Page 27 of Blackwicket

A soft scoff. “Gone where?”

“Back to where it came from.”

This had been our song and dance the first time we’d met. Pointed questions, half answers, appeals to ignorance.

“Dark Hall?” he asked, leaning in a bare fraction as though his next question were intimate. “Can you access Dark Hall, Ms. Blackwicket?”

Damn it. I tried to pivot, to focus on the contempt I harbored for this man.

“That’s what you want, isn’t it? You want me to tell you I regularly steal curses and smuggle them to Dark Hall, confessthat I and other Curse Eaters feed the Fiend with stolen magic, bending it to our will.”

I resisted the urge to cackle theatrically to emphasize the absurdity, but restrained myself, my dignity unable to take the blow. Panic was already making me lose my senses, but he was silent, patient. Waiting for the real answer.

“The Authority wants us to be leaders of the Brom, not victims of them,” I continued, more subdued, abandoning sarcasm for dangerous honesty. “Because it would make their job of brutalizing us all the easier.”

I met his eyes.

“But you’ve never had any qualms with doing that, have you, Inspector?”

“You should be able to recognize nasty rumors when you hear them.”

He was playing the same game I was, and he was better at it.

“You’re wrong about everything,” I said, weary.

“Surely not everything,” he countered, affecting a wounded tone as he produced two gold cufflinks from thin air.

They glinted in the silvery winter light as he moved them through his fingers with smooth, practiced ease. These were the cufflinks I’d given to Brock when he’d started offering me inappropriate interest, tucked in a box with a yellow satin ribbon, toxic with curses I’d placed there myself. They’d been empty when the Authority found him, face down in his own vomit, surrounded by bottles of whiskey. But there’d been the telltale sinking of his skin, and the inquest was alive, searching for the person responsible for driving this man, who’d never once indulged in liquor, to drink himself to death.

I watched them move across Inspector Harrow’s knuckles.

“Do you have any idea what Curse Eaters are meant to do with curses, Inspector?”

He raised a brow, eyes glowing a peculiar shade, like cognac amber, his curiosity ignited.

“I’ve been told a few different stories, but why don’t you tell me yours?”

“Set them free.”

It was the most basic explanation of our core function, the directive that drove my family and others for hundreds of years, perhaps since time immemorial, when man and magic first touched and a spark ignited.

“That’s what you’re meant to do, is it?” He stopped spinning the cufflinks and leaned in so close I could smell the magic on his skin, reminiscent of frost before snow.

“Then why do you keep them in this house?” he murmured.

Though it brought my face closer to his, I lifted my chin in defiance, proof he couldn’t intimidate me. He was twice my size, but I’d grown up with monsters at my bedside.

“Ask them yourself.”

He smiled, slow and languid, inviting an inexplicable panic that gave me the courage to push past his bulk. Shoving him aside with my shoulder, I began a swift departure.

“Sleep tight, Ms. Blackwicket,” Inspector Harrow called with mock tenderness. “Don’t let the curses bite.”

Chapter Eleven

The unfeeling sun, oblivious to my sorrows, pressed between the slats of closed shutters. I hoped I’d slept an entire day, planning to stay in bed until Fiona’s funeral. But as my surroundings came into focus, I was encouraged to climb from the warm sheets and unfasten the shutters to squint in a bright wash of cold sunshine.

Photos lined the walls—rows of them, framed in gold, countless faces captured in time. Many featured people I didn’t recognize, strangers who’d entered Fiona’s life while I was gone. Everyone else appeared joyful, but Fiona’s smile was thin in each, an effort made on behalf of her companions to appear happy. In some frames, a white petal had been pressed in the corner beneath the glass like a kiss. Blackberry flowers. I glimpsed at the land outside the window, where the garden fence still stood, crooked as a cemetery gate. Blackberries had been a favorite of ours. We’d grown them every summer, with our mother producing endless sweets and pastries for guests who never came.