Grim Lovelies

by Megan Shepherd

  He leaned in.

  “You aren’t made for sweeping floors, little beastie,” he said quietly, not unkindly. “Don’t you know that?”

  She paused, caught by his words. What did he mean? That’s why she’d been made, to sweep the floors. The question was on her lips, tickling her tongue, but how did one question a prince? Especially one so handsome?

  The sharp click of heels on the stairs interrupted her. She jerked upright and hung up the coat quickly, guiltily, as Mada Vittora swept down the stairs. Prince Rennar was slower to straighten.

  “Vittora.”

  “Rennar.” Mada Vittora’s smile was icy. “I didn’t realize you’d be joining us.”

  “We have much to discuss, do we not?”

  Mada Vittora extended her hand. “Yes. Over wine.”

  The prince took her hand with the slightest nod, a nod that said that even though he was in her house, even though he appeared decades younger than her, he was undeniably her master. He followed her down the hall, only once looking back over his shoulder at Anouk and her flour-dusted apron.

  A sharp voice spoke behind her. “Are you dimwitted, girl, or are you going to invite me in?”

  Anouk jumped.

  Lady Metham stood on the front steps. Her silver hair was pulled back into a wild twist, and she wore a pale gray gown; it looked like a thunderstorm had landed on the doorstep. Lord Metham was beside her, thin and bespectacled, along with a young woman of Asian descent with short-cropped hair whom he addressed as Countess Quine. Their lips bore the lingering stain of colorful powder, a mixture of finely ground flowers, herbs, dried blood, and butterfly wings made fresh daily by the powdersmiths in the basement of Castle Ides. Around each one’s neck hung a glass vial of the mixture. Powder was highly potent, reserved only for the Royals; witches made do with less refined elixirs concocted from their own stores of fresh flowers and herbs. In a pinch, even a plain rose or thorn or housefly swallowed whole could fuel a small trick if more effective means were out of reach.

  Anouk invited them in and led them to the salon, where Mada Vittora and Viggo waited and then served canapés and champagne. Not even the drinks washed away the pale blue and green flush of powder on Lady Metham’s lips or the pink stain on Countess Quine’s tongue, and Anouk wondered what magic they had wrought that day. Prince Rennar’s lips weren’t stained at all; the vial of powder around his neck was full. She couldn’t help but steal glances at him. What had his earlier words meant?

  As she filled Viggo’s glass with water, he snarled quietly, “I told you to tell Cricket to come.”

  Anouk spilled the water, then hurried to clean it up with a corner of her apron. She glanced over her shoulder at Mada Vittora and the Royals, who were speaking in low voices by the fireplace.

  “I did,” Anouk said. “I left a message in Wormly’s box, but he wrote back that Cricket had gone to Dordogne on some of the Mada’s business. She won’t be back for a few days. I tried, Viggo.”

  But she hadn’t. Not at all. Wormly was a Goblin who carried messages for Mada Vittora; Anouk had seen him earlier that day and had only waved from the window. She wasn’t about to put Cricket in such a messy situation. As far as she knew, Cricket was fast asleep in bed at the moment and dreaming something sweet.

  Viggo’s eyes narrowed, as though he sensed the lie.

  Mada Vittora clapped her hands and motioned to the ballroom. “Shall we dine?” Her eyes snapped to Anouk and she gave a tight jerk of her head. Anouk ran to the ballroom and pulled out a chair for each of them. Prince Rennar. Lord and Lady Metham. Countess Quine. And at the head of the table, Mada Vittora, whose eyes went to Anouk’s apron.

  “Change that dirty apron,” she hissed. “You’re an embarrassment. Oh, never mind, just stay out of the way altogether. We can serve ourselves.”

  Hot blood burned in Anouk’s cheeks. She quickly collected the canapé plates from the salon and dashed off toward the kitchen as Lady Metham proposed a toast.

  “To the new territories within the Haute,” Lady Metham said. “The Lavender Witch will be furious out there in her flower fortress.”

  “Let her be,” Mada Vittora said evenly.

  Glasses clinked.

  Anouk returned to the kitchen laden with the soiled plates, still feeling the sting of having displeased her mistress. Beau was perched on a stool, scraping the mixing bowl and licking the spoon.

  “I envy them,” he said, pointing the spoon toward the ballroom. “Why don’t you cook for me like this?”

  She put down the dishes and leaned on the counter, closing her eyes, her cheeks still warm.

  Beau pushed back his stool and stood. His hand pressed against her back. “What’s wrong, cabbage?”

  She shook her head. “Nothing.” She swallowed down the unsettling bile in her throat. “Prince Rennar is here.”

  Beau whistled, low and impressed.

  She hesitated. “He looked at me like he’d never seen a beastie before. He said I shouldn’t be sweeping her floors.”

  Beau gave the spoon another lick. “What should you be doing, then? The laundry?”

  Anouk took the spoon from him and tapped it against her lips, worried. “I don’t think that’s what he meant. He said it as though I shouldn’t be serving her at all.” The sugary smell of compote clung to her nose, turning her stomach, and she lobbed the spoon into the sudsy sink. Music started from somewhere deeper in the house, the high strains of a violin. Viggo must be playing. Sounds of clapping came from the ballroom.

  “They’re dancing,” Anouk said.

  “They’re drunk,” Beau answered.

  Anouk picked up the plates and dumped them into the sink. She tugged on yellow dish gloves distractedly. Could Luc’s disappearance be part of this territory war between the witches? She reached for the soap and a dishrag, but Beau got to the soap first and set it aside.

  “Dance with me,” he said.

  She gave him an impatient look, holding up the dripping dish gloves. “I’m a mess.”

  “You always are.” He wrapped one of his hands around her gloved one. “Come on, I know that look. You’ll worry all night over this. You deserve a break.”

  He held up their hands as though ready to dance. Soapy water ran down his arm, soaking his shirt cuff, but he didn’t seem to mind. The tempo of the violin music picked up; Viggo must have been in a good mood. Laughter came from the ballroom.

  Anouk rested one hand on his shoulder and sighed. “Go on, then. Show me how.”

  He grinned. “Step back. Like this. There. Now forward.”

  She tried to follow his movements, leaving damp footprints on the kitchen tiles. He led her in a clumsy circle around the big oak table, counting, “One-two-three-four, one-two-three-four.” The floor was slick from the water dripping from her dish gloves. Soap bubbles popped in the sink.

  “When did you learn how to dance?” she asked.

  He spun her in a circle by the oven. “I don’t. Know how to dance, I mean. I’m making it up as I go along. Now forward. To your left. Step back.” He swept her around the kitchen, past the dirty dishes and the pantry filled with jams and pickled meats. “Twirl. Bow. Now step to the right.”

  “Beau, you’re ridiculous!” She laughed.

  He pulled her close, twirling her by the icebox. His shirt was wet to the elbows now. The both of them were a mess, and she felt that same giddiness that she had on the roof, tipsy just from being in his arms, and—​

  He stepped on her toes.

  “Oh!” She grimaced as she pulled her hands from his and clutched at her foot.

  “Merde. Sorry about that. Let’s see the damage.” He lifted her by the waist, set her down on the kitchen table, and knelt to inspect her foot. Her left big toe was red and bore the imprint of his shoe tread, but it wasn’t bleeding. He ran his thumb over it gently. “No permanent harm, I think.” He paused. “I’d hate for you to have lost another one.”

  He took her right foot in his other hand and, holding b
oth her feet, ran his thumbs gently over the scars where her little toes had been. It had been six months. Nearly healed.

  “One, two, three, four,” he said quietly, counting the remaining toes on each foot.

  He didn’t let go of her feet. His hair was disheveled from dancing and from the steam from the stove. She touched her own. It had fallen out of the ribbon.

  “Anouk.” Beau’s hands tightened over her feet, kneading slightly.

  She tugged her feet out of his grasp, embarrassed by the scars and the missing toes and the questions Beau always raised about them. “Don’t start, Beau.”

  She climbed off the table.

  “Take these off,” he said suddenly, tugging at the dish gloves. “I want to hold your hand. Really dance.”

  “But we don’t know how.”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  She pulled off the dish gloves—​at least he’d dropped the subject of her toes. “And the apron,” he said, digging his fingers into the fabric at her waist. “I hate them, all these stupid things she makes you wear. Dressing you up like a doll.” His voice had grown low.

  “Beau, are you all right?”

  “Take it off,” he said, pulling at the ribbons behind her neck. “You aren’t some plaything. It isn’t okay, her ordering you around. Prince Rennar was right. You shouldn’t be sweeping her floors.”

  “But it’s my job.”

  “You get paid for a job. A job with no pay is called slavery.” He tugged at the apron.

  “Beau, what’s gotten into you? The Mada is . . . she’s like our . . .”

  “She’s not our mother,” he said flatly.

  The music from the ballroom stopped abruptly. For a moment the house was silent. No laughter, no clinking glasses, only the slowly bursting soap bubbles in the sink.

  “Anouk!” Mada Vittora suddenly called. “More wine!”

  Anouk gave Beau a hard look as she pushed his hands off her shoulders, then retied the bow of her apron. She smoothed her hands over it, pulled back her hair, and carried the wine decanter to the ballroom. They had cleared the table, throwing napkins on the floor and haphazardly stacking the rest of the dirty dishes, and now they leaned over a map of the city that was unrolled on the table. Prince Rennar held a dagger over the map, speaking in a low whisper as he made small, precise cuts. Anouk kept her eyes averted, but she glimpsed silver powder on his lips. What magic were they doing now?

  As she poured the wine, she tried not to make it obvious she was listening. Rennar was speaking the language of magic: the Selentium Vox, the Silent Tongue. Members of the Haute spent lifetimes mastering it. Mada Vittora spoke it better than most. The townhouse library was filled with rare handwritten volumes of Selentium Vox grammar and vocabulary, books that Anouk borrowed and pored over at night so that she would be ready to help her mistress if the time ever came. And it had, once. There had been an evening over the summer when Mada Vittora had guzzled too many limoncello tonics and couldn’t remember the words to a love spell she’d meant to cast on some famous Pretty movie star. Anouk had snuck into the library and sorted through the volumes using the bits and pieces of Selentium Vox she’d taught herself until she’d found the right book. She left it out on the bistro table in the courtyard, open to the correct spell; Mada Vittora discovered it and, in her tipsy state, assumed she’d found the spell herself.

  When Anouk went back to the kitchen, Beau was gone. Probably sulking in his room on the far side of the courtyard. Was it her fault he and Mada Vittora hadn’t ever gotten along? The Mada had given them life. Human life. Words to speak their thoughts, hands to do work, clothes to dress themselves, and all the other gifts that came with being human, like music and laughter and fairy tales, things Anouk clung to like precious jewels.

  Before Mada Vittora—​well, that was only darkness. It frightened Anouk to think about those days. She knew what she had been: animal. She didn’t know what type—​none of them knew—​but what did it matter? Animal was animal. Mangy and hungry. Alone and vulnerable. She knew she’d been this, but she didn’t remember. All she had was a hazy feeling of dread, like trying to rush home before a winter storm strikes, and that’s how she’d given her past a name: Dark thing. Cold place. It made her first memory all the sweeter: Roses and thyme. Waking on the attic floor with all the rest of them looking down at her. Beau. Cricket. Hunter Black. Luc, the eldest, who looked twenty but had been human for only five years. He’d wrapped a blanket around her and stroked her hair and said, It will all be well, you’re safe now, it’s scary now but you’ll learn. A puddle of blood had stained the floor beneath her. Viggo’s, though she hadn’t known it at the time.

  And the Mada. She had been there too, of course, perfumed by the trick’s marjoram and wormwood and foxglove, the words of the Selentium Vox whisper still on her lips. When her eyes had found Anouk’s, she had tilted her head and smiled.

  This one’s sweet, isn’t she?

  Anouk was lost in the memory, elbow-deep in cleaning the dishes, when she heard the click-click of heels on the kitchen floor. Mada Vittora came tottering in, drunk, her cheeks flushed unbecomingly.

  Anouk pulled off her gloves. “Is dinner over? Shall I fetch the Royals’ coats?”

  Mada Vittora waved vaguely. The top button of her blouse had come loose and was dangling. “Viggo’s seeing them out. He’s going to Castle Ides with them to handle the final paperwork.”

  An image flashed in Anouk’s head of Prince Rennar and she felt a stab of regret that she wouldn’t see him again. Why did she care? Honestly, she should be relieved that he and the other Royals were gone. But there had been something about the way he had looked at her so keenly, as though he knew something that she didn’t.

  “It was a good party, I hope?” Anouk asked.

  Mada Vittora took a step and slipped on the soapy water. She cursed and kicked off her heels. Her bare toes were surprisingly pale, like Anouk’s. Except, of course, that she had all ten.

  “Better than we dreamed.” Her eyes glistened with the alcohol. “Big things are going to happen. Just wait and see.”

  “Oh . . . good.” Anouk had been referring to the food.

  Mada Vittora saw the unraveling button and frowned. “Attash betit . . . betit . . . betit . . .” She couldn’t recall the last word of the repair trick.

  Anouk feigned a cough. “Truk.”

  Mada Vittora’s watery eyes snapped to her. A momentary suspicion wavered in her look, but it was soon drowned out by a tipsy hiccup, and she blinked and flicked at the little button. “Ah, I remember now. Attash betit truk.”

  The button obediently stitched itself back to the blouse.

  A flush of pride warmed Anouk’s cheeks. To her surprise, the witch suddenly pressed a kiss against Anouk’s forehead. “My sweet girl. My darling girl. Ma galuk spirn.” She wobbled away, leaving the heels.

  My clever girl. That was what she’d said in the Silent Tongue.

  Anouk brushed her fingers against her forehead, the kiss still damp. Her heart was lighter as she finished washing the dishes, dried them, and put them away. She soaked the big roasting pan in the sink to scour first thing in the morning. She cleared the rest of the dishes from the empty ballroom and blew out the candles. She swept the floor and closed the curtains over the tall windows. The moon was high outside. It had to be close to midnight.

  A thump sounded from upstairs.

  She dropped the broom, which clattered to the floor, and picked it back up in a hurry.

  She listened.

  No footsteps. No voices calling for her to come clean up a broken vase or fallen books. But something about the silence ate at her.

  “Mada?” she called up the stairs. “Is everything all right?”

  No answer.

  “Viggo?”

  But no, he had left with the Royals, and he would have taken Hunter Black with him. They wouldn’t be back until the morning. She went to the window and pushed aside the drapes. The black Rolls-Royce was parked o
ut front, as was Hunter Black’s gunmetal-gray motorcycle. They must have gone to Castle Ides in the Royals’ car.

  Now the silence gnashed at her with big, jagged teeth. With a start, she realized the clock above the drawing-room fireplace had stopped. She tapped its face. Nothing. She’d have to reset it.

  Her eyes trailed up to the portrait of the Shadow Royals, pulled by some unavoidable force, and she shivered. Were they watching even now? She went to the salon to check the time on the grandfather clock so she could reset the mantel one, but it had stopped too. A chill started at the base of her spine. She checked the hall clock, and the one in the kitchen, and the one on the stairs landing.

  Every clock in the house had stopped at exactly midnight.

  The chill grew. What was this dark magic? Not like any trick or whisper she had ever seen. The coldness spread up her back as she made her way up the stairs. She realized distractedly that she still clutched the broom in one hand.

  “Mada?”

  Empty bedrooms, empty halls. She double-checked Viggo’s room and the guest room Hunter Black used while he was in town to make sure they’d really left. All empty. She clutched the broom like a weapon, ready to strike. It wasn’t until the sixth floor, Mada Vittora’s grand bedroom, that she heard the scramble of someone’s jagged breath.

  “Hello?”

  She brandished the broom handle but then let her arms fall in surprise. “Beau?”

  He was crouched on the Persian rug at the foot of the bed. The closet door was open. The dressing table’s chair was overturned. Bright red wine had spilled and was soaking into the carpet, and Anouk tsked reflexively. The hardest stains to get out.

  She set the broom aside uncertainly. “What are you doing in here? Where’s Mada Vittora?”

  His hair was messy. His chest rose and fell quickly. He met her eyes with a gaze like a caught animal’s, a look she’d never seen on his face before, not even the time that Hunter Black had cornered him in the garage and threatened to cut out his tongue if he ever called Viggo a salaud again.