Tristan fell to his knees next to the chest, holding someone against him. A woman dressed in grey, her long dark hair spilling over his arm. She wore a dark cloak I recognized because she’d been wearing it the last time I saw her.

“Let me go.” I choked the words out.

“Cécile, no.” My father’s fingers clamped tighter around my arm.

“Let me go!” The words ripped from my throat, loud and full of power. Not caring that I’d just compelled my own father, I sprinted down the steps toward Tristan. The mud oozed hot and slippery between my bare toes, splattering up onto the white of my nightgown. But what did any of that matter?

“Élise…” Reaching out with one hand, I brushed back her hair, bile rising in my throat at the sight of her blank and unseeing eyes. “How?”

“Because she is dead.” Tristan’s voice was thick with a fury that rendered it almost unrecognizable. “And the curse cares naught for corpses.”

I let my hand drop to my side, my eyes taking in the chest, the damage done to it telling me all I needed to know about what had been done to her. To my friend, who was so terrified of confined spaces that she could not even bear the mines.

The ground stopped shaking, and a wind blew down from the mountains, wiping the heat of magic away. My skin prickled and I shivered, but not because of the chill of winter. Tristan had turned, and his face was full of vicious fury. I took a step backwards. He looked nothing like my husband. Nothing at all like the boy I’d fallen in love with. And most certainly nothing human. This was a creature I’d unleashed on the world with the power to tear it asunder, and his wrath was a terrifying thing.

“I’m going to burn him alive for this,” he said, and my eyes flicked past him to the inner lid of the chest. To the single name carved by the bloody nails of a terrified and dying girl.

Angoulême.

Our minds were connected. I knew what it was like when we were in perfect unison in love. Passion. Sorrow. But in that moment, I let his fury wash over me like water, soaking into every corner of my soul until it was no longer his anger, but mine. And it wanted vengeance.

Forty-Eight

Cécile

We rode hard back to Trianon, our plan developing as we shouted back and forth to each other over the sound of pounding hooves and gusting wind. Collecting my mother and hiding her away until the night was over and Anushka had lost the chance to perform her spell wasn’t an option. For one, the King’s compulsion beat in my head like a drum, marching me toward my goal; and two, it might be the only chance we had to catch Anushka. The masque was a trap for us, but that didn’t mean it couldn’t be turned on her. Her death was long past due.

Trotting our lathered horses through the frosty streets, we stopped in front of the townhouse, and I dismounted, handing my reins to Tristan.

“Stay with her¸” he said for hundredth time. “Don’t let her out of your sight. Anushka won’t make her move until the sun has set, and I’ll be inside the castle by then.” He hesitated before adding. “If something happens before, you know how to get my attention.”

I nodded, standing on my tiptoes as he bent in the saddle, his lips brushing mine. “Be careful.”

“I will.”

I stood on the front steps watching him until he rode out of sight, and then I extracted my key and went inside.

“You’re back,” the maid said, sparing me a passing glance as she polished the wood of the front table. “We all thought you’d decided to run off again.”

I ignored the comment. “Where is my mother?”

“Not here.”

My stomach dropped and I swallowed the burn threatening to rise in my throat. “Where is she?”

“At the castle, I expect. Lady Marie sent her very own carriage to retrieve her this morning, and your mother was fit to be tied about your absence when she left. Left a message that you’re to join her as soon as possible, though I daresay she’s probably given up hope.”

They had her. My heart hammered and I struggled to keep the dismay from my face. It’s too early for the spell, I reminded myself. But it was cold comfort, because our plans had been disrupted before we’d even begun. The witch had made her move.

And now it was time to make ours. “I’ll leave as soon as I’m washed,” I said. “If you could please heat me some water for a bath.”

Bathing didn’t seem a priority, but I had a part to play that did not include showing up sweaty and stinking of horse. Bolting up the stairs, I went to my room to retrieve the herbs I’d hidden in my desk in case I needed them.

My eyes went to the gown hanging freshly pressed from my dressing screen, clearly my mother’s selection. My stomach clenched, knowing that when she’d had it hung there, her only concern had been my appearance. How I would be received. She had no idea how much danger she was in, and I couldn’t even warn her. As disgusting as the idea was, she was our bait and I could do nothing to jeopardize that.

But I still needed to know where she was.

Hurrying down the hall to her room, I went to her vanity and snatched up a hairbrush. It was as devoid of hair as if it were new. Frowning, I riffled through the rest of her combs and cosmetics looking for strands of hair. Nothing. The maid must have been through, and she apparently did a better job cleaning my mother’s things than she did mine.

Turning up a lamp, I went to her closet and began going through her clothes, searching for the gleam of red-gold, but there was none. How was that even possible? The linens on her bed were freshly laundered, and my eyes roved around the room for something else I could use. An object would work, but it had to be something that mattered to her – not some little knickknack she’d bought and not thought about since.