Midnight Beauties

by Megan Shepherd

  “We aren’t bound by anything Mada Vittora made us for. Not anymore. And neither was Viggo. Since she died, he’s been free to make his own choices too. You saved his life countless times. It was his choice to save yours.”

  Hunter Black turned away to hide the dampness pooling in his dark eyes. Cricket uncertainly offered him an Hermès scarf she’d stolen from Pickwick and Rue’s. He grumbled at the floral pattern but then took it.

  The chimes of Big Ben tolled.

  Anouk’s heart lurched until she realized the clock was simply tolling the hour. Once more, she was taken by how normal the city was. How delightful it was just to see regular Pretties going about their regular little lives, tourists bent over guidebooks, police chasing after a stray dog, a boy and a girl walking hand in hand.

  And coming down the sidewalk was Luc. He was limping slightly, a fever sheen in his eyes, straining just to walk. He should have been fully healed by now, but he looked ten times worse than he had when he’d gone to the museum to check on Duke Karolinge. When he caught sight of Anouk and saw that she was safe, his pained expression eased.

  She stared at his weakened state. “Luc, you look—”

  He shook his head like it didn’t matter. Clammy sweat was slick on his temples. “Duke Karolinge is gone. The snow spell exhausted him. He couldn’t continue. As soon as he stopped whispering, the mummies unfroze and found him on the roof before he had the strength to start casting again. It wasn’t pretty.”

  Her stomach felt suddenly hollow. “I was afraid that was the case.”

  It had taken her a long time to trust a man—​a Royal—​whose job was to watch so many Pretty girls die. In the end, he’d finally faced his own coals.

  Luc faltered. He leaned against a building, wheezing.

  Anouk frowned. “Rennar, I need a favor.” She eyed the bright midday sun. “I need for you to make it snow one last time.”

  Chapter 47

  Once more, the day turned dark. Prince Rennar stood on Westminster Bridge, casting a whisper and circling his left hand, pulling in clouds over the London skyline. Pretties frowned up at the sky and opened their umbrellas against fresh snow. The fact that the snowstorm spanned only the length of the bridge and that the sun was still shining on both banks didn’t seem to vex them.

  Anouk stepped onto the bridge. “Will you join me, Luc?”

  He limped onto the bridge in halting steps, one hand pressed to his heart. Snow collected on his head and shoulders.

  He took her hand and asked softly, “What are you doing, Dust Bunny?”

  “Saving you.”

  She squeezed his hand in hers. If Luc had taught her to believe in anything, it was the power of hope. But she’d also learned that wishes weren’t enough. True magic didn’t happen by accident. It took blood and bone and bargains with ancient creatures that looked like little boys.

  An icy gust of wind blustered at her back, announcing his presence.

  “Hello, lovely.”

  She turned toward Jak. He was perched on the bridge railing beneath a streetlamp, its lantern casting a halo over his head.

  “Hello, Jak.”

  He grinned his sharp-toothed smile. “Have you summoned me so that I can collect my prize?”

  Luc’s palm was sweating, though from the poison or from nerves, Anouk wasn’t sure. Rennar continued his quiet whisper behind them, left hand gesturing in an endless circle, and one by one, the other Snow Children materialized on the lampposts and railings of the bridge, their eyes hungry.

  Anouk squeezed Luc’s hand. He still smelled like thyme, and it took her back to Mada Vittora’s townhouse attic, to the stories Luc made up for her, to games of invisible ink and secret messages. At the end of the bridge, where the snow stopped, Cricket and Petra and Beau waited. Their faces were pinched. They didn’t try to interfere.

  “Luc,” Anouk whispered. “I can reason with Jak. I can take your place. There are ways to give up being a witch.”

  She expected him to argue. She was even ready for him to try to throw her over the side of the bridge to keep her from making such a deadly promise. But she didn’t expect him to laugh. It came out of him in deep rolling bursts that gradually turned to coughs, and he doubled over and hacked into the snow. When he straightened, he wasn’t smiling.

  “Dust Bunny, I thought you’d have guessed.”

  Her face pulled tight. “Guessed what?”

  He pressed his hand against his heart. “The poison.”

  She shook her head. “I drew it out of you. I saw it. It poured out of your hand, that awful black mess.”

  He gave her a sad smile. “It was too late, Dust Bunny. A dose had already gotten to my heart. That’s why I agreed to Jak’s deal, don’t you understand? Either way, I’m going. I might as well go with a kiss.”

  Anouk blinked, trying to make sense of what she was hearing. She twisted toward Cricket, Petra, and Beau, but they were too far away to have heard Luc’s words. Rennar was closer. His whisper wavered when he overheard Luc’s confession, but only for a moment. His face was hard. He was used to losing those close to him.

  Anouk wasn’t.

  Angry, she spun on Jak. “Did you know he was dying?”

  He blinked lazily at her accusation. “I know a lot of things, and I knew that too.”

  Anouk felt tears pushing at her eyes. They’d lost Tenpenny. They’d lost Saint. They’d lost Duke Karolinge. They’d lost Viggo. Beau was without sight and they didn’t know if he’d get it back. She’d traded her hand in marriage to Rennar in a deal that had pitted the Courts against one another, and they were now on the brink of a Royal war.

  She couldn’t lose Luc too.

  She grabbed his lapels in both hands, made fists out of the fabric, and gave him a good solid shake. “Luc, you idiot.”

  She’d faced losing him before—​where had that gotten her? Alone in Paris, unmoored, like a ship without a captain. It was true that in his absence, she’d learned to stand on her own two feet and do incredible things: ride a motorcycle, kill witches, twist time itself. But she’d never looked to Luc to do any of those things anyway. He’d been her friend. His stories had taken the place of memories she never had; if it weren’t for his fairy tales, she wouldn’t have known about the Pretty World, about monsters, love, and luck.

  “You won’t lose him.”

  She was so focused on Luc that she’d forgotten Jak was there. At his words, she frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “A kiss from a Snow Child doesn’t kill.”

  “What about the frozen girls in the Black Forest?” Her voice was hard. If this was another one of his tricks, she’d lost her patience for it.

  Jak glanced over his shoulder at one of the other Snow Children. A girl, on her own, by the opposite lamppost. She sat on the railing, kicking her bare feet in the air, one arm wrapped around the lamppost. Her hair was the color of frost, like the others, but there was something oddly familiar in the hunched way she sat.

  Anouk’s eyes widened. “The girl in the woods. The frozen corpse. It’s her.”

  Jak nodded. “A kiss from a Snow Child might end one life, but it starts another. There are so many realms, lovely. Did you think yours was the only one?”

  It began to dawn on her that Luc must have known this. Luc was a story master, and he’d shared so many tales with her, even ones about the Snow Children, but he’d never told her the ending.

  Before she could stop him, Jak clutched the lamppost, crouched on the railing, and leaned forward. Luc hesitated for a breath before leaning forward too. Their lips met as the snow fell around them. At first it was simply a kiss. Two young men on Westminster Bridge sharing a moment. But then Luc’s body stiffened. It shook. Black lines threaded over his mouth and down his neck, and he started to convulse. Jak grabbed his head, not letting him pull away. He softened the kiss and, after a shiver, Luc’s body relaxed. The black lines settled deeper into his skin. His face took on a sheen of ice, and when he at last pulled away from J
ak, frost laced his breath.

  Anouk grabbed his shirt. “Luc!”

  “I’m here.” His icy breath fogged in the air. His eyes were threaded through with black that bled into the whites. His eyelashes were coated in ice. His lips were tinged with blue. His scalp, where he had a shadow of hair, was like frost at dawn.

  She felt a sob in her throat. “You’re ice cold.”

  To her surprise, Luc smiled. “I feel warm.” He tilted his head. “For now.”

  Jak jumped down from the railing, hopping over with nimble limbs. “See, lovely? Your friend is not gone. Dead, yes, but not gone. Every time it snows, you’ll have him again.”

  She looked sadly at Luc. She couldn’t help but feel that he was still lost to her. They’d never again pass secret notes to each other, never share the latest Goblin gossip over a bowl of praline cream, never sneak into the townhouse courtyard to watch the midnight roses bloom under a full moon. But the roses and the townhouse were gone anyway. There was no going back for any of them.

  Luc cupped her face and pressed their foreheads together. “Anouk, don’t give up hope. Do you know how stories come to be? There’s magic to stories, but not the kind made with tricks and whispers. Stories begin with one person and one idea. Fairy tales don’t need spells to bring them into existence; they only need a dreamer with a good tale about people who fight for what they love and a world that hinges on their actions. Dust Bunny, you don’t need any more of my fairy tales, do you understand? All they ever were was words and wishes. I made them up. You’re living your own story now. The story of a beastie who became a princess. A maid who saved a city. There’s a place for you in this world. Find it. Write your own story. I promise you, it’ll be told for ages to come by Pretties gathered around campfires, by Goblins over tea, even by Royals. You’re magic, Anouk.”

  She thought of Cricket stealing the artifacts from Castle Ides and the British Museum, the clues that she thought led to the existence of other beasties. Haven’t you ever wondered what our place in the world is? What it could be? Cricket had asked. They weren’t maids and chauffeurs and gardeners anymore. They didn’t answer to witches or Royals. The Haute ran through their veins. They were bound to it and it to them. Ages ago, Prince Rennar had created the beastie spell for a reason.

  “Oh, Luc.” She threw her arms around him. “I’m going to miss you.”

  “Whenever you need me,” he said in her ear, “summon the snow and I’ll be there.”

  She squeezed him tight. For a moment she wished time could freeze as it had for the Pretties. But every story had to end sometime. At least they had helped the Goblins retake their city. Even now, she could hear the hoots and yelps of Goblins racing through London on motorcycles and bursting into pubs, taking all the liquor, and throwing gold coins at Pretties in exchange. She’d never known what it meant to have a home that she truly called hers, but she could see what it meant for them. Goblins were the oldest of the orders, even older than the Royals, and yet for centuries they’d been treated as errand boys. That changed now. The Court of Isles, based in London, was gone. Without Prince Maxim and Lady Imogen, the city was free.

  She let Luc go and nodded to Rennar. He understood her signal and let the snow whisper die on his lips. The snowfall lessened until the last flakes were nearly on the ground. Luc raised a hand. Then he, Jak, and all the rest vanished.

  Anouk stared at the place where they’d been. She heard footsteps and felt Beau’s presence at her side. He rested one hand on the railing, felt his way along it, and then wrapped a hand around her waist. She leaned her head against his shoulder.

  “We’re going to get you your sight back,” she promised. “And then we’re going to help Cricket find what she’s looking for.”

  “And then what, Princess?”

  “Then we’re going to do whatever we want, Beau. Go to America and drive in that race you want. NASCAR. Eat shrimp and grits and deep-dish pizza and ride horses over mountains and lie out on sunny beaches. And when we’re done, we’re going to find our place in this world, like Luc said. We’re the only ones in the Haute whom the vitae echo doesn’t affect. That has to mean something. We can kill, but killing was never our primary purpose. I think we’re meant to be guardians of magic, in a sense. Ensuring the balance of magic and technology. Safeguarding the rules. Making sure that no Royals or witches or anyone else treads into territory that could harm others.”

  “A magic army.”

  “Maybe more like magic police. There are only five of us. A bit small for an army.”

  She pressed her hands against the sides of his face and guided his lips to hers. Beneath their feet, the Thames gurgled. In the distance, the Eye of London spun in its Ferris-wheel circle, giving Pretty tourists a view of a city that had very nearly been annihilated—​not that any of them remembered. Beau’s hand traced up to her nape. She tilted her head back, letting her hair fall over her shoulders. If she had dust on her cheek, she didn’t care. She kissed Beau deeper. He smelled like cologne from Pickwick and Rue’s, winter frost, and magic. She smiled to herself, thinking of Jak, and almost laughed. He was right. There was nothing in the world better than a good kiss.

  She pulled back and ran a playful finger down Beau’s nose.

  When the crash came, she heard it distantly, like something that had happened in a half-forgotten nightmare. Her head turned toward the sound instinctively, and Beau’s did too, even though his eyes saw nothing. He didn’t see the odd way that the Ferris wheel had stopped. He didn’t see the tangle of bodies on the street next to Westminster Bridge. He didn’t see the Goblin motorcycles and buses that had crashed together in a horrifying wreck.

  He didn’t see that standing on top of the Ferris wheel, commanding the wreck like a conductor leading an orchestra, was the man Anouk had stood with under a trellis of roses and married.

  Prince Rennar.

  Head of the Shadow Royals of Paris, overseer of the Haute.

  She’d saved London, and now, for some reason she couldn’t possibly fathom, the man she’d bound herself to was tearing it apart all over again.

  Chapter 48

  “R ennar!”

  She ran across Westminster Bridge toward the London Eye Ferris wheel, the city a blur from the wind stinging her eyes. She gritted her teeth and whispered a spell to give her feet greater speed. Her heart pounded. What did Rennar think he was doing? They’d stopped the Noirceur! The battle was over! London was rightfully back in the hands of the Goblins, as they’d always planned.

  I’m tired, Anouk, he had said. For too long, power has been in the wrong hands.

  She leaped over a chain onto the pier that housed the Ferris wheel, startling the Pretties who operated the ride. They shouted at her. She cast a quick whisper that made her invisible to them.

  “Rennar!” she called up. “Stop this!”

  On the Thames, the Goblins had commandeered a party boat that blasted out rock music. The boat was now rocking wildly back and forth, though the rest of the river was calm. The boat suddenly tipped far too much to one side and started taking on water. The Goblins screamed. The boat continued to take on water until it rolled over and began sinking. Giant air bubbles churned as it sank. Goblins were thrown into the roiling waves.

  It had happened in seconds.

  Anouk froze at the edge of the pier, watching in horror. Goblins were terrible swimmers. She didn’t know how to swim either, but what did that matter to a witch? She had to save them. With enough life-essence, she could drain the entire Thames. But as if sensing her line of thinking, the water began to spin like a funnel, sucking down the Goblins and the boat. She swallowed the last of her owl feathers and cast a spell to stop the water, but it was too late. Every one of the Goblins vanished beneath the surface. As fiercely as she whispered, none resurfaced.

  She shook her head as though she hadn’t seen right. The Goblins in the water were . . . gone. How many of them? Twenty? Thirty? How many more had died on the buses and motorcycles Renna
r had made crash?

  Fury stormed in her chest until she felt it was going to erupt out of her. Power ached in her hands and feet. She spun toward the stopped Ferris wheel. He’d doubtlessly try to prevent anyone from climbing it. But she’d flown before. She uncorked the bottle that held the rest of Saint’s blood and sucked down a few hungry sips.

  “Volart kael.”

  She felt the thrill of her feet leaving solid ground. She held on to the bars of the Ferris wheel as she rose, not exactly flying but certainly climbing with ease, rising higher and higher until the city skyline fanned out on the horizon and then she was at the very top, and she grabbed the metal rim to keep from rising higher.

  She was breathing hard. This high, the wind whipped at her, blowing her hair in her face. She pushed it away, steadying herself on the precarious bars of the Ferris wheel, and faced Rennar. He turned to her with a conflicted expression. The spell to capsize the party boat was still fresh on his lips.

  The world was so far below them that it made her feel dizzy, and she clutched the bar harder.

  “What are you doing?” she cried.

  “What we always planned to do, you and I.”

  She sputtered in surprise. “We agreed to turn over power to the lesser orders, not kill them! Tell me you didn’t lie to me, Rennar. Tell me this isn’t a trick.”

  Hesitation wavered in his eyes. His brows knit together. “Anouk, you knew all along what I planned. The Court of Isles is gone. The Coven of Oxford is dead. London is free for the taking. I’m the ruler of the Haute, which extends as far as the sun shines. I’m taking back what belongs to me.”

  She felt like she was going mad. “No. You said you were tired of ruling. You said that power had been in the wrong hands for too long. That being a Royal meant knowing when to hold on to power and when to give it up.”

  He took a hesitant step toward her. “I am tired. Tired of usurpers like the Coven of Oxford trying to take what is mine.” He ran a hand over his face and then held it out pleadingly. “Whose wrong hands did you think I meant, if not theirs?”