The throne room doors burst open a moment later, and Beau strode in.
Audible gasps filled the chamber. All conversation ceased. One woman even emitted a small shriek. He winked at her. “Bonjour, everyone. I am sorry if I kept you waiting.” To his mother’s family in the corner, he added in a softer voice, “Ia orana.”
Tears filled Oliana’s eyes as she leapt to her feet. “Arava.”
“Metua vahine.” Upon seeing her, Beau’s smile warmed to something genuine. He tilted his head to peer behind her at someone I couldn’t see. “Mau tuahine iti.” When delighted squeals answered him, my heart stuttered painfully. Two someones. Violette and Victoire. I pressed closer, trying in vain to see them, but Madame Labelle pulled me back.
Auguste stiffened visibly at his son’s arrival. His eyes never left Beau’s face. “The prodigal son returns.”
“Père.” Beau’s smirk reappeared. His armor, I realized. “Did you miss me?”
Absolute silence reigned as Auguste studied his son’s rumpled hair, his filthy clothes. “You disappoint me.”
“I assure you, the sentiment is mutual.”
Auguste smiled. It held more promise than a knife. “Do you think you’re clever?” he asked softly. He still didn’t bother to rise. “Do you mean to embarrass me with this tawdry display?” With a lazy flick of his wrist, he gestured around the chamber. “By all means, do continue. Your audience is rapt. Tell them of how disappointed you are in your father, the man who ravaged the countryside for weeks to find his son. Tell them of how your mother wept herself to sleep all those nights, waiting for word. Tell them of how she prayed to her gods and mine for your return.” Now he did stand. “Tell them, Beauregard, of how your sisters slipped out of the castle to find you, how a witch nearly cut off their heads.”
Fresh gasps sounded as Beau’s eyes widened.
Auguste descended the steps slowly. “They’re all waiting to hear, son. Tell them of your new companions. Tell them of the witches and werewolves you call friends. Perhaps they’re already acquainted. Perhaps your companions have murdered their families.” His lip curled. “Tell them of how you abandoned your family to help the daughter of La Dame des Sorcières—the daughter whose blood could kill not only you, but also your sisters. Tell them of how you freed her.” He reached Beau at last, and the two stared at each other. For a second. For an eternity. Auguste’s voice quieted. “I have long tolerated your indiscretions, but this time, you go too far.”
Beau tried to sneer. “You haven’t tolerated them. You’ve ignored them. Your opinion means less to me now than it ever has—”
“My opinion,” Auguste snarled, fisting the front of Beau’s shirt, “is the only reason you haven’t been lashed to a stake. You dare to dismiss me? You dare to challenge your father for the sake of a witch’s dirty cunt?” Auguste shoved him away, and Beau stumbled, blanching. No one lifted a hand to steady him.
“It isn’t like that—”
“You are a child.” At the venom in Auguste’s voice, the aristocrats drew back further. “A cosseted child in a gilded tower, who has never tasted the blood of war or smelled the stench of death. Do you fancy yourself a hero now, son? After a fortnight of playing pretend with your friends, do you call yourself a warrior? Do you plan to save us?” He shoved him again. “Have you ever seen a loup garou feast on the intestines of a soldier?” And again. “Have you ever watched a Dame Blanche desiccate a newborn babe?”
Beau struggled to his feet. “They—they wouldn’t do that. Lou wouldn’t—”
“You are a child and a fool,” Auguste said coldly, “and you have humiliated me for the last time.” Expelling a hard breath from his nose, he straightened to his full height. My height. “But I am not without mercy. Captain Toussaint told me of your grand plan to defeat La Dame des Sorcières. Tell me the location of her daughter, and all will be forgiven.”
No. Panic caught in my throat. I forgot to breathe. To think. I could only watch as Beau’s eyes widened. As he yielded a step to his father. “I can’t do that.”
Auguste’s face hardened. “You will tell me where she is, or I will strip you of your title and inheritance.” Shocked whispers erupted, but Auguste ignored them, his voice growing louder with each word. With each step. Oliana touched a hand to her mouth in horror. “I will banish you from my castle and my life. I will condemn you as a criminal, a conspirator, and when you burn beside your friends, I will think of you no more.”
“Father,” Beau said, aghast, but Auguste did not stop.
“Where is she?”
“I—” Beau’s gaze darted helplessly to his mother, but she merely closed her eyes, weeping softly. He cleared his throat and tried again. I held my breath. “I can’t tell you where she is because I—I don’t know.”
“Frère!” From behind Oliana, a beautiful girl with Beau’s black hair and tawny skin darted forward. My chest seized as she wrung her hands, as Auguste swept her backward, away from Beau. “Frère, please, tell him where she is. Tell him!”
Her twin raced to join them. Though she glared, her chin quivered. “You don’t need to beg, Violette. Of course he’ll tell him. The witches tried to kill us.”
Beau’s voice turned strangled. “Victoire—”
Auguste’s eyes narrowed. “You would protect a witch over your own sisters?”
“We should go.” Madame Labelle tugged fruitlessly on my arm, her breathing shallow. Panicked. “This was a mistake. Clearly Auguste won’t help us.”
“We can’t just leave him—”
Beau lifted his hands, gesturing to the aristocrats. “It doesn’t have to be this way. They aren’t all evil. If you’d just help us, we can eliminate Morgane. She’s in the city—here, now—and she’s planning something terrible for the Archbishop’s funeral—”
Madame Labelle pulled more insistently. “Reid—”
“You truly are a fool.” Auguste wrapped a possessive arm around each of his daughters, dragging them backward. “I must confess, however, I am not surprised. Though you loathe me, I know you, son. I know your habits. I know your haunts. For fear of losing your newfound friends, I knew you would visit me on this foolish errand.”
Vaguely, I recognized the sound of footsteps behind me. Of voices. Madame Labelle clawed at my arm now, shouting my name, but my mind followed too slow, sluggish. The realization came too late. I turned just as Auguste said, “And I knew you would use the tunnels to do it.”
“Flibbertigibbet!” Beau’s shouts filled the chamber as he whirled toward us with wild eyes. “Bumfuzzle!”
The hilt of a Balisarda smashed into my temple, and I saw no more.
Pride Goeth Before the Fall
Lou
He’d left without me. I stared into my whiskey, tipping it sideways, pouring it slowly onto the wooden bar. Coco took the tumbler from me without missing a beat in her conversation with Liana. Across the tavern, Ansel sat between Toulouse and Thierry. They all laughed at a joke I couldn’t hear.
One big, happy family.
Except they all stared at me, whispering, like I was a cannon about to explode.
And that bastard had left without a word.
I don’t know what I’d expected—I’d practically doused him in whiskey and lit the match. But I hadn’t lied. I hadn’t said anything untrue. That’s what he’d wanted, right? He’d wanted the truth.
Don’t lie to me, he’d said.
I shoved away from the bar, stalking to the filthy window up front and staring through its dirt-streaked panes. He should’ve been back by now. If he’d left when Deveraux said he’d left—when I’d been sulking upstairs in misery—he should’ve climbed back through the tunnel a half hour ago. Something must’ve happened. Perhaps he’d found trouble—
Do you understand now? Does that make me a monster?
No. It makes you your mother.
A fresh wave of anger washed over me. Perhaps he had found trouble. And—this time—perhaps he could sort it out without me. Wit
hout magic.
Breath tickled my neck, and I whirled, coming face-to-face with Nicholina. When she grinned at me, I scowled. Blood had stained her teeth yellow. Indeed, her paper-thin skin was now her palest feature, brighter and whiter than the moon. I shouldered past her to an empty table in the corner. “I want to be alone, Nicholina.”
“Shouldn’t be too hard, souris.” She drifted around me, whispering, gesturing to Coco and Ansel, to Blaise and Liana, to Toulouse and Thierry. “They certainly don’t want our company.” She leaned closer. Her lips brushed my ear. “We make them uncomfortable.”
I swatted her away. “Don’t touch me.”
When I plunked down, turning my back to her, she floated to the chair opposite. She didn’t sit, however. I supposed wraiths didn’t sit. One couldn’t look sinister and uncanny with one’s ass on a barstool. “We aren’t so very different,” she breathed. “People don’t like us either.”
“People like me just fine,” I snapped.
“Do they?” Her colorless eyes flicked to Blaise, where he watched me from the bar. “We can sense his thoughts, oh yes, and he hasn’t forgotten how you crushed his son’s bones. He longs to feast on your flesh, make you whimper and groan.”
My own gaze cut to his. His lip curled over sharp incisors. Fuck.
“But you won’t whimper, will you?” Nicholina canted her face closer to mine. “You’ll fight, and you’ll bite with teeth of your own.” She laughed then—the sound skittered down my spine—and repeated, “We aren’t so very different. For years, our people have been persecuted, and we have been persecuted among even them.”
For some reason, I doubted she referred to we as her and me, the two of us. No. It seemed Nicholina wasn’t the only one living inside her head these days. Perhaps there were . . . others. I told you she’s weird, Gabrielle had confided. Too many hearts. My own heart twisted at the memory. Poor Gaby. I hoped she hadn’t suffered.
Ismay sat at a table with La Voisin, eyes red-rimmed and glassy. A handful of their sisters joined them. Babette had remained in the blood camp to care for those too young, too old, too weak, or too sick to fight.
They hadn’t recovered Gaby’s body.
“We’ll tell you a secret, little mouse,” Nicholina whispered, drawing my attention back to her. “It isn’t on us to make them comfortable. No, no, no it’s not. It’s not, it’s not, it’s not. It’s on them.”
I stared at her. “How did you become like this, Nicholina?”
She grinned again—a too-wide grin that nearly split her face in half. “How did you become like this, Louise? We all make choices. We all suffer consequences.”
“I’m done with this conversation.” Expelling a harsh breath, I returned Blaise’s glare with one of my own. If he didn’t blink soon, he’d lose an eye. Nicholina—though clearly demented—was right about one thing: I would bite back. When Terrance murmured in his ear, he finally shifted his gaze away from me toward the storeroom door. I tensed immediately. Had they heard something I hadn’t? Had Reid returned?
Without hesitating, I curled a finger, and my eyesight clouded. My hearing, however, heightened, and Terrance’s low voice echoed as if he stood beside me. “Do you think he’s dead? The huntsman?”
Blaise shook his head. “Perhaps. There is no peace in the human king’s heart. Reid was foolish to approach him.”
“If he is dead . . . when can we leave this place?” Terrance cast a sidelong look at La Voisin and Ismay, at the blood witches around them. “We owe these demons no loyalty.”
A twitch started in my cheek. Before I realized my feet had moved, I was standing, pressing my fists against the table. The pattern dissolved. “It seems you owe Reid no loyalty either.” They both looked up, startled—angry—but theirs was a flicker to my rage. Nicholina clapped her hands together in delight. Coco, Ansel, and Claud all rose tentatively. “If you suspect he’s in danger, why are you still here?” My voice rose, grew into something beyond me. Though I heard myself speaking, I did not form these words. “You owe him a life debt, you mangy dogs. Or would you like me to reclaim Terrance’s?” I lifted my hands.
Blaise’s teeth flashed as he rose from his chair. “You dare threaten us?”
“Louise . . . ,” Claud said, his voice conciliatory. “What are you doing?”
“They think Reid is dead,” I spat. “They’re debating when they can leave us.”
Though La Voisin chuckled, her eyes remained flat and cold. “Of course they are. At the first sign of trouble, they tuck their tails and flee back to their swamp. They’re cowards. I told you not to trust them, Louise.”
When Liana moved toward the door, I slammed it shut with an easy flick of my wrist. My eyes never left Blaise’s. “You aren’t going anywhere. Not until you bring him back to me.”
Snarling, Blaise’s face began to shift. “You do not control the loup garou, witch. We did not harm you for your mate’s sake. If he dies, so too does our benevolence. Be very careful.”
La Voisin stepped to my side, hands clasped. “Perhaps it is you who should be careful, Blaise. If you invoke the wrath of this witch, you invoke the wrath of us all.” She lifted a hand, and the blood witches stood as one—at least a dozen of them. Four times as many as Blaise, Liana, and Terrance, who edged back-to-back, growling low in their throats. Their fingernails extended to lethal points.
“We will leave here in peace.” Despite his words, Blaise met La Voisin’s gaze in open challenge. “No blood must be drawn.”
“How easily you forget.” La Voisin smiled, and it was a cruel, chilling thing. When she lowered her collar, revealing three jagged scars across her chest—claw marks—the blood witches hummed with anticipation. And so did I. God, so did I. “We like blood. Especially our own.”
Tension in the room taut to explode, they stared at each other.
Ansel started to step between them—Ansel, of all people—but Claud stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. “Stand down, lad. Before you get hurt.” To La Voisin and Blaise, he said, “Let us not forget the grander purpose here. We have a common enemy. We can all play nice until Monsieur Diggory returns, can’t we?” With a pointed glance first at Blaise, then at me, he added, “Because he will return.”
Not a breath sounded in the long, tense silence that followed. We all waited for someone to move. To strike.
At last, Blaise sighed heavily. “You speak wisdom, Claud Deveraux. We will await Monsieur Diggory’s return. If he does not, my children and I will leave this place—and its inhabitants”—his yellow eyes found mine—“unharmed. You have my word.”
“Ah, excellent—”
But La Voisin only smirked. “Coward.”
That was all it took.
With a snarl, Terrance launched himself at her, but Nicholina appeared, seizing his half-shifted throat and twisting. He yelped, flying through the air, and landed at Blaise’s feet. Liana had already shifted. She tore after Nicholina. Blaise quickly followed, as did Ansel and Claud when they realized the blood witches were after, well—blood. Knives in hand, Ismay and her sisters attacked the wolves’ jugulars, but the wolves moved faster, leaping atop the bar to gain higher ground. Though cornered, though outnumbered, Terrance managed to knock away Ismay’s knife, pinning her beneath his paw. When his other slashed open her face, she screamed. Coco rushed to intervene.
And I . . . I touched a finger to the whiskey on the bar. Just a finger. One simple spark—so similar, yet so different from that pub fire long ago. Had it only been a fortnight?
It felt like years.
The flames chased the whiskey down the bar to where Terrance—
No. Not Terrance. I tilted my head, bemused, as the flames instead found another, climbing up her feet, her legs, her chest. Soon she screamed in terror, in pain—trying desperately to draw blood, to claw magic from her wrists—but I only laughed. I laughed and laughed until my eyes stung and my throat ached, laughed until her voice finally pierced the smoke in my mind. Until I realized to whom
that voice belonged.
“Coco,” I breathed.
I stared at her in disbelief, releasing the pattern. The flames died instantly, and she crumpled to the floor. Smoke curled from her clothing, her skin, and she gasped between sobs, struggling to catch her breath. The rest of the room came back in pieces—Ansel’s horrified expression, Terrance’s frantic shout, Ismay’s mad dash to find honey. When I stumbled forward to help her, a hand caught my throat.
“No closer,” La Voisin snarled, her nails biting into my skin.
“Enough, Josephine.” Deveraux loomed over us, graver than I’d ever seen him. “Release her.”
La Voisin’s eyes bulged slightly as she glared at him, but—one by one—her fingers gradually loosened. I sucked in a harsh breath and staggered forward. “Coco.”
But both blood witches and werewolves shielded her as I approached, and I could see little more than her eye above Ansel’s arm. He too had positioned himself between us. My breath caught at the hostility in their gazes. At the fear. “Coco, I’m so sorry—”
She struggled to rise. “I’ll be fine, Lou,” she said weakly.
“It was an accident. You have to believe me.” My voice broke on the last, but my heart—it broke at the tears welling in her eyes as she looked at me. She pressed a hand to her mouth to stem her sobs. “Coco, please. You know I never would’ve—would’ve never intentionally—”
Behind her, Nicholina grinned. Her inflection deepened, changed, as she said, “The Lord doth say, ‘Come, heed him, all. Pride goeth before the fall.’”
The finality of what I’d done cleaved through me, and I heard his voice. Felt his soft touch on my hair.
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