Page 38 of Fortress of Ambrose (House of Marionne #3)

Thirty-One

Nore

Telling Yagrin the truth couldn’t be any worse than the torture he’s going through. Nore didn’t have him the way she wanted him now. And if she told him, she still risked not having him. She had to fess up and hope for the best.

“Yagrin, I don’t think I’ve told you what I love about you.”

His brow creased. The music shifted, and they danced the next section several feet apart. The dance floor was a tapestry of ornate masks. It felt like every single one of them was looking right at her and could feel the thud of her heart pounding against her ribs.

“I’ve never met someone who despises the Order’s hypocrisy the way I do.”

They moved into the next part of the dance. He stepped backward; she stepped forward, following his steps.

“And—” Her voice cracked. “I love that you don’t look down on me because I don’t have magic. It feels like I am more beautiful to you without it. It feels like we could run away from all this together and pretend the Order, magic, none of it ever existed.”

“How do you—”

“Let me finish. I love that you are not easily fooled. You don’t wear intellect as a shield like so many in my House do.

I grew up in a world of plastic people enslaved by their need to be better than the next person.

I could care less.” She squeezed his hands.

“And you get that! No one else I’ve ever met gets that.

” Her heart sank. “When I am with you, there is no Order. Or awful mother. Or terrible brother. Or looming dead.”

He tucked his lip.

“I don’t desire magic. I decided a long time ago, I don’t need it. But if there was a magic that could make you understand how sorry I am for what I’ve done to you—” Her eyes stung.

“Nore?”

“I love you, Yagrin. I have only ever loved you. And I will always love you.” She swallowed. “Even if you can’t forgive me. Only with you have I ever felt free.”

His hands stiffened in hers. He stopped dancing. “Forgive you for what, exactly?”

When she opened her mouth to speak, shadows shifted in the distance. The skies darkened as the dead descended upon them.

Her heart banged violently in her chest.

Yagrin turned, following her gaze. “They’re here. Impossible.”

“My brother. Somehow he’s done this. They want my heart, Yagrin.”

“Your heart?”

She grabbed him by the sleeve. “Have you ever considered why Ambrose can stretch magic in ways others can’t?

Our Anatomers can change others’ faces when the rest of you can only change your own.

Our Retentors don’t just remove magic; they can repair it.

Our expansive intellect has a source.” The crowd continued dancing, a few glancing up with the expectation of rain.

“We have a Pact with our dead. They get the Headmistress’s heart, allowing them to cling to a shell of a life.

And our members get to channel their power to push magic beyond its limits. ”

His gaze widened. He let go of her hand. She hadn’t even told him the worst yet.

“But you don’t have magic—” His mouth fell open. “Your ancestors would be furious if your heart is given—”

“They’d devour me alive.” She fought tears. “My mother needs to live. They have her heart. It needs to beat forever.”

Yagrin put distance between them.

“Who knows this?”

“My brother wants to be heir. And we don’t have any female cousins anywhere near the immediate bloodline. A dozen times removed, all males. Because of that, succession would pass to him if I’m out of the way when our mother dies.”

Yagrin didn’t move. Frozen with shock.

“But he promises to bring me back to life with the Scroll after he’s secured Headship.”

“Bullshit.”

“He might actually mean it, but I’m not taking any chances. I told you before, people get one time to show me who they are. If he would kill me, his own sister, I can’t be sure he’d bring me back. Or what my condition would even be after.”

“He’s not going to kill you. He’s not even going to touch you.”

“If they are here, he has to be.” An audience of masks watched them.

How many of them knew her brother was out for her blood, like Shar had?

Did Litze summon Ellery? Getting the ancestors to cross the threshold is probably what delayed him here.

Yagrin pulled her closer. Her stomach knotted.

The next admission she made would rip him away from her forever.

But she’d been this truthful, she owed him the rest.

“Ellery could be anyone on this dance floor,” she said, studying the ornate make-up, which even without Anatomer magic was a perfect disguise. The music played sweetly. She grimaced.

“He is here somewhere, daughter,” said a voice that felt like a dagger in her back.

Nore turned to face her mother. Isla Ambrose—or someone who looked like her—stood in front of her with a decorative party mask on her face and a plain gray gown dangling at her feet. Nore blinked.

“May I cut in?” she asked Yagrin.

His grip on her tightened. “Sorry, I really like this song.”

“Nore, I came here to help you,” her mother pleaded.

But Nore grabbed Yagrin’s hand and exposed his palm. “Show me the truth.”

He got her meaning and unleashed darkness, dripping destructive magic from his fingers. Her mother gasped as his toushana grazed Isla’s skin with a hiss. But no disguise was torn away. It was actually her. Isla cupped her cheek where the dark magic burned her skin ever so slightly.

“I swear it’s me.”

Litze Oralia joined them on the dance floor with a stern expression.

“I’ve done what you asked,” she said to Isla, who held out her hand in response. Litze pulled out a brittle piece of old stained paper and handed it to her mother. Nore’s heart leapt. The Scroll!

“Where’s my son?” Isla asked.

Litze flapped a hand in the air. “You’re a poor ad-lib in a flawless script.

This is a party. Please take your family matters elsewhere.

I’ve done what my ancestors were sworn to.

I kept the piece safe and delivered it to you, specifically, by request.” She wiped her hands together. “I am finished with this mess.”

“If you’re here to help me,” I told my mother, “let me see that Scroll piece.”

But Isla tucked it into her dress pocket before Nore could snatch it.

“Neither you nor Ellery can be trusted with this very dangerous magic. You are both behaving like petulant children. You will honor the rules of our House and do your duty. Or so help me, Sovereign, Sage, and Wielder, I will disinherit you both.”

“Do me the favor,” Nore said. “Please.”

“You wouldn’t do that to me, Mother.” Ellery’s voice curdled Nore’s blood.

Her brother lifted a decorative mask with sequins and gems off his face, and Nore realized he’d been dancing around them for some time.

Watching, plotting, waiting. She needed that Scroll piece from her mother and the one he had on him. Then she needed to get out of there!

When the dead sauntered onto the dance floor, the music came to a screeching halt. Some guests fled, but a small crowd watched as if they were enthralled by some kind of show.

“I am your true favorite.” Ellery gestured at the audience for them to laugh. And they did.

Yagrin stiffened beside her.

“We should show gratitude to Headmistress Oralia and her hospitality by leaving this dance floor,” Isla said.

“And rob them of the performance of their lifetimes?” Ellery clapped. His dark exuberance twisted Nore’s spine. “We’re going to give these loons a show,” he told her under his breath.

Nerves cinched in her gut.

“The tension is masterful,” someone uttered from the crowd. Nore looked for Litze or Drew, but she didn’t see either of them. She scanned for an exit, standing closer to her mother, eyeing the pocket she’d stuck the Scroll in, wondering where Ellery had hidden his.

“Ellery.” Her mother glared. “You said you wanted to come here together to ensure things ran smoothly. We are leaving.” Her mother started to storm off, but Ellery didn’t budge. He only had eyes for Nore. A flash of silver inside his sleeve caught her eye.

She stepped backward at the sight of the blade.

“You have half of what we want. I don’t see any reason we can’t work together,” Yagrin said, a protective arm around her waist.

“Wexton. Your reputation precedes you.” Her brother sneered at her. “This is who you’ve spent your time with?”

He knew Red loved someone, but until this moment he hadn’t known who. Ellery’s lips curled, and when he reached for her face with his hand, she almost wished it was the blade. He dragged his magic down the slope of her nose, and she tried to pull away. But he gripped her by the back of the hair.

“You’ve lived a half life, pretending. That’s not freedom, sister.”

He held her roughly and forced her still while he changed her face. Red’s pouted lips. Red’s deeper-red ringlets. Her cheeks. Her shoulders. All of Nore became the dead girl again.

Yagrin uttered a sound that made Nore’s heart stammer.

He stumbled backward and gaped at her. Pale.

“You—”

“I was about to tell you.”

“Plans have changed,” Ellery said.

Pain ripped down her back. She gritted her teeth, refusing to give him the enjoyment of hearing her scream.

“We have all the pieces; we can work together,” she said. “You’re my brother. My safe person. My escape from her.” She jabbed a finger in her mother’s direction, and the tears rolling down Red’s cheeks felt like flames.

Ellery dug out the Scroll piece from Perl and the half piece from their House.

Yagrin cocked his head, feeling his own pockets for the parts they had.

Nore eyed the piece in her mother’s fist. She considered all four of them.

She could picture them side by side. Together they formed a piece of parchment.

But with a hole in the middle.

For a fifth piece.

The world dented at its edges. She couldn’t think. What did that mean?

“We are not done,” her brother said. “The pieces are in each of the Houses. All the Houses.”

Her body rocked in his grip. No! She hadn’t considered it.

“Duncan?” How did you find a relic in a House that’s been disbanded for generations? Her pulse raced. He glared at her. Without the Scroll he couldn’t bring her back to life, but he could still kill her, right now, and become Headmaster.

“I thought you loved me,” she forced out.

“I do. And I love this House. More than you love the House, clearly.” The dead handed him something reminiscent of a glove but made of shadows. He slipped it over his hand. She couldn’t breathe.

“You’re blinded by your pain, little sister. I’m freeing you.”

Ellery moved his gloved hand in a circular motion. The air glowed in a way she’d never seen. Then he shoved his shadowed hand into her chest. Her body shook as he gripped her heart and pulled it out.

The audience gasped. Nore had forgotten they were there. Someone screamed in horror, and people fled in every direction.

“No!” Isla screamed, an earsplitting shriek. She blinked, then blinked again, eyes widening as if she was seeing for the first time.

Nore’s vision blurred.

The world dimmed.

The dead took her heart from her brother’s hands and placed it in a glass box. Her mother’s heart vanished the moment Nore’s entered. Ellery smirked. Isla gasped for air. The last thing she remembered was her mother falling on top of her with a face full of tears.