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Chapter 21

Lotte

Lotte had never had the luxury of boredom before.

At the convent, if Lotte was ever caught idle, she’d either be punished or given another chore. But Grace had poured herself into bed with the casual nonchalance of someone who hadn’t just taken hours of someone’s memories. And Lotte was left…idle.

After help from the maids, she had figured out how to make the water run in the bathroom. It had been gloriously, magically hot. Hot enough that after years of washing in an icy pump at the convent, she thought it might make her skin melt off. She’d stood under it for what felt like hours. Watching blood and grime wash off her. Watching the convent, Estelle, Gelde, years of solitude and lies leave her. When she emerged, scrubbed raw and dripping wet, there was a fresh plate of pastries and fruit, and tea waiting for her on a small table by the window.

The maids moved around her efficiently, clearing away her breakfast when she was done. And then Lotte was left alone in the sprawling suite of the Paragon.

Waiting for the next trial.

Within a few hours, Lotte was restless. She’d opened every cabinet and drawer and cupboard in the suite. She’d tried to go into the hallway, but a maid had stopped her, pointing out kindly that she wasn’t dressed. When Lotte had gone looking for the green dress from last night, it had vanished. Whisked away to be cleaned.

Out the window, the city sprawled in every direction. To the north, she could see the woods, bordered by a crescent of large houses, the Holtzfall mansion the largest of them. The woods stretched beyond sight, but somewhere, far away, they met the ice sea to the north. In the days of Honor Holtzfall, everything in every direction would have been covered by trees. But Lotte felt just as bewildered by the city as people must have once been by the woods.

She thought back to when Estelle would flip through magazines picking out the marvels of the city. Shops that served frozen desserts, kept cold by magic. Places where you could watch moving pictures or hear live music. Lotte would have no idea where to start if she wanted any of those things. But she also had a feeling that whatever trial was coming next, it wouldn’t come for her locked away here. If she was going to win, she had to get out there.

Although the maid was probably right—wandering the streets of Walstad wearing nothing but a hotel bathrobe wouldn’t end well.

The door opening startled Lotte out of her thoughts. She turned, expecting to find yet another maid entering. Instead, letting herself into the suite like she owned the place was Modesty Holtzfall.

And behind her…Theo. Lotte felt an aching flash of gratitude for a familiar face. She took an involuntary step toward him, but she stopped as he kept his eyes straight ahead, not meeting her gaze.

He walked like a soldier, rigidity in every inch of his body. Maybe she had misread him last night. Maybe she had overstepped the boundary that was supposed to exist between knights and Holtzfalls. Suddenly in the daylight their conversation in the dark hallway, his offer to take her to safety, felt illicit. And Lotte was suddenly painfully aware that she was wearing nothing but a bathrobe.

“Cousin!” Modesty air-kissed each side of Lotte’s face, as if they had been the best of friends their whole lives. “I thought you might be an early riser like me.” It was nearly noon. “After all, word is you were raised in a convent.”

Lotte drew back sharply. “Where did you hear that?”

“Oh, you know.” Modesty sank onto the settee, Theo taking up a guard position behind her. Lotte’s eyes strayed to him again, but his were still fixed ahead. “Around.”

Around. Lotte needed to know who was talking about her. If someone knew she was from Gelde, how long until they knew what the people of Gelde thought of her? The viceful, convent-bound girl. Unworthy of winning a game of virtues.

Lotte perched awkwardly on the sofa next to her cousin, and let her arm brush Modesty’s, breaking the barrier of the hindern, enough to skim the thought that was at the top of Modesty’s mind.

Modesty hadn’t heard she was from Gelde. She had gotten up early this morning to press their grandmother for information. To know where this new cousin had come from until finally, a challenging glint in her eyes, Mercy Holtzfall had told her she was raised in a convent. Which dashed Modesty’s half-formed plan of leaking to the papers that she’d been raised in a brothel overseas…

Modesty was threatened by her.

She might have already won a trial, the first trial of the Veritaz. The heirship was within her reach.

And yet it was Ottoline on the front of every paper.

And this morning, the reporters were waiting outside the Paragon Hotel, not Modesty’s apartment.

“So it’s true. My, what a stacked deck Aunt Grace has with you in a game of virtues.” The playful smile never left Modesty’s lips, but a small thrill of danger went down Lotte’s spine.

Her family had already tried to kill her before she got to the trials.

And now Lotte was alone in a room with someone eyeing her as competition. For the trials and for attention.

There is a great deal you’re going to have to learn if you want to be part of this family, Ottoline. Her mother was right about that, no doubt. But, no matter what the Sisters had told her grandmother, her family didn’t know anything about Lotte either. They didn’t know she had spent a decade playing at friendship with someone who always needed to be the shiniest thing in the room.

Lotte had been six when she was finally released from the cold solitude of the convent to go to school with the other children. The Sisters had told her again and again that she would be punished if she indulged her curse to steal thoughts from their minds.

Lotte would have promised anything if it meant being allowed out of the convent. She saw the children from the village at weekly prayers with their parents, full of laughter and warmth that she craved. But the other children had been wary of her. Their mothers knew each other, their fathers worked or drank together, or both. She was the strange parentless child from the convent. The desperation to get them to welcome her had clawed at Lotte’s chest.

It hadn’t taken long for Lotte to realize that the same way they pulled away from her, they pulled toward the bright-eyed baker’s daughter. And it was impossible not to hear Estelle’s mind. Her thoughts spilled out of her like a beacon, too bright and loud for Lotte to ignore. And Lotte saw that she was her path in.

Her chance came during a game Lotte didn’t know. A razor-sharp thought flashed from Estelle’s mind. She was so much better at this game than everyone else. It was embarrassing for them. And so boring for her. If only she could find someone who would be a decent match. Latching onto that thought, Lotte had stepped away from the fence, toward the game.

Lotte could keep up with Estelle because she knew every move before someone made it. She anticipated where one girl would dodge; she knew where another boy was hiding. Winning would have been easy for her. But she let Estelle win, narrowly. Because no matter that she thought she wanted to meet her match, Estelle still wanted to win. To be the most important, interesting, popular person in the room. And Lotte could make sure it happened.

And as an out-of-breath and muddy Estelle flung up her hands in victory, she had already decided that she liked this new strange girl from the convent on the hill, who was almost a match for her, but not quite.

Lotte had used her curse over and over again to stay Estelle’s friend. To whisper a thought passing through Estelle’s mind just in time for Estelle to gasp and slap her on the arm and say, I was just thinking that. To agree with every opinion she had before she voiced it. And tell her what she wanted to hear.

She had found her way into Gelde through Estelle.

And she could do it again with Modesty.

She needed a way out of this hotel room to start with. A foot into this family. Into the trials. She just needed to make Modesty believe she wasn’t a threat to her in this game. That she was the na?ve little country girl lost in the great big city.

“I guess news travels a lot faster in the city than I’m used to.” Lotte widened her eyes a little more than was natural, pitching her voice higher. Instantly, Modesty’s expression eased. And finally, Theo’s eyes flicked over to her. Lotte forced her gaze away from him. She was suddenly sure he could see through her. That he could see her trying to hide the angry ambition he had witnessed in her grandmother’s office.

She told herself it didn’t matter. So long as Modesty didn’t see through her.

“Anyway.” Modesty toyed with a tassel on the couch with forced indifference. “Do you know what you might wear to Hugo Arndt’s luncheon today?”

“Hugo Arndt?” This time the na?veté wasn’t an affectation.

“I’m not convinced he has the strength of character to stand against the Grims if he’s elected governor. But we do have to hear him out. So—what do you think you’ll wear?”

Modesty wanted to outdress her, Lotte realized. That’s why she was here. And with that, she saw her path. She could give Modesty what she wanted. And get some clothes and out of this hotel with it.

Lotte arranged her face to what she hoped was endearing helplessness. She could feel Theo’s gaze on her, threatening to burn it away. But she kept it fixed.

“Well, maybe I could borrow something from my mother.” She didn’t want to lay it on too thick, but as she thought of the cameras she’d seen in Modesty’s mind, waiting outside the Paragon, she added, “I don’t think I can be seen out in this, after all.”

Modesty took the bait. “Oh, dear cousin, that won’t do at all! You must let me take you out to buy something suitable!”