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CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

From the District to the Deucalion

They didn’t celebrate Morrigan’s birthday at the Hotel Deucalion the next day, nor the one after. There were too many police interviews and serious conversations to be had. Too much sleep to catch up on. Too many surprise visitors to see. (Well, three.)

Louis and Lottie St James appeared on the first night of Basking. They’d snuck out via the lintel chain and taken the Wunderground (for the first time ever) all the way to Humdinger Avenue, just to deliver the freshest Silverborn scandal.

‘Guess where Gigi Grand has been this WHOLE TIME?’ shrieked an overexcited Lottie, bouncing up and down on Morrigan’s bed (which promptly and obligingly turned into a jumping castle). ‘LOCKED INSIDE DEVEREAUX HOUSE! Like a TRAGIC PRISONER!’

‘ What?! ’

‘Mmm. Apparently Noelle went to see the Silk in the middle of the night, because—’

‘ I’M telling it, Louis!’ Lottie said, throwing a cushion at her brother. ‘Noelle went to the Silk and told them her parents have had Gigi locked up in her old bedroom for MONTHS and they’d forbidden Noelle to tell ANYBODY and the Silk had to come and brEAK HER OUT!’

In her mind, Morrigan instantly saw Noelle’s pale, frightened face when they met outside the Silver District Watchhouse. That’s why she’d looked so terrified. Because she was doing something incredibly brave: defying her parents to rescue her sister. Morrigan felt the sting of regret, wishing she’d followed the horrid, brave little rat into the station and offered to help her.

‘Gigi secretly went to visit Noelle on the night of the wedding and fell asleep,’ Lottie went on, ‘and the next morning when Lady Devereaux heard the news about Dario, she ran in to tell Noelle and found Gigi there with her, and when Gigi found out Dario had been murdered she was HYSTERICAL and told her parents she loved Dario and they were planning to run away together in the spring and when she tried to leave and see if he really was dead, Lord and Lady Psychopath LOCKED HER UP because they were scared she’d bring even MORE scandal on their house if anyone found out she’d been having an affair with Dario, especially when they were already worried about the Silver Assembly … but now they might be charged with KIDNAPPING!’

Eyes wild, lungs heaving like a marathon runner, Lottie took a minute to catch her breath while Morrigan tried to process the news. ‘How do you know all this?’

‘Our cousin Penny,’ the twins said in unison.

‘Of course. And did Gigi … tell her parents anything else? About Dario or … Modestine?’

‘Like what?’ asked Louis.

Morrigan blinked. ‘Um, nothing.’

Gigi must have kept the Darling–Rinaldi marriage plot a secret from her parents. Even though surely it would have given them enough ammunition to protect their own position at the Silver Assembly, and maybe that would have convinced them to let Gigi go. She’d been missing all this time because she was protecting her friend.

The daughters of Devereaux House had both been quite brave.

‘You know,’ said Morrigan, chewing thoughtfully on her lip, ‘I think you two should consider inviting Noelle to the Lintel-hoppers Club.’

Morrigan’s third surprise visitor arrived the following morning. Margot Darling was escorted by Fenestra to Jupiter’s study, which he’d graciously agreed to vacate for the purpose of their meeting (after making it loudly and repeatedly clear that he’d be just down the hall ). Fenestra had agreed to no such thing, but eventually took Morrigan’s many hints and departed (after staring dead-eyed at Lady Margot while slowly pawing her handbag off the side table and onto the floor).

‘How did you know I was Hillary D’Boer? It was awfully clever of you.’

Morrigan wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting Aunt Margot to start with, but it wasn’t that. ‘I didn’t. My friend Cadence figured out your anagram. Lady Horrible.’

She explained briefly what she’d seen in her mother’s bedroom in the ghostly hour (being purposefully vague about how it was created, of course).

‘Of all the scenes from our childhood you might have witnessed,’ Aunt Margot said, shaking her head ruefully. ‘I truly hate to think you’d judge either of us from what you saw in there. Certainly not my finest moment, but even your mother … Oh, Morrigan. She was so much more than some silly fight we once had . ’

‘It didn’t seem like a silly fight to me,’ Morrigan said, scowling. ‘You hit her.’

‘Yes, I was horrible. She was right to call me that. Unfortunately, Meredith saw the very worst and the very best of me … and vice-versa, I might add. We were best friends and co-conspirators, but we were also mortal enemies. Often on the same day. I’m afraid that’s what having sisters is like, sometimes. I’ve also never laughed with anyone the way I used to laugh with Meredith. When she left, I wasn’t sure I’d ever have fun again.

‘I admit things did occasionally get a little strained between us, after my debut.’ Margot fiddled with one of her gloves, looking away. ‘When I came of age, our parents laid everything on my shoulders quite suddenly. The Darlings had once been a big family, but various deaths and ill-advised marriages meant our numbers had dwindled so dramatically that by the time I debuted, my parents and I were the only names left on the family plaque. I know that doesn’t mean much to you, but for a Greater House in the Silver District, it’s a dangerous position to be in.’ She sighed, and her cheeks turned faintly pink with embarrassment. ‘We were also … heavily in debt. It was a tightrope walk just to keep our family afloat.

‘I realised very quickly how precarious our family’s situation was, and how important it would be for my sisters and me to make smart, strategic decisions when it came to marriage and children and making alliances with other houses. I didn’t want to be thinking about things like that at fifteen.’

‘But you didn’t make a smart, strategic marriage,’ Morrigan pointed out. ‘You married someone from outside the Silver District, without any money.’ She refrained from saying, you married a murderer since, technically, Tobias hadn’t been a murderer when she married him.

‘Yes. Tobias Clark was my one rebellion. And now, of course, my greatest regret.’ Her face was grey with misery. ‘Morrigan … I want you to know that I didn’t write that awful book about your mother.’

Morrigan raised her eyebrows dubiously, but said nothing.

‘You were right about everything else,’ Aunt Margot rushed onwards. ‘I am … I was Hillary D’Boer. I started writing silly little stories when I was a teenager, about all the worst and most ridiculous people I knew. I wrote them for your mother, to make her laugh. Meredith sent one of my earlier efforts to an editor at the Looking Glass and they published it anonymously. It caused a dreadful stir in the district, which of course Merry adored. ’ She smiled to herself. ‘I stopped writing after she left us, because … well, there didn’t seem much point if it wasn’t for her.’

She paused to swallow. ‘But then … everything began crashing down. The newspapers were suddenly publishing the most awful stories about my sister, saying the most abominable things. Everyone turned against her, against us. The Devereaux led open warfare, campaigning to get us voted out of the Greater Circle. They’d always been jealous of our family’s influence, and the scandal of Meredith’s treason was a perfect opportunity to drag Darling House through the muck. My parents only just managed to pull us through to the other side—’

‘By publicly denouncing my mother as a traitor,’ Morrigan interrupted flatly. ‘By abandoning and betraying their daughter.’

Aunt Margot’s eyes filled with tears, but she blinked them away, bringing herself under control. ‘Yes.’

‘Did you do anything to stop them?’

‘No,’ she admitted. ‘I was too frightened. Too small and selfish. I took the coward’s way out and vented my anger by picking up my pen again. I took my revenge on the page. If Meredith’s mistakes could be splashed all over the papers for people’s entertainment, then so would everybody else’s. The newspapers lapped them up, and then a young man from a small publishing company called Clark I thought if they laid claim to you and brought you to Nevermoor, Mama would have no choice but to accept you into our family. But Mrs Asher told me she was outbid, despite her best efforts.’ Aunt Margot pursed her lips, looking as if she remained unconvinced by Mrs Asher’s efforts .

Morrigan experienced a strange flash of something that was not quite déjà vu, but more like a brief glimpse of another life she might have had. She was imagining, for the first time ever, what might have happened if things had gone slightly differently on Bid Day. If Corvus hadn’t torn up her bids. If the Skyfaced Clocks hadn’t changed.

‘Morrigan, my mother is a difficult, stubborn woman,’ said her aunt. ‘But you must understand, losing Meredith, and then my father so soon afterwards … it broke something in her forever. I don’t expect you to forgive her, but—’

‘That’s good,’ Morrigan interrupted. ‘Because I don’t need a grandmother who doesn’t want me. I already have a family.’

Aunt Margot gave her a small, unconvincing smile. ‘I’m sure the Crows are—’

‘Ew,’ said Morrigan. ‘Not the Crows. I meant Jupiter and Fen and Jack and everyone at the Deucalion. My siblings in Unit 919. I have people who care about me, and not just because I’m a Wundersmith. You can tell your mother I said thanks. If she hadn’t failed to have the smallest scrap of interest in me, I might never have found my real family.’

Aunt Margot’s chin wobbled slightly, but she smiled through unshed tears.

‘You have no reason to believe me, Morrigan, but I truly am happy to see the life you’ve made for yourself,’ she said, glancing around the room at the photos plastering Jupiter’s study walls. ‘I hope one day you might allow me to be a part of it again.’