Page 72 of Fortress of Ambrose (House of Marionne #3)

Fifty-Seven

Quell

I toss every copy but one of Debs Daily on the estate grounds in the fire. I had them all brought to me when I opened mine this morning and saw the headline.

Wexton Family Mansion Burned to the Ground with One Confirmed Dead Inside

Jordan’s family home, the article explains, was destroyed in a sudden overnight blaze.

There is no apparent cause for the arson, it says.

Inside are the confirmed remains of a faithful father, servant of the brotherhood, and brother to House of Perl Headmistress Beaulah Perl, Richard Charles Wexton II.

Jordan’s father. There is no mention of his mother.

Only that they are still searching for remains.

When my fireplace eats the last corner of the paper, I fold the only copy and tuck it in the bottom of a drawer and exhale.

He will hear this terrible news from me.

I twist the pearls around my neck. I know he didn’t care for his father.

But this isn’t news anyone wants to hear.

The rest of the Daily is equally harrowing—more Darkbearer attacks on neighborhoods across the States.

Morgantown in West Virginia. Lexington, Kentucky.

There was one in Nashville last night. And two suburbs in central Alabama this morning.

Each is farther South.

Closer to Chateau Soleil.

He is coming.

We are not ready. There is still a hole in the gate. A rat in the walls. We don’t have anything to put the Sphere’s toushana into. There is nothing I can do, besides what I can do. And it doesn’t feel like enough.

I sit in my full black gown, as best as I can, and flip through my grandmother’s journal about her roses to do something useful.

But another book from the stack I found in the library yesterday grabs my attention: a biography on the Dragunhead.

I slide it onto my lap and read about the childhood and adolescent musings of a man who is determined to capture me.

I pull my shawl tighter around myself, when the door opens.

Jordan enters, decked out in a fine dark tux with a white bow tie at his neck.

His shoulders still hang with the deep heaviness he returned with from meeting his brother early this morning.

When I woke up, I found him in the chaise across my bedroom, staring out the window.

When I returned from breakfast, he was gone.

The drawer with the article inside it taunts me. Now does not seem like the right time. But who am I to choose that for him?

“You look lovely,” he says, but the divot between his brows betrays his attempt at appearing okay.

I cross the room to be nearer to him. “You never told me how it went with Yagrin.”

He won’t look at me. “Later. Let’s set the trap.”

I knit my fingers and fill my lungs with air. I cannot spend this entire evening with him and not mention this. I have to tell him. “Can I hold your hand?”

He stares at his before offering it to me. “Sure.”

“You don’t fear this anymore.” I lace my fingers with his.

“No.”

I wait for him to say more. For him to explain why he will tolerate brief touches confidently. Why he promises I will understand soon. But I tuck my need to know away.

“We shouldn’t delay.” He pulls the diadem with the Sphere’s magic out of his pocket. “A replica.” He twists it, its gems gleaming. “Can I see the real one again?”

We enter my grandmother’s bedroom—where we have stowed away the real diadem with the Sphere’s magic.

I unlock the door to the smaller room off her bedroom, where she once kept me.

He goes inside, and I follow, connected to him, trying to find the right words.

He grabs the real diadem and holds it beside the fake.

“They’re imperceptibly different.”

“The real one has a nick.” He shows me a spot on the edge of the headband before locking the real one back away.

Back in the living room, he sets the fake on the coffee table inside a half-opened metal box.

We release hands so I can arrange the room in a bit of disarray to make it look like I left in a rush.

“You think it will work?” he asks.

The plan is to leave my quarters unlocked with the diadem’s metal box in plain sight.

The Dragunhead wants the Sphere’s magic, and we’re serving up half of it on a silver platter.

We made the ball mandatory, after all, to pull this off.

We will watch the dance for who slips away.

We’ll follow them to catch them red-handed. “It will work.”

I pull the desk drawer open where I’ve hid the article, wrestling with withholding such urgent news. So much is riding on this diadem trap succeeding. After. I’ll tell him after the ball. Getting rid of the rat will feel like a win.

“What is that?” He peers over my shoulder.

I shove the drawer closed. But he pulls it back open and finds the folded newspaper, so small the headline is hardly readable. I snatch it away. Jordan stares at me quizzically.

“Quell?”

“I wanted to tell you later.”

“What’s happened?”

“Jordan, sit.”

He does. I sit beside him and take his hand again. He lets me, but his grip is rigid, and his palm is sweaty. I can’t think of a way to say it that sounds good. So I just spill.

“The Dragunhead has burned down the home where you grew up.” I cup his hand with both of mine. “And your father was inside at the time. He is dead.”

Jordan rips his hands from mine. The green in his eyes dulls as he glares at the folded paper in my hands.

“Did it say anything about my mother?”

“They are still looking. Jordan, I’m so sorry.” I give him another moment to say something, to ask questions, but he doesn’t move. And it only rattles my pulse more. The weight in his chest grows so heavy I feel it, and I can hardly breathe. “Would you like to read the article?” I offer it to him.

With a vacant stare, he takes it from my hands and tosses it in the fire. Then he offers me his arm. “We’re going to be late.”

The ballroom is beautifully decorated in lush dark fabrics.

Black silks billow from the ceilings, and roses from the garden fill elegant vases on the tables.

Dexler asked for my creative vision, and I told her to design it around my diadem.

I hoped it would feel more welcoming, like a powerful House with a refreshing makeover.

“Dexler really remixed things,” I say to Jordan, who is stiff on my arm, a hollowed shell. Every time I say something to him, I get a short reply.

“She did.”

Now is no different. The tables are decked out with tall centerpieces ornamented with crystal, which shimmers against the rich black fabric everywhere.

Everyone is dressed in dapper suits in all styles and radiant gowns in gorgeous patterns and colors.

Sweet music floats in the air, coming from an Audior who has to be one of Zecky’s.

A few dance. But despite the atmosphere of festivity, most linger on the perimeter of the ballroom, shuffling their feet, side-eyeing the food reception line and scarcely filled chairs.

The reality is, until an hour ago, they’d been locked in their rooms for twenty-four straight hours other than the handful of people escorted to do work in the extraction lab.

“Is everyone here?” Jordan asks. There are two sets of grand doors to the ballroom: the main entrance, which feeds into the reception line, and a pair of smaller carved doors on the north side of the ballroom, where two servers enter and exit.

Both doors are closed as the servers set out the last trays of hot food. I count each head in the room.

“Yes, every single body on the grounds is in this room.”

Willam sits at a table, picking over a biscuit on a tiny glass plate.

Knox is beside him. They don’t speak. I’ve been so busy I haven’t had time to check in with them.

Dimara is beside Knox, ripping a piece of chicken off a bone and shoving it into her mouth.

The twins and Kedd also sit at their table, staring into space, resigned.

“They are miserable, Jordan.”

“Not my problem.”

No, but sort of your fault.

I smooth my dress. Before the news tonight, he hadn’t been himself. He’s been less willing to listen, harder to compromise with, and now he won’t talk to me at all. The world is in pieces. We should be closer than ever. But I’m not sure I’ve ever felt more distant from him.

“If we want the culprit to feel safe enough sneaking off, we need to liven up this atmosphere. Dance with me.” I pull him toward the dance floor, and he refuses, rigid in place.

I am asking a lot of him after the news he just learned and clearly hasn’t processed.

“Well, keep an eye on the doors. I’m going to try to perk things up. ”

He glares at the main entrance to the ballroom.

“No one is going to try to sneak out with you standing guard like that. Grab food or sit down. At least pretend to be distracted.” I reach for his hand, and it’s ice cold, the toushana in him highly agitated.

I pull out a chair at the nearest table.

Jordan meets my eyes with a steel glare, but he sits.

I flag one of the servers to set a plate and drink in front of him.

And I hurry off to try to inspire some revelry. The first table I visit is Willam’s.

“I hope your night was alright.”

“Nice ball. Right back to the old ways, huh?” Willam eyes me warily. This is the first ball they’ve ever been to. I hadn’t considered whether they’d want to go to a ball at all. Another pair makes their way to the dance floor.

Knox dabs her mouth with a napkin. “How long will we be restricted in our rooms?”

Dimara watches with a sneer.

“I’m not sure.” I whisper to Knox, “We need to be very cautious right now.”

“Oh?” She says in a tone that is colder than her stare.

“Yes. We’ve come into some information. We need to be careful with people we don’t really know.”

“You’re perfectly fine locking us in our rooms after basically kidnapping us?” Dimara scoffs.