“You will see her when Anushka wills it, not before.”

She was here. “And here I believed you were the most powerful woman on the Isle,” I said. “Apparently I was wrong.”

Marie laughed, but the sound was all harsh edges. “When she sings, we all dance to her tune. She might be more devil than woman, but what is the saying? ‘The enemy of my enemy is my friend?’” She walked further into the room, and my eyes fixed on a red-gold hair caught on one of her heels. Mine? My mother’s? Anushka’s?

“Besides, she punished me harshly the last time I crossed her, and I will not make the same mistake again.”

“Please,” I said, dropping to my knees in front of her as if to beg. “She’s going to kill my mother. You need to help me.” I pressed my hand against the stray hair, holding it against the ground.

“I wish I could, Cécile,” she replied, stepping back and averting her eyes in discomfort. The hair remained under my hand. “But this is the only way to keep the Isle safe. She is the only one who can keep them contained.”

My eyes went to the costume still draped on its hanger, and hers followed suit. “After all this, you honestly expect me to perform?” Closing my fingers around the hair, I sat back on my heels.

“If you want the troll to survive the night, you will do just that.” Her face was grim. “Those are Anushka’s terms: if you do as she asks, she will return the creature to his cage alive. If you interfere with her ritual, she will see him dead.”

My stomach clenched, and I turned away from her, staring at the glow of the lamp until my eyes burned and watered. “You’d have me choose between the life of my lover and the life of my mother?” All of this was just words now. I needed her gone so I could attempt a spell.

“Genevieve’s death is not negotiable. Whether you choose to cooperate tonight will not change that fact. All you can hope to gain is the life of your lover.” Her voice twisted on the word as though it were some revolting and debauched thing.

“He knows this is a trap,” I whispered. “He knows what she plans to do.”

“That will not save him.” Marie went to my costume, tracing a finger down the silken fabric. “I want you to know, Cécile, I don’t relish this task. Harboring Anushka from the trolls is a burden those in my position have borne for five centuries. The duty of protecting the woman our husbands are oath-sworn to hunt down and kill. And she does not make it easy.”

The Regent didn’t know, and neither did Aiden. That explained much.

“It all makes for such strange irony that you – who are destined to be part of what keeps the curse in place – are responsible for unleashing one of the worst of them upon the world.”

“What has he done that is so horrible?” I demanded.

“It is what he can do that is terrifying,” she snapped. “Which is why he must be contained or killed. Those are your choices.”

I glared at her for a long moment, then let my shoulders slump in defeat. “I will do as she wishes. For his sake.”

“You’ve made the right choice.” She went to the door. “Finish getting ready. The guests have already begun to arrive.”

I waited until she was gone before wiping the fake tears from my face. Then I peeled the hair off my sweaty palm and examined it. There was no way of knowing who it belonged to, but it was my last chance. Tristan was planning to arrive promptly, and he’d be expecting to hear from me. I wasn’t ready to think about what might happen if I didn’t deliver.

Fifty-One

Tristan

“Eyes up,” I muttered under my breath, trying to keep my apprehension regarding Cécile’s silence out of my voice. “Remember, you’re supposed to be here.”

Sabine dutifully lifted her chin, but her death grip on my arm didn’t lessen.

“You told me once that information was free for the taking to those who watched and listened,” I added. “This is the same. Watch them, and do as they do. They may not know who you are, but that is not same as them knowing you’re the daughter of an innkeeper from a town in the middle of nowhere.”

“Right.”

I nodded at a pair I recognized from one of the many parties I’d attended during my first week in Trianon, introducing Sabine as an old friend of the family, before moving on. I heard their whispered speculation about how I secured an invitation to such an exclusive event, but none of that concerned me. Cécile should have contacted me by now, if not with answers, then at least to let me know our plan had failed.

“Do you see Marie?”

Sabine shook her head. She’d assured me she’d recognize the Lady du Chastelier, and I’d set her to watching the woman to see whom she spoke with. In the worst case, I needed to have the woman within reach in case I needed to force answers out of her the hard way. “But that’s the Regent over there,” Sabine added.

I let my gaze pass over the direction she’d indicated, easily picking out the Regent by the circle of courtiers fawning about him. He had the look of his son, but with many more years, grey hairs, and paunch around the middle.

“I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that you’d have the audacity to show your face here.”

I turned around to find Aiden standing behind me. He was freshly shaven and dressed as befitted his station, yet he looked haggard. A decade or more older than I knew him to be. “My lord.” I bowed low. “I take it you aren’t the individual I have to thank for the invitation to tonight’s fête?”