Page 36

Chapter Thirty-Four

And a Long Grudge

We stare after her for a beat of silence. Then—

“What was that ?” I whirl to face him incredulously. “Are you completely without sense? The entire point of this exercise was to seek her help, to commiserate with her and to charm her, to apply gentle pressure if all else failed—”

He rolls his eyes and steps around me. “We’re investigating a killer, Célie, not asking him over for tea.”

“And now?” Storming after him through the pit, I nearly step on his heel—then I do step on his heel, and he growls, turning with lethal speed and sweeping me into his arms once more. Perfect. All the better to poke him right in his idiotic chest, which I proceed to do. Most vehemently. “What now, O Ruthless One? Eponine sent us to Pennelope for a reason, and because of you , she and Jermaine are probably plotting our painful and untimely ends at this very second.” I poke him again. Then again for good measure. “Well?”

He glares down at me as we climb the stairs. “Well what ?”

“What did you hope to accomplish by bullying her that way? What did we gain?”

“Much more than you think,” he says coolly, “O Brilliant One.”

“I’m wounded, truly”—I clutch my chest in feigned injury—“but as the courtesans have hidden their rooms, I doubt we’ll be able to just stroll into Babette’s without permission, let alone conduct a thorough search of it. We needed Pennelope for that too.”

“How quickly you forget I’ve been here before.”

“How is that relevant?”

“I know where the courtesans’ rooms are.”

“Oh.” I blink at him, and heat rushes to my face at his meaning. “ Oh. ”

“As delicious as I find that look”—his eyes darken as we draw to a halt beside one of the enormous stone fireplaces—“it’s incredibly distracting, and we have only an hour and a half before sunrise.” Setting me on my feet, he nods to the black fire before us. “The courtesans’ rooms lie beyond the flames—one of Eponine’s more ingenious security measures. One cannot enter without the blessing of a courtesan.” His subtle emphasis on the word blessing makes me frown, but he continues before I can question it. “Those who try burn to death within seconds. This is Hellfire, eternal fire, cast many years ago by La Voisin herself.”

“I know what Hellfire is.” Earlier this year, the same black flames ravaged the entire city of Cesarine, including my sister’s crypt. I stare at the deadly tendrils in trepidation, and at that precise second, the violet-eyed courtesan steps out of the fireplace next to ours— out of it, passing straight through the flames, like the back of the chimney is some kind of door. Which it is , I realize, returning the courtesan’s puzzled wave. A golden doorknob winks at us behind the flames. My gaze darts back to Michal. “What sort of blessing could possibly allow us to pass through Hellfire unscathed?”

“It isn’t really a blessing. It’s a loophole in the magic.” He runs his hand along the mantel as if inspecting for dust, but his fingers linger over its elaborate whorls and shapes too long to be casual. His eyes probe them too intently. Some I recognize—like the serpent and the wide, yawning mouth of Abaddon, demon of the abyss—while others I don’t. “Like all witches, La Voisin wove a gap into her enchantment: courtesans can pass through the flames without harm, as can anyone they bless with a kiss.”

A kiss.

I echo the words faintly. “You— You’re saying that in order to enter Babette’s rooms, a courtesan will need to... kiss us.” He nods once, curt, before stalking to the next fireplace. But that isn’t answer enough. That isn’t near answer enough, and this is suddenly the most asinine plan I’ve ever heard. A hundred more questions spring fully formed to my lips as I hurry after him. “Can only the courtesan to whom the room belongs bestow their blessing, or are all courtesans given access to all rooms? If the former, how on earth are we going to procure the blessing of Babette, who is, in fact, dead ?” When I step on his heel again, he turns to glare at me. Perhaps that look would’ve once stopped me cold, but now it only spurs me faster. “Won’t asking to enter her rooms raise suspicion? And what are you looking for, exactly? Because if it’s the latter, we don’t need to locate her individual rooms at all. We could simply ask someone for their blessing to enter any one of these fireplaces—”

“By all means”—tension radiates from his shoulders, his neck, his jaw—“go ask a courtesan for a kiss. I’m sure they’ll give it without question, and no one will run to Pennelope when you ask to enter her dead cousin’s rooms.”

“Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit, Michal.” Lifting my chin, I tilt my head toward the pit, where a handful of courtesans pretend not to watch us, and two more stare outright, their faces taut with suspicion and anger. Either they overheard our conversation with Pennelope earlier, or they don’t appreciate a pale, imperious man prowling around outside their bedchambers. “We aren’t exactly being inconspicuous as it is, and”—I lower my voice—“and couldn’t you just compel a courtesan to tell us where to go?”

“Doest my ears deceive me, or did the holier-than-thou Mademoiselle Célie Tremblay just suggest we take away free will?” He casts me a sidelong glance. “I had no idea you were so wicked, pet. How delightful.”

Though I flush at his words, chagrined, he continues to feel along each mantelpiece, as thorough and composed as ever. Sweat trickles between my shoulder blades. If the heat from the fire bothers him, however, he doesn’t show it. “I don’t mean we should compel her,” I say hastily. “I’m merely asking, hypothetically , what would happen if we did.”

“Hypothetically,” he repeats, his voice dry.

“Of course. I would never actually suggest we force someone to do something against their will. I’m not”—I cast about for the right word, failing to find it—“I’m not evil .”

“No, no. Just hypothetically evil.” He rolls his eyes again as I sputter indignantly. “Compulsion requires much greater effort on supernatural creatures than humans. Their own brand of magic protects them. When a vampire slips through their mental shield, he often shatters it, which in turn shatters their mind. It takes supreme self-control to leave a creature intact, and even then, the compulsion might fail.”

Helpless to resist, I ask, “Could you do it, though? As a last resort?”

“Are you implying I’m beyond hypothetically evil?”

Scowling, I try not to sound as flustered as I feel. “And it would work? You wouldn’t shatter anyone’s mind, and the compulsion wouldn’t fail?”

“Hypothetically.”

“If you say the word hypothetically again—” I exhale hard through my nose, straightening my shoulders and wresting control of myself once more. Bickering will get us nowhere. “How many hours until sunrise?” I ask again.

“One and a quarter.”

Neck still prickling from the courtesans’ gazes, I turn to count each fireplace. Over a dozen overall, closer to a score. “And... what happens if we stay past daybreak?”

“Guests cannot remain in Les Abysses past daybreak.” A low, frustrated noise reverberates from his throat, and his fingers curl upon the mantel like scythes. A piece of stonework crumbles into his palm, littering the hearth in black dust. “Each fireplace is identical,” he murmurs. “No distinguishable markers.”

“Can you scent blood magic through the smoke?” I repress the urge to fidget, to bounce slightly on the balls of my feet. We’ll need at least an hour to search Babette’s rooms properly, if we can even find them at all—and that’s only if Pennelope doesn’t swoop down upon us and ruin everything, which she could do at any moment. Now I do begin to bounce, knitting my fingers together and clutching them tight. “Babette wasn’t particularly trusting. She might’ve placed additional protections on her door, especially after falling in with someone dangerous.”

But Michal only shakes his head. “Too many smells.”

He stalks to the next fireplace. And the next. With each one, he grows more agitated, but his agitation looks different from mine—instead of growing flustered and animated, he grows cold and quiet. Succinct. No emotion whatsoever flickers across his expression as he studies each curve in the stone, and he refuses to hurry. Every step is deliberate. Calm and controlled. Part of me wants to shake him, just to see if he’d crack, while the rest knows better. This might be our only opportunity to learn about the killer, and we cannot waste it.

I pace behind him, searching for anything he might’ve missed, but of course there’s nothing—the stonework on each mantel is identical, as are the shadows dancing on the walls between them. I glare at each one in turn. They seem humanoid in shape, almost like ghosts, except—

I bolt upright at the thought. Ghosts.

What was it Michal said about his sister? She’ll be back. The temptation to meddle is too great. Unexpected hope swells in my chest. Nothing could be more meddlesome than this exact situation, and evidently—if Mila died in Cesarine but chose to haunt Requiem—ghosts aren’t confined to the land on which they died. Could she have followed us here? Could she tell us which fireplace belonged to Babette?

Shooting a furtive glance at Michal’s back, I focus with single-minded intensity on that bubble of hope, which grows larger by the second. In the castle, in the theater—even in the Old City, stalked by vampires—my emotions allowed me to slip through the veil. They allowed me to banish Mila in a moment of pique. Perhaps they’ll allow me to call her again.

Only one way to find out.

“Mila?” I whisper eagerly. “Are you here?”

At the sound of her name, Michal’s face snaps toward mine, and he appears at my side in the span between heartbeats. I extend my hand without looking at him. He nearly crushes my fingers in his haste. “Mila?” I try again, searching the walls, the ceiling, even the pit, waiting for her to pop into existence with a tut tut and supercilious expression. “Please, Mila, we need your help. It’s just a simple favor—quick and easy.”

Nothing happens.

“ Mila. ” Hissing her name now, I turn in a slow circle. Irritation pricks at my hope like needles. She had no problem following me to the aviary and berating me— twice —but the moment I actually need her? Silence. “Oh, come on , Mila. Don’t be like this. It’s terribly rude to ignore a friend, you know—”

Michal squeezes my hand, and my attention sharpens on the wall nearest us. The shadows there continue to writhe and twist, but one of them—it looks different from the others. Silver instead of black, its form more opaque. I smile in triumph as the ghost materializes, twining her arms over her head in a peculiar manner. My smile falters. Eyes closed, face contorted with passion, she sashays her hips rather awkwardly and bobs her head to music I cannot hear. Perfect ringlets bounce to and fro with the movement, and she flips one of them with the practiced air of a stage actor.

She also, tragically, isn’t Mila.

“Guinevere.” I fix my smile back into place, praying for a miracle. “How lovely to see you.”

Her eyes flutter open at my voice, and she pretends to startle. “Célie!” Clutching her chest, she says, “What are the chances , darling? Mila mentioned you might be here, of course, but I never expected Michal to accompany you.” An obvious lie, accompanied by a saccharine smile. “Are the two of you... official, then?” Before I can answer, she clicks her tongue sympathetically. “Quite the choice for a first date, isn’t it? He took me to a candlelit dinner in Le Présage, complete with a choir of melusines—such angelic voices, such rapture that night—but never despair, darling. Never despair.” She drifts forward to pat my head in perhaps the most condescending gesture ever made. “Very few will ever experience a love as cosmic as ours. Star-crossed, you know.”

“How... nice.” I risk a glance at Michal, who looks as if someone has clubbed him over the head. Brows furrowed in disbelief, he recoils and tries to twist his fingers from mine, but I clamp on to him like a vise. Though he glares at me—half-furious and half-pleading—I whirl and seize his other hand too, lacing our fingers tight. If I cannot escape, neither will he. “I believe the two of you are already acquainted,” I say pleasantly, “but allow me to offer reintroductions—Michal, meet the ghost of Guinevere, and Guinevere, meet Michal Vasiliev, His Royal Majesty and king of Requiem.”

Guinevere’s eyes dart between us in dawning realization, growing wider and wider until—

Gasping, she swoops level with Michal’s face, hovering an inch or two from his nose. “Can you see me, cherub?”

He stares determinedly at the fire, at the ceiling, at anything other than the vibrating ghost in front of him—and a good thing too. His eyes would’ve surely crossed if he tried to meet hers. Heedless of his reaction, she adds gleefully, “After all this time, can you hear me?”

He grimaces when she tickles his ear. “Hello, Guinevere.”

“Egad, you can !” Breathless with triumph, she quickly twines several ringlets around her finger, pinches dark silver spots upon her cheeks, and smooths her pristine gown. “Oh, happy day! Happy, happy day indeed!” Then—with the efficiency of a gardener in spring—she plants herself directly between Michal and me, which stretches our clasped hands directly through her stomach. Gooseflesh erupts up my arms. “You needn’t worry about her anymore, Michal darling.” She tosses her hair in my face before nuzzling her cheek against his rigid chest, purring in contentment like a cat. “Not now that we’re reunited at last. Why bother with cheap pyrite, after all, when you can have real gold? I forgive your boorish behavior, by the way,” she says to him, elbowing me aside further. “I know you didn’t mean to change the locks on every door in the castle, just as you know I didn’t mean to smash every window on the first floor.”

Lip curling, Michal levels her with a black look. “And some on the second.”

She bats her lashes sweetly. “Shall we let bygones be bygones?”

“That depends. Did you also destroy the portrait of Uncle Vladimir in my study?”

She swells instantly, as if he insulted her mother or perhaps kicked her dog instead of asking a perfectly reasonable question. “Did I—? How dare —?” Clutching her chest once more, she retreats backward into me, and now it’s my turn to grimace. She feels like a bucket of ice water dumped overhead. “’Tis a question boldly spoken from the man who destroyed my very heart ! But oh no, poor Uncle Vladimir has a mustache now! Let us all grieve his countenance, for the paint on his face means more to Michal Vasiliev than the pure and enduring love in his paramour’s chest!”

Michal shakes his head in exasperation. “We were never paramours , Guinevere—”

“Ah!” Guinevere swoons as if he stabbed her. Unsure what else to do—but quite sure I need to do something before she reaches full-blown hysteria—I release one of Michal’s hands and wrap my arm around her shoulders; she deflates dramatically at the contact, turning her head to sob loudly into the crook of my neck. “And now for the salt! Inflicting the wound never was enough for him, Célie darling. Always, always he must deny our connection, deny the very heartbeat of our souls . I implore you to run, not walk, away from this wretched beast before he cleaves your heart straight in two, as he has mine!”

When Michal starts to retort, I shoot him a menacing look and mouth, Stop talking . He clenches his jaw impatiently instead. “You have nothing to fear of that, Guinevere,” I say soothingly, stroking her silver hair. “My heart is quite safe. Michal kidnapped me to use as bait, after all, and as soon as I serve my purpose, he’ll probably try to kill me.”

Too late, I remember Guinevere’s fit of temper outside Michal’s study— You warmbloods are always so presumptuous, disparaging death in front of the dead— but she no longer seems to care about disparaging anything except Michal. I can empathize.

“You see?” Her sobs grow somehow louder, and for the first time since I learned of my gift, I feel enormously grateful that no one can see or hear ghosts except me. Though one or two courtesans in the pit still watch us—confused, probably, by my oddly suspended arm and our conversation with thin air—the rest have lost interest or retired for the morning. As if she senses my attention drifting, Guinevere pretends to gasp for breath. “He cares not for the feelings of anyone but himself!”

I nod sagely. “I’m not fully convinced he has feelings.”

“ Or friends.”

“Or even a basic understanding of what friendship entails.”

“Ha!” Guinevere straightens and claps her hands in delight—her eyes mysteriously dry—and we gaze at each other with a strange new sense of kinship. “I knew I liked you, Célie Tremblay,” she says, reaching out to smooth a lock of my hair, “and I’ve henceforth decided—we shall be the very best of friends, you and I. The very best indeed.”

I bow my head in a half curtsy. “I would be honored to call you friend, Guinevere.”

Michal looks seconds away from hurling himself into the fire. With the air of a man trying and failing to reclaim control of the situation, he asks in a terse voice, “How familiar are you with Les Abysses, Guinevere? Do you visit often?”

She whirls toward him in an instant. “Why? Are you implying I followed you here? Is that what you think? Poor, pathetic Guinevere, she must’ve been pining after me for all these centuries —” She snaps her fingers under his nose, eyes blazing bright and liquid silver. “A woman has needs , Michal, and I will not be shamed for seeking companionship in the afterlife. Do you hear me? I will not be shamed!”

I touch her arm lightly before she can gouge his eyes out. Or before Michal can open his mouth again. “No one is trying to shame you, Guinevere.” Though how, exactly, a ghost seeks companionship among the living is something I plan to ask about later. “We just— We need a favor.”

She arches a narrow brow. “Oh?”

“We need to know which of these fireplaces leads to Babette Trousset’s rooms.”

“ Ooooh ,” she repeats with relish, looking infinitely more intrigued. “And whatever do you want there ? Rumors abound that the girl is dead.” At this, she cuts a sly, significant look at Michal, twirling another ringlet around her finger. The gesture reeks of nonchalance, but—much like Michal’s performance with the fireplaces earlier—there’s nothing nonchalant about it. My eyes narrow slightly.

Guinevere knows something we don’t.

Worse still—if I know her at all, she’ll try to bait us with her secret for as long as possible, relishing in our struggle. We don’t have time to dangle on the end of her hook, and even if we did, Michal would need to crawl on his belly and beg before Guinevere told him anything. She’d want him to squirm. To suffer. Our friendship has lasted all of three seconds; it’ll do nothing to heal a centuries-old grudge.

Michal’s face darkens with the same realization.

“We want to search her rooms, to see if she left anything behind that might point us to her killer.” I watch Guinevere’s face carefully, frowning at the way her lips quirk slightly at the corners. Her eyes glitter with malice, or perhaps glee; perhaps the two are one and the same with Guinevere. “Can you tell us which way to go?”

“Of course I can, darling. Anything for a friend .” She twists the word in her mouth like a barbarous thing, and I tense, waiting for the sting. Instead, she taps the tip of my nose with her finger before pointing it at the fireplace directly beside us. “ That is your entrance, though I am loath to inform you that no courtesan here will give their blessing to enter. ’Tis bad luck to meddle in affairs of the dead—just a word to the wise, cherub,” she adds to me, winking viciously.

“Any courtesan can give their blessing?” I ask.

She shrugs a delicate shoulder. “The enchantment got a little sticky when the evil hag tried to personalize it to each fireplace—plus the turnover of staff, you know. It turned into a logistical nightmare. No, a one-for-all enchantment fit best, and anyone who wears the color red can bestow—” She stops abruptly, clamping her lips together and blinking hastily between us. She needn’t finish the thought, however.

Michal does it for her.

His gaze descends to my rumpled crimson gown, and at the sight of it, he smiles. It’s a lethal smile—a victorious one—and it trails gooseflesh down my spine like a cold finger. His cold finger. Though he raises his brows at me, expectant, he makes no move in my direction. Waiting , I realize with a flush of familiar heat. It collides with the chill of his gaze into a tempest.

Anyone who wears the color red can bestow their blessing.

Scoffing in a rather panicked way, Guinevere darts between us. “I don’t know what possessed you to wear such a garish color, Célie, but it really doesn’t suit—”

“Excuse me, Guinevere.”

“But Célie, darling , you shouldn’t—”

I step around her, hardly hearing her, and walk with purpose toward Michal. Though my heart thunders, I cannot hear it either. I cannot hear anything except the deafening roar in my ears. You’re being ridiculous , I tell myself firmly. It’s just a kiss. It’s for the investigation . He still doesn’t move. Still doesn’t speak. His smile widens, however, as the tip of our boots touch, as I stretch onto tiptoe, as I lift my face toward his. No one should be this beautiful up close. His lashes fan thick and dark against his eyes as he lowers his gaze to my lips.

“I have to kiss you,” I whisper.

Again, he tucks a strand of hair behind my ear with startling affection. “I know.”

He isn’t going to do it for me, however. He can’t. And if I wait much longer, I’ll lose my nerve—or worse, Guinevere will drag me away by my hair, and the two of us will never know what lies in Babette’s rooms. It’s for the investigation , I repeat in desperation, and—before I can change my mind—I press my lips to his.

For a second, he doesn’t move. I don’t move. We simply stand there, his hand still cupping my cheek, until humiliation flares swift and hot in my belly. Though my experience is limited, I have kissed one or two men before, and I know it isn’t supposed to be so—so stiff and awkward and—and—

I move to pull away, cheeks burning, but his free hand rises swiftly to capture my waist, pulling me flush against him. When I gasp, startled, his hand slides into my hair, and he tips my face back to deepen the kiss. My mouth parts instinctively in response, and the instant our tongues touch, a deep and potent heat unfurls inside me—slower than before, but stronger, suffusive. An ache instead of a throb. I close my eyes against it— helpless against it—and wrap my arms around his neck, pressing closer and reveling in the strange feel of him. His breath is colder than mine. His body larger, harder, deadly enough to kill. Though I mold my own against it, desperate to find friction, to welcome his heavy weight, I cannot move close enough to ease the ache, cannot coax him to envelop me completely. No, he holds me like glass until I think I might scream. And perhaps I already am screaming. Because this is Michal. Michal. I can’t— I shouldn’t be—

Gasping again, I wrench my lips away and stare at him in shock. He doesn’t release me, instead staring right back for one heartbeat. Two. The room falls away even as Guinevere sputters behind us, indignant, until only Michal and I remain. His hands tighten upon my waist infinitesimally. This close, I should be able to feel his heartbeat, should be able to see a flush in his cheeks, but of course, he remains as pale and strange as ever. Not a hair out of place. At last, with a slightly mocking smile, he brushes a thumb across my cheek and says, “No one would be disappointed, Célie.”

Without another word or backward glance, he strides into the fireplace without me.