Crimson Bound

by Rosamund Hodge

  “No.” She drew her knife. He didn’t move—his eyes didn’t even flicker back at her—but his sudden, wary stillness sliced through her. She was sick of being the reason that people were wary.

  “You said Prince Hugo found a door above the sun and below the moon. Do you think you could find it too?”

  Then he did look at her. “Why? What do you want with it?”

  “That is not your concern, monsieur. But if you refuse, I’ll tell Erec what you can do and that you need even closer watching. Good luck recruiting worshippers after that.”

  But the threat seemed to make him relax. His shoulders loosened and he smiled at her as he tilted his head back and said, “Go ahead.”

  UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

  HarperCollins Publishers

  ..................................................................

  Of course she didn’t tell Erec. She couldn’t, because if Erec knew that Armand had—whatever connection to the Forest it was that he had—then he would want to find a way to use it, either for the King or for himself. And then Rachelle would never get a chance to quietly drag away Armand and make him open the door for her.

  She wasn’t getting a chance anyway.

  “I’m going to kill you,” she told Armand that evening. “If you don’t help me, I will kill you.”

  He waited a moment. And then smiled. “That’s not a good enough threat, you know.”

  It wasn’t a threat at all. Rachelle had killed once in cold blood; she couldn’t do it again. Staring at Armand, she felt sure that he knew she couldn’t do it again.

  Rachelle was the second-strongest bloodbound in service to the King and she had nothing to threaten with, nothing to bargain with. She could fight a whole pack of woodspawn by herself and win, but she couldn’t force one irritating courtier to do her will. All she could do was spend the night searching by herself, then trail after Armand, pretending to care if he lived or died.

  Bloodbound didn’t need as much sleep as normal humans, but it had been days since she’d slept more than four hours. Her head wouldn’t stop aching. It didn’t help that there were no gaps in Armand’s schedule that day. He dragged her from one court function to another, where people tittered at rumors of failing crops and laughed at the suggestion of Endless Night.

  By the time they ended up at the after-dinner party, where the nobles were all wagering at cards, Rachelle was starting to think that Endless Night might not be so bad. At least there would be no giggling. Screams and blood and dying, yes, but no polite little giggles.

  The blood would flow across the parquet flooring and soak into the seams of the little wooden panels. The same way the blood had soaked into the floor of Aunt Léonie’s cottage.

  Rachelle had been hoping that the forestborn would hurt the people around her the same way her own forestborn had once hurt Aunt Léonie. She’d imagined it happening and she had liked it. She felt sick.

  They were standing near the table where the King played—very badly—with la Fontaine and a gaggle of other nobles. At last, after a round of particularly hideous losses, he flung down his cards with a rattling cough that everyone ignored.

  “I’ve had my fill for the night,” he said. “A good game, cards. Trains the mind.” He rose and patted Armand on the shoulder; Rachelle suspected she was the only one who saw Armand’s wince, and for a moment she felt sorry for him.

  “A battlefield of wits,” drawled a tall, muscular young man with long dark curls.

  Rachelle recognized him: Vincent Angevin, one of the King’s nephews and very likely the person sending assassins after Armand. He was also likely the next heir to the throne, if his royal uncle ever got done pretending to be immortal.

  “Such a pity you haven’t the wherewithal to join us,” Vincent went on, looking at Armand’s hands, and then ruffled his hair. “But it would hardly be proper for a saint to gamble, would it?”

  Two of the ladies at the table giggled. La Fontaine snapped her fan open. Vincent chuckled and slapped Armand’s back. “Preach me a sermon when I’m done winning, cousin.” He grinned at the room: the lazy, mischievous grin of somebody who knew he could get away with being cruel.

  Rachelle had known a boy who smiled like that, back in her village. For years he had charmed all the adults while beating the younger children bloody. Without meaning to, she edged closer to Armand. She was sure she was the only one who saw the very slight way that his chin raised and his shoulders set.

  “I haven’t heard that card games are a sin,” he said. “I’ll play a round if Mademoiselle Brinon will hold my cards for me.”

  “I don’t—” Rachelle started.

  “Just do what I say.” Armand sat himself down at the table. “Well? Will you deal me a hand?”

  Vincent smiled expansively. “I can’t deny you any consolation, dear cousin. Play with us, if it comforts you.”

  La Fontaine dealt out the cards. Rachelle picked them up. She could read the numerals well enough, but they were decorated with various other symbols and figures that meant nothing to her.

  “Let me see,” said Armand, leaning over her shoulder.

  “Pity Raoul isn’t here,” said Vincent. “I seem to remember him always helping you when you got in trouble.”

  “Where is Monsieur Courtavel?” asked one of the ladies. “We all miss him.”

  Raoul Courtavel was another of the King’s illegitimate sons. He was widely considered a contender for the throne, despite his famously not getting along with his father, because he was enormously popular with the people for fighting pirates in the Mare Nostrum. Rachelle did not much care about the pirates—safe trade routes meant nothing when the daylight was dying—but at least Raoul Courtavel had never called for the bloodbound to be exterminated. He’d also never tried to recruit any of them as his personal retainers, which Vincent apparently had.

  “I believe Raoul is still resting at his country estate,” said Armand, “ever since Father told him that he was overworking himself.” He looked at the cards, then at the faces of the other players. “Put that one down,” he said, pointing at the leftmost card in her hands.

  Rachelle never worked out exactly what the rules of the game were, except that some of the cards could be laid down, some could be demanded from another player’s hand, and some must be held on to at all costs. But what she realized very quickly was that players were allowed to lie about their hands—except when they weren’t—and that successful bluffing was the only way to win.

  Armand smiled politely, lied through his teeth, and in ten minutes he had won all the money that everyone else had put down on the table.

  “A marvelous conquest,” said la Fontaine. “Clearly fortune favors the holy.”

  “Or the—” Vincent Angevin cut off whatever he’d been about to say. He shoved back his chair instead and bowed stiffly. “Good evening.” Then he was gone.

  “I do believe that’s a miracle itself,” said la Fontaine. “Vincent Angevin, leaving the gambling table before dawn.” She rapped Armand’s silver hand with her fan. “You still have not come to my salon. You will be there tomorrow morning, I command it.”

  “If the King permits it,” said Armand, not looking at Rachelle.

  “You too, Mademoiselle Brinon,” said la Fontaine. “You must be there.”

  “I’m his bodyguard,” said Rachelle. “Of course I have to follow him.”

  She stared grimly at the cards scattered across the table and tried not to remember la Fontaine finding her in the King’s outer chambers.

  “I mean as a guest,” said la Fontaine. “I’ll insist to my lord, if you need a royal order.”

  It was probably some bizarre scheme to humiliate her. But she couldn’t afford to get in any trouble with the King.

  “You can call me a guest if you like,” she said.

  The next morning, Amélie looked her in the eye and said, “You’re going to wear a dress this time. You’re going to wear a dress and let me paint your
face, and no, you don’t get a choice about it.”

  “I’m not there as a guest,” Rachelle muttered.

  “Yes, you are,” said Amélie. “A page delivered a note last night. She officially invited you, and that means a dress and cosmetics.”

  “She wants to humiliate me,” said Rachelle. “That means it doesn’t matter what I wear.”

  Amélie clapped her hands. “Then you’ll just have to be more beautiful than her.”

  What does it matter? Rachelle thought. The world is ending and I’m trapped attending parties.

  But then Amélie met her eyes and said quietly, “We had a bargain.”

  If the world was ending, she owed it to Amélie to keep her promise and let her do what she loved.

  And that was how Rachelle ended up sitting in a chair by the table full of little pots and brushes. Amélie, standing beside her, picked up a brush and set it down again. She put two fingers on each of Rachelle’s temples and slowly tilted her head from side to side, scrutinizing her face. Then she let go and bit her lip.

  “Something wrong?” asked Rachelle.

  “The question is,” said Amélie, sounding like she had just come to the end of a long speech, “are you brave enough?”

  “What?”

  “I can’t make you beautiful,” said Amélie. “I’m going to give you the most beautiful makeup you’ve ever seen, but if you just sit under it and—and wilt, you’ll look pathetic. It’s like a sword. If you don’t wield it, then it isn’t any use to you. And it’s all right if you want to look pathetic most of the time, but this is my one chance to show anyone what I can do, so you are not going to ruin it. Understood?”

  “Do I usually look pathetic?”

  “No,” said Amélie, “but you do get a look of terror when I talk to you about dresses.”

  “I’m not . . . I don’t know how to be a lady,” said Rachelle. “If you wanted that, you should have gotten someone else.”

  “No,” said Amélie. “I don’t want anyone else. Just walk into that salon and defy them. Promise?”

  “All right,” said Rachelle after a moment. The words I don’t want anyone else drummed through her head, desperately comforting. Amélie didn’t know everything Rachelle had done, so it should be no comfort at all to be wanted by her, but it was.

  “Good.” Amélie nodded sharply. Then she raised her voice and called, “Sévigné!”

  The chambermaid—a short, plump woman with a few gray hairs peeking out from under her cap—appeared at Amélie’s side, and they had a short, swift discussion in low voices, Amélie frequently jabbing a brush at Rachelle’s face to make a point. Then Amélie unbraided Rachelle’s hair and first piled it loosely on top of her head, next pulled it all back so tightly her scalp felt stretched. Sévigné clucked her tongue, took hold of Rachelle’s hair, and seemed to do exactly the same thing—but it set off another little flurry of discussion.

  Rachelle didn’t listen to what they said; they were speaking in half sentences about things she didn’t understand anyway. She let the patter of their words wash over her. They were both talking as if she weren’t there, which was something that normally drove her to distraction. But they were talking about how to use her face and body for a canvas, and it made her feel oddly treasured.

  When the consultation was over, Sévigné bustled off while Amélie went to work with the makeup. She gripped Rachelle’s face, tilted it, and started painting on the foundation with quick little strokes like a cat lapping up milk.

  The tension unspooled from Rachelle’s shoulders and the weariness seeped out of her bones. The Forest and the Devourer stopped mattering. The world had narrowed down to just this: the warm pressure of Amélie’s fingers tilting her head. The tickle of the brush. The soft sound of Amélie’s lips opening—she was forever clicking her tongue and making faces while she worked, nose wrinkling or mouth scrunching to one side.

  Then came the dusting of pearl powder. Then the rouge, which Amélie applied with her fingertips, rubbing it into Rachelle’s cheeks. Then the burned clove brushed into her eyebrows to darken them.

  “Can you cover the mark?” Rachelle asked abruptly as Amélie finished with her eyebrows.

  “No,” said Amélie. “If I cake on that much powder, it will just flake off. Besides, the mark matches your dress and the patch I’m going to put on your face.” She held up a tiny black velvet star. “Did you know there’s a language to patches?”

  “No,” Rachelle said warily. “What does a star mean?”

  “Assassin.”

  “What?”

  Amélie laughed. “Actually, it means ‘courage.’” She dabbed glue on the patch, set it on Rachelle’s right cheekbone, and then pressed it in with her thumb. “I wouldn’t put anything on your face that wasn’t true.”

  “You just covered my face with nineteen kinds of paint,” said Rachelle. “I don’t think there’s anything true left on it.”

  “Three kinds of paint. Look at me and open your mouth.” Rachelle obeyed, and Amélie started to paint rouge on her lips. “And don’t ever talk about my art that way. I’m not painting you to hide you. I’m painting you because you’re beautiful.” She wiped her thumb under Rachelle’s lip to clear away a smudge. “There. All done.” She handed the mirror to Rachelle. “This is just the beginning.”

  Once again, a lady stared back from the mirror. She still looked entirely false; but this time Rachelle looked at her and thought, Amélie believes I deserve to look beautiful.

  It was a strangely intoxicating feeling, and as the preparations went on, she only felt more drunk: the same dizzy exultation, the feeling that her body was lighter than air and no longer quite attached to her.

  Sévigné descended upon her, and once she had molded Rachelle’s hair into suitable ringlets—muttering all the while about how there wasn’t enough time—she looped it up on top of her head with pink ribbons and pearl-ended pins.

  The corset was very different from the simple stays Rachelle usually wore under her shirt: not as uncomfortable as she’d expected, but far stranger. It pressed into her ribs but also straightened her spine; though it was maddeningly confining, it felt like it added inches to her height and made her float off the ground.

  And then came the dress itself: deep rose silk that fell about her body in luscious folds. The puffed sleeves were slashed to show white silk underneath, and strings of silk flowers tightened the sleeves around her elbows. With all the shifts and petticoats beneath, it was the heaviest garment that Rachelle had ever worn, wrapping her like a suit of armor; yet the neckline dipped wide and low, barely clinging to her shoulders. Not only did it expose more of her breasts than anyone had ever seen, but it showed off to all the world the bloodred star at the base of the throat.

  Rachelle looked in the mirror at the star and its echo on her cheek, and she thought, Amélie says it means courage.

  “Here’s your fan,” said Amélie, putting it in her hand.

  “Thank you,” said Rachelle, and went to get Armand. The little arched heels of her shoes gave her steps a strange, rocking rhythm that she’d never felt before.

  Armand was waiting in his sitting room, standing with his back to the wall, arms loose at his sides, mouth bunched in a wry half smile.

  Erec stood beside him.

  “What do you want?” Rachelle demanded, trying desperately not to think of how low her dress was cut and completely failing.

  “My lady,” he said, stepping forward and bowing. “I am here to escort you to the salon.”

  “You’re not invited,” said Rachelle.

  “I think you’ll find I’m invited most places.” He took her hand and kissed it.

  She wanted to protest, but he would only laugh. And Rachelle had decided long ago that she could bear the occasional mockery for the sake of his friendship.

  “I think you turn up most places, and people can’t be bothered to chase you out,” she said. “But come along if you please.”

  UNCORRECTED E
-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

  HarperCollins Publishers

  ..................................................................

  Of course Erec had to put her hand on his arm so they could make a grand entrance together. Rachelle didn’t fight him over it. Once they were inside la Fontaine’s sitting room, he would doubtless find five other girls—prettier than her and more elegant as well—and forget her, leaving her in peace.

  But when they stepped through the doorway, Rachelle was the one who briefly forgot him. The sitting room was impressive enough by itself: it was quite large, with a ceiling painted like the sky and walls covered in murals of rolling green hills and shepherds. (She thought they must be shepherds because of their crooks, though the lounging, silk-draped youths looked nothing like the actual shepherds she had known. But the other option was bishops, and that seemed even less likely.) La Fontaine, though, had transformed the room into a garden. There were potted trees of every kind: apple and oak, orange and palm. Roses grew among them—southern woodwives used roses in their charms, but Rachelle doubted that la Fontaine knew enough about actual country life for it to be a conscious allusion.

  There were no sun or moons painted or sculpted anywhere. She was so used to checking rooms, she hardly noticed she was doing it.

  The guests, sitting on little cushioned stools, for a moment really did look like they were figures from the idyllic murals come to life. Then they all turned to stare and whisper behind their fans, and Rachelle remembered that she was an intruder in this perfect, pastoral world. She was a wolf among porcelain sheep, and Erec would probably tell her that ought to make her unafraid, but her skin crawled when she saw their eyes turning to her.

  The room flurried to life as five or six of the guests converged on Armand. Rachelle noticed his shoulders tense as they bore down upon him, and for one instant her own body sparked with the readiness to fight—but then he was smiling and nodding to the flock gathered around him, and she realized he had only been preparing himself to charm and lie.