by Nyna Queen
Darken froze. “Did you invite him?”
Stephane lowered his hands and gave him a look reserved for the mentally challenged.
“Great Mother forbid! I’m glad things have finally calmed down a little and Maxwell and Josepha are taking it so well. Last thing I need is for him to run through the house and get everybody riled up again. You know how he is.” His expression was slightly tormented. “And he can’t keep a secret to save his life.”
Darken grimaced. Imagining the spider and their little brother under the same roof … not a good idea.
Tyler was a good kid who had his heart in the right place, he really was, but he was also a walking disaster. At twenty-four, the boy had no restraint and even less consideration. He always meant well—but by meaning well, he usually screwed things up on an epic scale.
It wasn’t easy for him, Darken reflected. As the last born, he had always stood in the shadow of his elder brothers: Stephane was the family’s pride and joy, the figurehead of their grandeur and achievements. And Darken himself, due to his caste, had also always received his fair share of attention, whether he wanted it or not. And then there was the little straggler who didn’t seem able to do anything right and who didn’t even have a particular strong magical talent to put in the balance. Within three years he had already dropped out of four different study courses, managed to get himself convicted for taking part in a bar brawl last summer, and caused their mother no end of distress.
Darken walked over to the cabinet, got out a decanter of whiskey and filled two glasses. Stephane accepted the offered glass with a grateful nod and Darken perched on the armrest of the couch, swirling the golden liquid.
“What did you tell him?”
Steph made a vague gesture. “I said that the children needed rest for now.” He took a great gulp of whiskey. “I’ll arrange a visit in a couple of days when the waves have calmed a little,” he added. “At the townhouse or in the park. We better not involve him in any of this—for all our sakes. The fewer people who know, the better anyway.”
“That’s actually what I wanted to talk to you about.” Darken leaned forward, his eyes gaining a slight crimson sheen. “Too many people know about it already.”
Steph looked up sharply. “Whom are you concerned about?”
Darken slowly took a sip of whiskey, savoring the wooden taste with a faint hint of honey in it. “How much can the household be trusted?”
His brother stiffened. “I’d trust them with my life.”
Darken’s voice became a soft, vicious croon. “Along with the lives of your children?”
Steph’s brow furrowed with annoyance. “I’ve known most of them for decades, Darken. They’ve all been working for the family for at least a couple of years, without exception. You know this. Their loyalty is out of the question.”
“Is it?” Darken let his fingers slowly run along the rim of the glass, trailing the gentle curve. “That was a secure line that I used when I contacted you from Blayde’s hotel in the Pacified Zone. Those are not entirely impossible to tap but … it usually requires access to at least one of the communication devices.” His gaze gained an intense, predatory focus. “What device did you use when we spoke that night?”
For the first time, his brother looked uncomfortable. “My portable vis-a.”
Figured. “Do you have it on you?”
Hesitantly, Stephane reached into his pockets and took out the convex, silver three-inch disk. He placed it upon Darken’s outstretched palm.
Delicate arcane symbols covered the smooth surface. Darken applied the appropriate pressure to both sides while moving his hand counterclockwise. The device opened with a soft whir, displaying a glowing heart of blue energy running along silver wires. And there, almost invisible, except to the trained eye, was a tiny, transparent gel flake veined with hair-thin, silver metal threads.
“Look at you,” Darken purred, plucking out the little magic sigil and holding it out on the tip of his little finger. “You’ve been bugged, old son.”
Detached from its base the spell-bug used up the last of its magic charge, biting at Darken’s fingers, and then crumpled together, dead. A snarl pulled Stephane’s lips away from his teeth, giving the impression that he wanted to bite something—or someone.
“Who had access to your vis-a?” Darken asked. Stephane shrugged uneasily. “It could have been anyone, really—here, or at the townhouse, or even at the parliament …” He spread his fingers wide. “I don’t keep it on me all the time. I mostly leave it on my table …”
“Not anymore.” Darken’s hand closed around the disk, putting pressure on it until the crystalline silver metal cracked. Who knew what other kinds of magic tampering had been done with it? He dropped the mutilated tool on the table, a crushed mess of metal and glowing blue wires. “I’ll get you a new one. Carry it on you at all times. Don’t let anybody else touch it. No exceptions.”
Stephane nodded, looking slightly pale.
Having almost suspected something like this, Darken was glad he had been careful not to share any vital information, especially any information about Alex, during their last call. A stitch in time …
“You do seem right about Helton’s household, though.” Darken picked up the gossamer papers from the glass table and shuffled through them with his thumb. “I checked the relevant modules of the security surveillance logs with Chief Captain Mighell.”
His brother’s head of security had been more than accommodating, anxious to avoid any more casualties from his ranks. “There have been no outgoing calls or other transmissions from the estate since we arrived—except for Jayne calling her sick father—and nobody crossed the ward border of the estate, either in or out, only you and Edalyne and your entourage when you arrived.”
In addition, he had taken each and every one of the residing staff to task after their discussion earlier that day. If any of them had been involved in the events, he doubted they would have been able to hide their guilt under his rather … insistent … scrutiny. It would likely result in them avoiding him even more but that was a price he had been willing to pay in exchange for some clarity.
“I’ve also spoken in length with Hector. He was the last one who talked to Captain Camrryn before they left with the family coaches. Camrryn had told him that he’d been instructed to collect us at the Pacified Zone.”
Stephane frowned. “By whom?”
“He didn’t say, and Hector assumed it must have been you. After all, who else could it have been?” He nodded at the crumpled halves of the vis-aural emitter. “Someone might have used the connection over the spell-bug. In any case, there is an informant among our ranks and we need to find out who it is. In the meantime, we need to be extremely careful. If any of this leaks …”
He didn’t need to voice that their little scheme would fall apart before it had even started and they would all be in great jeopardy, with Alex leading the way to the gallows.
Stephane downed the rest of his drink. “Eady and I will talk to Captain Mighell tonight regarding security protocol. And with Hector and Elsbeth. As I said, I trust our servants explicitly but it won’t hurt if these two inculcate them once more. And tomorrow, we will contact Maxwell and Josepha’s school and take them out for the rest of the term. The summer holidays start in two weeks anyway. I don’t think anybody will see this as an odd request, considering what’s happened, and I’ll sleep better knowing they are here and well protected.”
“A sensible measure,” Darken agreed. “And it will prevent those two from telling their friends about their ‘adventures,’” he noted with a hint of a smile, thinking about Max in particular.
Steph grunted in reply. “Also, I was under the impression that Josepha wanted to help with the spider’s preparation for the ball.” There was a slight frown on his face.
“Your daughter is certainly … committed in this,” Darken said carefully, remembering only too well how she had refused to stop the healing, even at the risk of her he
alth. Well, there was no need to give his brother all the details right now.
“The fact that she made a stand for the spider today, hasn’t gone unnoticed,” Stephane said. “Maxwell is a whirlwind, a ray of sunshine. Everybody likes him and it isn’t overly difficult to win his affection—though I must admit, he seems rather dotty about the spider.”
Darken smirked. “He’s a ten-year-old boy. Remember when you were that age? Only the appearance of a flesh-and-blood dragon could trump having a real-life shaper in the house.”
“True,” Stephane said ruefully. “However, my point is, Josepha has always been cut from a different cloth. She was always shy and more guarded. Her trust isn’t easily won, and the fact that the shaper managed to win it, clearly speaks in her favor as far as I’m concerned.” He rubbed his neck and then shook his head.
“A shaper, go figure. If anybody would ever have told me that I would once be hosting one of the creatures of the night in my house, I would have laughed him out of court. And now look at us—planning to take her to the most renowned elite gathering there is, right under the nose of the prime himself.” His gold-green eyes narrowed. “Do you think she can do what she claims she can? You know, the things she said about her shaper abilities?”
“Brother, I’ve seen this woman climb the walls of Gomorrha with nothing but her bare hands,” Darken said dryly. “So, yes, I’m pretty sure that she can.” Whether she could keep her sharp tongue in check long enough to pass as a trueborn lady, that was another matter altogether.
“And do you think we can trust her?”
Darken put down his glass. Cards on the table. “Yes, I think we can trust her.”
“You seem extremely sure of that.”
Darken showed him the edge of his teeth. “You would agree that it is considerably difficult to hide your true colors from someone like me, wouldn’t you?”
His brother gave him a long, careful look. “Generally.”
Generally. Unless personal feelings were involved? No, his feelings had nothing to do with his assessment of Alex’s trustworthiness. Or did they?
“If nothing else, you can trust her motives,” he said, ignoring the unasked question beneath his brother’s words. “For her, there is a lot on the line if we don’t get this sorted out. No hideout in the world will ever truly keep her out of reach of the realm’s long arm of the law, not with a crime like this. And, frankly, regarding your shaper policy, it would be most beneficial for her if you were to become the governor of the South. She’s got a lot to lose and much to gain.”
“Don’t hold back.”
Darken grimaced. “You haven’t spent the past couple of days with her. I have. She had no reason to help Maxwell and Josepha in the first place, but she did. And when I found them, she attacked me.”
His brother had the gall to laugh. “She attacked you and that makes you trust her?”
Darken scowled and muttered something uncomplimentary which only made his brother laugh harder.
“She attacked me, Steph, a forfeit, one of Death’s Servants, to protect a pair of children she had no particular attachment to. She could have run, yet she chose to stay and fight. A fight she couldn’t be sure to win—and I almost killed her for it. And after that, she risked her life several more times to keep them safe.” The memory of her squirming body on the metal cot in the Duke’s laboratory brought a shiver of heated revulsion over him. He crossed his arms. “You said it yourself: she made quite an impression on the children.”
“Only on them?”
Darken gave his brother a sharp glance. “What are you implying?”
Stephane was the picture of perfect innocence. “Oh, nothing. Nothing at all.” He cleared his throat, obviously searching for something else to say. “I had a feeling the spider was a little … incensed by the way we decided to include her in our operation.”
“Incensed? I have no idea what you are talking about. She was on her best behavior today.”
His brother’s eyebrows arched upward. “If that was her best, I don’t want to know what her worst is like.”
Oh, I’m sure you’ll find out.
“Well, I suppose we shouldn’t gripe,” Darken said, feeling slightly irritated on the spider’s behalf. “She came here expecting to be free of all this”—and of him? a gnawing voice wondered at the back of his mind, which he ruthlessly silenced—“and now she is stuck in this place and has to deal with all these trueborn people who are, by nature, highly suspicious of her kind. That alone would give anyone a pause.”
“And she hasn’t even had the worst of it yet,” Stephane said.
Darken tensed. Stephane’s mouth twitched just slightly. “Tomorrow she will meet Mother.”
A wry smile curved Darken’s lips. “Poor Alex. She has no idea what she’s gotten herself into.”
CHAPTER FIVE
JUST what have I gotten myself into?
Alex tiptoed down the corridor of the dark mansion, careful not to make any noise. It was still before dawn and the house was as silent as a graveyard. Yet silence could be deceptive. And she had absolutely no desire to run into anybody right now. Especially not one of the Dubois family. Specifically not Darken or his choleric madman of a brother.
Alex scowled. Last night’s dinner was still stuck in her bones and she had not the slightest clue how she would survive breakfast in the same room with those two atrocities who called themselves the Dubois brothers. Dealing with one of them was bad enough. Both of them together …
Alex shuddered.
Compared to them a pack of wolves seemed tame. They hunted like one, too. One of them would run at you at full speed, snarling and howling arguments, and when you tried to turn and flee, you’d find that the other one had snuck up behind you, baring his teeth and preventing your escape. Together they were like an avalanche: fast, destructive, and impossible to predict.
No, she definitely wasn’t ready to face either of them this morning. Or anybody else for that matter. At least, not until she’d had a giant mug of coffee.
Alex rounded a corner and stopped in front of a plain wooden door. If she remembered correctly from her little “guided tour” yesterday, this should be the kitchen. Carefully pushing down the handle, she poked her head inside—and released a tiny breath of relief. It was the kitchen, and, thankfully, it was empty. True, it was early, but with these trueborns and their opulent breakfasts, you never knew.
Alex slipped inside and gently closed the door behind her. Like all the rooms she'd seen so far at the country mansion, this one was modern, with a touch of country house charm to it. Ivory cupboards with glowing wooden worktops formed a U-shaped counter surrounding a big freestanding cooking island, which, in itself, was bigger than her entire kitchen in the Bin. Everything was meticulously clean and orderly, each kitchen appliance and device in its own spot, with not a speck of dust marring the place.
On the right-hand side, a long table was already set with dishes and cutlery for breakfast—perhaps ready for the staff before they began their morning chores.
Although nobody was in sight, some gracious soul must have already been awake, since a window had been left open to let in some fresh air, and the rich scent of freshly brewed coffee wafted through the kitchen. Mhmm. Alex inhaled deeply. Just as she’d hoped.
Alex padded over to the fancy magic-fueled coffee maker. After a little rummaging through the cabinets, she found a big mug and filled it to the rim.
At the end of the room, huge, outrageously clean windows were overlooking a vast backyard, bordered in the distance by tall pines, cedars, and firs. Clasping her mug, Alex slid open the screen door and stepped outside onto the terrace in her slippers.
The air was crisp with the chill of early morning. The rising sun had only just begun to gently burn through the haze that still hung between the trees like ghosts wrapping their translucent white arms around their trunks, unwilling to fade.
Sipping her coffee, Alex strolled to the edge of the flagstones. The per
fectly mowed lawn was covered by a blanket of morning dew, a silver shadow coating the world that would soon yield to the golden breath of morning. A spider had woven its delicate web in a colorful flowerbed and in the first rays of the morning sun, dewdrops sparkled along its gossamer threads like a string of transparent pearls; a snapshot of natural beauty, on the verge of fading. Alex stared at the unspoiled perfection and for some unknown reason, it made her heart ache. Her life might be chaos, but here, at this moment, in this place, peace still reigned, calm and unimpressed by the craziness of the world out there. A world in which children were abducted because their parents had ambitions and people were murdered for no other reason than that they had been born with the wrong skin. This display of passing beauty was a painful reminder of the brittle quality of her own life that, only a day ago, had hung by a thread just as silken and delicate as this one.
It finally sunk in. Against all odds, she was still alive.
The question was, for how long?
The full weight of her semi-voluntary commitment settled on Alex’s shoulders and she swayed, stumped by the immensity of her foolishness. Attending some royal trueborn ball? And not just any ball. The Summerball. At the Royal Palace. She must be out of her fucking mind! What could go wrong with a slum-born shaper waltzing through a place filled with the elite of the realm and their itchy-fingered-trigger-happy bodyguards?
Well, you suggested this ludicrous scheme, sugar.
Yes, right, she had suggested crashing the party, but she’d pictured her own involvement quite differently. Not to go … not to actually pretend …
You can still run, sugar.
Yeah, into the arms of the next guardaí patrol, perhaps. Outside of these walls, she’d relinquish the last bit of safety she had. After all, she was still wanted for murder. And even if Stephane declared her dead in an upcoming press conference—obliterated by Darken’s outburst outside the Pacified Zone as they had agreed would be the best line of action for their plan to work—where exactly would she go? She couldn’t go back to her old life in the Bin or anywhere near it. Some other halfborn slum somewhere in the Southern Provinces, then. But no matter where she went, she’d have to stay out of trouble. Which was never going to happen. Not with her track record. And yet she’d have to. Because if she ever came to the attention of the law again, this whole thing would whip back at her like a boomerang studded with lethal spikes. It would always hover above her neck, like the Jester’s scythe-shaped fool’s scepter, waiting for a moment of carelessness to strike.