Page 39

THE MOST BEAUTIFUL THING IN THE WORLD

SEBASTIAN

W e have a plan, or at least, the beginning of one.

I met with Cora and Oskar in the courtyard to explain our new challenge: breaking the curse without risking Grace’s life.

Oskar understood immediately, as I hoped he would, but Cora was more difficult.

She had endless questions and dozens of hypothetical consequences if we failed the ritual a second time.

Eventually, Oskar retired for the night, promising to inform the rest of the inner circle of our changed plans. Cora hounded me for another two hours after he left, and it all came back to her earlier sentiment.

If you choose her over them, you’re dooming your entire species. Again.

Cora was right. It was my recklessness that caused the sun curse, and this is my only chance to repair the damage…but sacrificing Grace isn’t saving my people. It’s making the same mistake of selfishness, all over again. This time, I’m not choosing Grace over the vampires.

I’m choosing redemption over revenge.

The future over the past .

Our love over my pride.

By the time Cora and I left the courtyard, I felt like she understood.

I can only hope the others will feel the same way.

We don’t need to risk Grace to save ourselves.

We can break the curse—and we will—but we’ll do it the right way.

The witches don’t realize Grace exists, so we have nothing but time to?—

“Beatrice?”

My brain stutters as I enter the blood letting room.

There are dozens of feeding vampires, but my eyes immediately lock on the brunette at the center table.

Beatrice sits across from a human man, his wrist pressed to her ruby lips.

Her eyes are hazy as she pulls back to wave at me.

She uses the back of her wrist to wipe her mouth, expression shifting when I don’t move a single muscle.

I’m sure I must be hallucinating, and I blink, desperate to make the vision disappear.

“Is everything okay?” she asks. She breaks away from the bloodletter, snapping to attention. Without taking her eyes off me, she strides across the room to my side.

“Where is she?”

Beatrice freezes, jaw tensing, teeth grinding. She studies me silently, as if decoding a complicated riddle.

“Grace?” she asks finally.

“Did you leave her alone?” I ask.

Without waiting for a response, I spin out of the room and take off in the direction of my quarters. I don’t let myself run, much as I’m tempted. I need to understand, because Beatrice wouldn’t abandon her post without reason. Something must have happened.

“Is she hurt?” I ask.

Without turning, I know Beatrice has followed me. She keeps pace at my side, our shoulders brushing .

“She was fine when I left,” she says. Her voice wavers. “Oskar came to replace me.”

I stop, turning abruptly on Beatrice. She stumbles, back striking the wall, eyes widening as I crowd her against it. I breathe her in, searching for even the faintest hint of Grace’s blood.

There’s nothing.

Beatrice shudders where she stands, neck tense as she leans away from me. I can smell the fear radiating off her, but there’s no sign of deception or guilt. She’s telling the truth, but no matter how hard I try, I can’t make sense of it.

“Why?”

“He said you’d sent him,” she says. “This was two hours ago. He said?—”

I don’t hear the rest of her sentence. I take off, tearing through the halls so fast I can barely track where I am. I’m up the stairs and down a twist of corridors and standing in front of my closed bedroom door.

He’s not here.

The hallway is quiet, and so are my quarters. There’s nothing, not even a hint of breathing, coming from my bedroom.

I already know.

With my heart in my stomach, I shove the door open, revealing an empty room. My bed is unmade. Grace’s shoes are gone, and so is her coat from the dresser. Everything else is as I left it.

There’s no sign of her, but there wasn’t a struggle either.

Beatrice flies into view, shuddering to a stop inches from me. Her head whips one way, then another, before she lunges into the room. She’s cowering as she turns, dark eyes growing large.

“I didn’t…” she starts, lower lip trembling. “I swear, I am te lling the truth, Master. Oskar came, and he told me to leave, and I—I did. But I swear…”

Her words break into hysterical sobs as falls to her knees. She dips her head, resting it on the floor between us.

“Please, Master,” she says, her words muffled. “Have mercy. I didn’t?—”

“Did he say anything?” I demand. “Did he give any indication he was taking her somewhere?”

“No, I swear,” she says. She stares up at me, makeup running down her cheeks. “He said he was taking over until you were done with Cora. That’s it. I promise.”

I don’t know if she’s telling the truth. Right now, it doesn’t matter.

“Get up,” I say. “Round the others. Bring them to the courtyard.”

Without a word, Beatrice launches to her feet and disappears around the corner. I grab Grace’s electronic from the bed and make my way through the manor.

Cora can use it for a locating spell. If Grace is gone, if she’s been stolen from me, these will help bring her back.

Unless she wasn’t stolen at all.

Unless she ran, and he helped her.

I shove the thought out of my head. There isn’t time to consider it.

“No one speaks,” I command. I stand at the head of the table, looking from each seated member of my inner circle. They all face me without a speck of remorse or guilt, as if they’re all as determined to find Grace as I am.

Is it possible they’re all innocent?

It doesn’t make sense for any of them to betray me. Outside of Cora, they’re all vampires. They want to break this curse as desperately as I do. I glance at our resident witch as she adjusts Grace’s electronic on the table. No, it’s impossible to imagine Cora sabotaging this.

“Is it ready?” I ask, nodding toward her set-up. Three brightly-colored herbs surround the electronic, forming a loose triangle.

Cora nods and closes her eyes. With her hands spread over the table, she mutters a foreign spell beneath her breath. The air shifts with magic, and the herbs slowly begin to twitch against the stone. As Cora works, the rest of us alternate between watching her and watching the courtyard’s entrance.

Beatrice and Amelia sit on the far side of the table, and Theo sits across from them. I stare at the opposite head of the table, where my oldest friend usually sits.

“Master,” Milas calls.

I turn, chest tensing. Milas strides into the courtyard, hand on Oskar’s shoulder.

The old man isn’t fighting him off. He doesn’t look riddled with guilt or fear.

His expression is as gentle, as steady as ever.

He walks with his hands loose at his sides, a soft smile lighting his face once he reaches me.

“Oskar,” I say, searching his eyes .

If Beatrice is telling the truth, he was the last to see Grace before she disappeared. He would be guilty of something terrible—and I should be able to sense it. Looking now, there is nothing but gentle warmth and a familiarity deeper than my own reflection.

“Everyone sit,” I say, forcing myself to look away. My voice is hard, teeming with overflowing tension. I can feel every muscle in my neck, in my back, in my legs. It takes all my effort not to lunge for Oskar’s throat.

Careful .

The fastest path to Grace is with the truth. Until I know what happened, I can’t know where to look. Or who to punish.

“Beatrice, tell me your truth,” I say. “Be brief, but don’t leave anything out.”

All eyes turn to Beatrice. She swallows, placing her trembling hands on the stone table. She keeps her eyes locked intently on me as she wrings her fingers together.

“I was posted outside your door,” she says. “I’d been there for about an hour when Oskar arrived. He said I was being dismissed and that he would take over watch. I went straight to Amelia’s quarters from there, and I remained until I left to feed. That’s when you found me.”

I shift my attention to Amelia.

“True?”

“Beatrice arrived about twenty minutes after sunfall,” Amelia says. “She mentioned she’d been relieved by Oskar. She was with me until the second hour, when she said she was going to feed.”

“Oskar,” I say.

The old man, my longest friend, sits on the opposite end of the table at his usual place.

He sits with relaxed posture and his eyes keep flicking to the heavens.

In the moments before he speaks, I scan over his entire appearance.

Where I had to search for Beatrice’s emotions, Oskar’s are written plainly over his face.

He’s confident, comfortable, unbothered.

Innocent , I tell myself. He’s clearly innocent.

“Beatrice speaks the truth,” he says finally.

Something jolts in my chest, sharp as a wooden stake through the heart.

“After our meeting, I went to your quarters,” he says. His eyes are on mine, steady and unrelenting. “I dismissed Beatrice. I told Grace she was to retrieve her father’s belongings from the human world.”

Something violent and scalding crashes through my insides. It’s impossible to think, to feel, to do anything but stare at my oldest friend. He’d taken the words from our meeting and used them to mislead Grace. My Grace. I want to lunge across the table and rip his head from his body.

Instead, I force myself to swallow, to take a deep, heaving breath.

“Why.” I meant to ask it as a question, but it comes as a sharp command.

“I told her Cora believed it would help the curse,” he says. His face remains soft and warm, but something in his eyes flickers with darkness. With cruelty. So brief it would have been easy to miss.

At some point, it seems Oskar started a game, and I’m at the center of it. How many times did that flicker of evil cross his expression, and I was too naive to notice?

Whatever his plan, it’s clear he wants to relish this moment. He’d like to drag it out, make me beg for each parcel of information. He’s going to hold his words close, so I must do the same.