The Malediction: Hidden Huntress Part 36

"There was no letter tonight."

"Perhaps it is at the front desk and they are waiting until morning to deliver it."

He shook his head. "Chris has already been down to check."

I bit the inside of my cheeks, realizing that while I'd slept he'd come and gone, without my even noticing.

"Something has happened in Trollus," he said, his voice sharp with trepidation. "Angouleme wouldn't have made a move like the one he did tonight if he was not confident that my father could not retaliate."

I hesitated. "Do you think he's dead?" And as I had said the words I'd realized I was afraid he'd say yes. That the troll I'd wished dead more times than I could count was now the lesser evil the only man who stood between Trollus and the blackness of Angouleme and Roland from within, and the relentless hate of Lord Aiden without.

"You tell me."

I realized I was on my feet and pulling on my dress, though I had no memory of getting out of bed. My skin burned with tension and my head ached with the single-minded purpose of an addict. And I knew what had pulled me from sleep. "He's alive," I whispered, my fingers pausing on my b.u.t.tons. "But he is very desperate."

"I don't know what to do."

I lifted my head. Tristan had turned from the window to face me, eyes filled with a helplessness I'd never seen before. This young man who was undeniably brilliant. Who'd been raised on plots and strategies and schemes; who'd faced down the most dire of predicaments without faltering, was looking to me for an answer.

I ran my tongue over my lips, but it was very nearly as dry as they were. "That necklace matters to a.n.u.shka. We need to get it back."

That had been hours ago. We'd dispatched Chris with a pocketful of gold to track down the stockman and buy back the necklace. We'd tasked Sabine with discovering what she could about the fallout from Esmeralda's death; most importantly, whether Aiden or my brother had pointed a finger at Tristan. Neither had yet returned, and after discussing every possible contingency, we'd both drifted into our own thoughts.

Tristan sighed and shifted, and I felt his fingers interlock with mine. Glancing down, I saw he'd pressed his face against my stomach, his eyes closed and lashes black against his fair skin. My heart softened, warmth chasing away the tension and ceaseless pressure of the King's compulsion. I smoothed the disarray of his hair and traced a finger along the curve of his ear, my thumb brushing along the line of his cheekbone.

He relaxed, and a smile curved my lips as I thought of this hard-won gift of his trust. That he'd finally stopped trying to hide his fears and weaknesses, and was willingly turning to me for comfort was worth more to me than all the gold in Trollus.

"I love you," I mouthed silently, and his fingers tightened around mine as though he had heard. It made me think of last night. The way it had felt. The intensity of the moment. But then an unwanted thought intruded. "a.n.u.shka was Alexis' mistress," I said, half to myself. "Do you know for how long?"

"Two years. Possibly three. It's not something he would have cared to have doc.u.mented. Nor would his wife."

I frowned. "What was her name?"

"Lamia." Tristan cleared his throat. "Other than my great-grandmother who ruled Trollus for almost forty years, Lamia is said to have been the most powerful queen in our history."

"Did not help her much," I muttered.

He hesitated before answering. "She may not have cared. Their match would have been arranged by the crown for the purpose of breeding power into the line, and she would have been raised to be... pragmatic."

I considered his words, and they sounded hollow. Even if the troll queen had not cared a whit for her husband, she was still bonded to him. a.n.u.shka knew how to mute the connection, but it would have required her slipping the other woman a potion every time she was with Alexis. More likely, the Queen had known about the affair and had lived with those feelings in her head over and over again. It would have been maddening.

"Did she survive his murder?"

"Yes. But when it became clear there was no escape from a.n.u.shka's curse, she went mad. Her son had to..." He broke off. "He had no choice. Power and madness are a poor mix."

I met his eye, and neither of us needed to say anything to know he referred to his own brother as much as the long-dead queen.

A knock sounded at the door. "It's me," Sabine's m.u.f.fled voice called through. "Let me in."

Once inside, she pulled back her hood, snow falling to dust the floor. "I swear this is the coldest winter I've ever known," she muttered, pulling off her cloak and draping it over a chair. "Build up the fire, would you?"

The fireplace burst bright with pale troll-fire as Tristan followed Sabine into the sitting room, his expression intent. "Well?"

"There's nothing," she said, sitting on the chair across from me. "No talk of a murder, much less one where the individual died in an ... unusual fashion. Not even a whisper." Pouring a cup of tea from the pot on the table, she took a mouthful and grimaced and held out the cup to Tristan. "It's cold."

He shot her a black look, but a second later, the cup was steaming.

"I went to the opera house to see if by some chance no one had found the body, but it was gone. There was still some blood under the snow, but it looked like someone had put in a bit of effort to make it appear as though nothing had happened, albeit a sloppy one."

Tristan sat down heavily next to me. "Your father's doing?" I asked.

He gave a slow shake of his head. "If it was his doing, it wouldn't have been sloppy."

"Then who?"

"I've no notion."

Sabine leaned back in her chair. "I stopped by your mother's home. She hasn't returned yet, but she sent word that she'll be back in Trianon tomorrow morning. Apparently Julian's gone to join her."

I grimaced. "It makes me nervous having her running around the countryside, given the danger we know she's in."

The door abruptly flung open, and Chris flew in. "I found him!"

"The necklace? Did he have it?" Tristan demanded.

"No, but..."

Tristan swore and stormed over to the window to rest his forehead against the cool gla.s.s.

"But," Chris continued. "You won't believe who he sold it to. He said a woman came at dawn with a purse full of gold asking about it. Said it was of sentimental value and that the girl who sold it was a fool."

I winced, because that much was true. "Did he recognize her? Did he describe her?"

"He said she was wearing a hood that obscured most of her face."

The temperature of the room burned hot, and Sabine sat up straight in her chair, eying Tristan with unease.

"I should have gone myself," he growled at the window. "I might have caught her and all this would be done."

"Tristan, I missed her by a good hour," Chris said. "It would have made no difference if you'd gone. But listen to this: the stockman said she arrived and left in a carriage marked in the Regent's colors."

I sat up straight and Tristan swung around to face us.

"There's more," Chris said. "The man at the front desk gave me this when I came back in." Walking swiftly around the chairs, he went to Tristan and handed him an envelope. "It can't be a coincidence."

Tristan broke the seal, his eyes scanning the card. "It's an invitation to Lady Marie du Chastelier's Longest Night ball."

I blinked. "That's where my masque is to be performed. It's the most exclusive event of the year," I added, getting to my feet. "The invitations to this went out weeks ago, and only the upper crust of Trianon n.o.bility will be there. Not bourgeoisie boys riding high on their fathers' wealth."

"It's not addressed to a bourgeoisie boy riding high on his father's wealth," Tristan said quietly, handing me the invitation.

My heart accelerated as I took in the words, His Royal Highness, Prince Tristan de Montigny is cordially invited to... "It's a trap."

"Undoubtedly," Tristan replied. "And she's confident enough that she's not even trying to hide it."

"Why take so much risk?" Sabine asked. "There will be countless people there to witness what she does. People who will remember her face and who she was. There are better places to kill you."

"Agreed," Tristan said. "But both Cecile and Genevieve will be there, and I cannot help but think that means something."

Longest Night... I exhaled a ragged breath. "It's the solstice."

Chris, who had learned more about magic in the previous months than he probably ever wanted, nodded. "Witches can draw on more power during moments of transitions like the solstices and..." He broke off, turning toward the window and then back to me. "The full moon. Cecile, tomorrow night is a full moon."

"How often do they occur together?" Sabine asked.

"I don't know." I glanced at Tristan, but he shook his head. "I never spent much time studying astronomy there wasn't much point. Pierre would without a doubt know, but asking him is obviously out of the question. But what difference does it make? Her magic won't work against me."

An idea began to tickle my mind and with it came fear. "Do you have my map? The list of dead women that was tucked into Catherine's grimoire?"

He silently retrieved the paper from a locked chest and handed it to me. My eyes roved over the names, and the years that they had died. Nearly always nineteen or thirty-eight years apart, with a few exceptions. A weak and baseless pattern. Unless it wasn't. I set the paper on the table and pressed a hand to my mouth. I'd left my mother alone, thinking that we had years before she was in any danger. But what if we'd been wrong?

I dropped my hand to my lap. "We need to know when the last time the full moon and winter solstice were in conjunction. We need to know all the times it has been. And we need a reliable source."

"I know what you're suggesting," Tristan said flatly, "and the answer is no."

"We need to find out if there is a pattern," I said. "This might be the only way we can predict her actions. And frankly, we need to know what is really happening in Trollus."

"How?" He grimaced. "It isn't as if we can waltz into the city and ask. My father's control over Trollus is uncertain, and we can be sure that Angouleme will do everything in his power to thwart us."

"We wouldn't waltz in," I said. "We'd sneak."

Tristan shook his head. "Even if we managed to get into the city, there isn't a chance of me making it all the way to Pierre unnoticed. My magic is too strong they'll know it's me."

"Which is why I'll go alone."

He leveled me with a chilling glare. "Even if it were worth the risk, it would be impossible. There are two ways into the city, and both are gated and guarded."

"That's not entirely true," Chris said, then winced as Tristan redirected his glare.

I stood up and leaned forward until my face blocked their line of sight. "What are you talking about?"

Chris mumbled something shockingly foul to do with goats and then sighed. "Well, they do have a hole in their roof."

Forty-Four.

Cecile

We left the horses tied up, in the trees, and started toward the sea of rock concealing Trollus from the rest of the world. I was wearing a grey dress and hooded cloak, my hair expertly tucked under a black wig that Sabine had retrieved from the opera house's collection of costumes. It wasn't a perfect disguise, but I was banking on no one taking much notice of a half-blood girl running an errand for her owner.

Tristan had said little since we'd left Trianon, his attention seemingly focused on guiding his black gelding on the road slick with ice and mud, but I knew better. As much as he disliked the risk we were taking to get this information, he wanted, no, needed to know what was happening in Trollus, and that made him much more reckless than he normally was. I wasn't sure if that was a good or bad thing.

"I thought it would be easier to see," I muttered once we had clambered up. "Do you know which way? It's going to take us hours to climb to the middle." Holding my skirts with one hand, I leapt over onto the next rock, then turned back to Tristan. "It's all right to walk out here, isn't it? It won't, you know..." I moved in an exaggerated wobble from side to side.

"You're standing on a great deal of rock, love," Tristan said, the first bit of humor I'd seen in hours rising onto his face. "You're going to need to eat more chocolate truffles if you intend to finish the mountain's work."

A faintly shimmering platform of magic bridged the gap between the two boulders, and he strolled across, then offered me his arm. "Do you remember the last time we disguised you as a troll?"

"How could I forget," I said, holding tight to his arm and trying not to think about all the rock crashing out from underneath us and how far we'd fall if it did. "Only that time you were trying to sneak me out, not in." My eyes drifted over the grey stones as I remembered when I'd decided to stay in Trollus, the way he'd kissed me, and the feeling that I finally had nearly everything I wanted. How long had it lasted? Five minutes before everything had quite literally crashed down around us.

"Your choosing to stay was the most purely happy moment of my life."

I rested my head against his shoulder. "I've never once regretted that choice." But we both knew what was unsaid that our moments of happiness were so few and far between, hemmed in on all sides by disaster and tragedy. Then and now. Trying to live and love while the blood of a friend and comrade was on our hands and knowing that worse was yet to come. Did that make us appreciate those precious moments more, or did it tarnish them? I didn't know.

"Here it is."

The moon hole was much larger than I'd thought perhaps ten feet across, and while from the streets of Trollus it had appeared to me as hope and freedom, from this perspective it seemed like the gate to h.e.l.l itself. Black, menacing, and deadly. A wave of vertigo hit me, and I swayed unsteadily on my feet.