lip curled when Absalon sauntered too close.
“What is it?” Taking her hand, I pulled her apart from the others. The matagots followed like shadows. If I knocked the rat from her shoulder—if I wrapped my hands around the necks of the cat and fox—would they leave her in peace? Would they haunt me instead?
“I’m sending word to Claud,” she said, and the fox disappeared in a cloud of smoke. “He might know how to get through this blockade undetected.”
Beau craned his neck, eavesdropping unapologetically. “That’s your plan?” Skepticism laced his voice. “I know Claud somehow . . . shielded you in Beauchêne, but these aren’t bandits.”
“You’re right.” An edge clipped Lou’s voice as she faced him. “These are huntsmen armed with Balisardas. I got lucky with Jean Luc—I knew his buttons, and I pressed them. I distracted him, disarmed him. His men didn’t dare hurt me while he was under my power. But he isn’t here now, and I doubt I’ll be able to disarm all two dozen of them without quite literally setting the world on fire.” She exhaled impatiently, stroking the rat’s nose, as if to—as if to calm down. My stomach twisted. “Even then, we’re trying not to raise the alarm. We need a quick and quiet entrance.”
“They’ll be expecting magic,” I hurried to add. Anything to keep her from changing strategy. Anything to keep her from the alternative. “And Claud Deveraux hid us along Les Dents. Maybe he can hide us here too.”
Beau threw his hands in the air. “This is a completely different situation! These men know we’re here. They’re searching every wagon. For Claud Deveraux to hide us, he’d need to quite literally make us disappear.”
“Do you have another plan?” Both Lou and the rat glared at him. “If so, by all means, please share with the class.” When he didn’t answer, she scoffed bitterly. “That’s what I thought. Now can you do everyone a favor and shut the hell up? We’re anxious enough as it is.”
“Lou,” Coco admonished in a low voice, but Lou only turned away, crossing her arms and scowling at the snow. Of their own volition, my feet moved—my body angled—to shield her from the others’ disapproving looks. She might’ve deserved them. I didn’t care.
“If you’re going to reprimand me, you can piss off too.” Though she wiped furiously at her eyes, a tear still escaped. I brushed it away with my thumb. Instinctive. “Don’t.” She jerked, swatting my hand, and turned her back on me too. Absalon hissed at her feet. “I’m fine.”
I didn’t move. Didn’t react. Inside, however, I reeled as if she’d struck me—as if the two of us hurtled toward a cliff, heedless, each pulling at the other. Each pushing. Both desperate to save ourselves, and both helpless to stop our trajectory. We were careening toward that edge, Lou and I.
I’d never felt so powerless in my life.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, but she didn’t acknowledge me, instead shoving Jean Luc’s Balisarda into my hand.
“We didn’t have time earlier, but while we’re waiting . . . I stole it for you. To replace the one I lost.” She pressed it harder. My fingers curled around the hilt reflexively. The silver felt different. Wrong. Though Jean Luc had clearly cared for the blade—it’d been recently cleaned and sharpened—it wasn’t mine. It didn’t smooth the jagged edge in my chest. Didn’t fill the empty hole there. I slid it into my bandolier anyway, unsure of what else to do. She continued without enthusiasm. “I know I might’ve gotten a little carried away in the process. With—with the ice. I’m sorry. I promise it won’t happen again.”
I promise.
For days I’d waited to hear those words, yet now they rang hollow in my ears. Empty. She didn’t understand the meaning of them. Perhaps couldn’t. They implied truth, trust. I doubted she’d ever known either. Still—I wanted to believe her. Desperately. And an apology from her didn’t com
e lightly.
I swallowed against the sudden tightness in my throat. “Thank you.”
We stayed quiet for a long time after that. Though the sun crept across the sky, the queue hardly moved. And the others’ eyes—I felt them on us. Especially the wolves’. Heat prickled along my neck. My ears. I didn’t like the way they looked at Lou. They knew her only as she was now. They didn’t know her warmth, her compassion. Her love.
After what you’ve done, be grateful I do not demand your blood, Louise le Blanc.
Though I trusted they wouldn’t harm me, they’d made no such promise to her. Whatever madness this day inevitably brought, I wouldn’t leave them alone with her. I would give them no opportunity to retaliate. Forlorn, I traced the curve of Lou’s neck with my gaze. She’d knotted her white hair at her nape. Tied another ribbon around her throat. All at once so familiar yet so different.
I had to fix her.
When the sun crested the trees, the fox at last returned to us. She nosed Lou’s boot, staring up at her intently. Communicating silently with her eyes. “Does she . . . speak to you?” I asked.
Lou frowned. “Not with words. It’s more like a feeling. Like—like her consciousness touches mine, and I understand.” Her head snapped up. “Toulouse and Thierry are coming.”
Within minutes, two familiar black heads parted the crowd, proving her right. With a crutch under his arm, Toulouse whistled one of Deveraux’s tunes. He grinned at Liana, tipping his hat, before grasping my shoulder.
“Bonjour à vous,” he told her. “Good morrow, good morrow. And fancy meeting you here, Monsieur Diggory.”
“Shhh.” I ducked my head, but no one on the road paid us any notice. “Are you daft?”
“Some days.” His gaze fell behind us to the werewolves, and he grinned wider. “I see I was mistaken. How unexpected. I’ll admit, I doubted your powers of persuasion, but I’ve never been more pleased to be wrong.” He elbowed Thierry with a chuckle. “Perhaps I should try it more often, eh, brother?” His grin faded slightly as he turned back to me. “Would you like to try that card now?”
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