The Everlasting Rose (Belles, The)

by Dhonielle Clayton

  The Minister of News has even developed weather balloons, which release rain down over cities and reveal invisible post-balloons, so don’t risk using the ones we purchased. Send all messages with Or using her claw.

  I’m still trying to find my way into the palace. Your note was extremely helpful, and I avoided making a huge mistake trying to use the old tunnel network.

  My family is being held in apartments rather than dungeons. The Minister of War ensured that, and I am forever grateful. I’m going to break them out in three days’ time, the same day as the coronation. I’m putting the pieces together.

  Once I secure my family, I will come back into Trianon and wait for you. The festivities will have just begun, and it will be chaos—which is a good thing. Oftentimes, things are missed in a storm. Use the maps!

  Be safe.

  Rémy

  “What does it say?” Edel tries to take the parchment from my hands. “Is it from Rémy?”

  “Yes.” I pull away. “It was for me. He told me that post-balloons are being monitored and not to send them in the direction of Trianon anymore. To send Or only.” I tuck the parchment into my dress pocket, and it feels like a warm bayou rock through the fabric. His words run through my mind.

  I will come back into Trianon and wait for you.

  Be safe.

  She frowns, her mouth pursed with confusion and irritation. “You’re being strange.”

  “Fine.” I take the letter out again and shove it at her.

  She reads it. “I’m glad he’s all right.”

  “You suddenly like him?”

  “I don’t dislike him.” Her eyes burn into mine. “I don’t love him like you do.”

  “He’s been good to us. He was there for me at the palace, even when I didn’t realize it,” I admit. “He’s important.” The words I love him tuck themselves deep down inside me, afraid to be exposed to light and air once again.

  The teacup dragons squeak.

  “They need to be fed,” she says.

  “And we should write to Arabella about what happened with Valerie. She’s probably heard about the Silk Teahouse burning already.”

  Edel feeds them salted pork, then hands me my quill, ink, and a small piece of parchment.

  I scribble quickly.

  Arabella,

  Valerie is dead. The Silk Teahouse has burned down. But we’ve located who we were looking for, and are on our way there. We’ll be with you, soon.

  Love,

  Camille

  I read it out loud to Edel, and she grunts her approval. I put the dragons, except for Fantôme, in their cage and drag a cloth over its bars.

  “You’ve got a journey tonight,” I say.

  Edel feeds her another cube of salted pork. I fish out one of Arabella’s sangsues from our jars. Only two remain.

  “Stay low.” I kiss Fantôme’s warm head and send her out the window.

  Footsteps draw near to the door. A newspaper slides beneath it with a whoosh.

  I grab it—the late-night edition of the Herald. The front page shows Sophia and Auguste at the Royal Opera under the headline: TROUBLE BEFORE MATRIMONY. She’s all grins and her teacup monkey, Singe, hangs off her tall hair-tower like it’s a low-hanging tree branch. Auguste grimaces, his long, tousled hair pulled back. He’s grown a full beard and his eyes look sad.

  I wonder if soon I won’t think about him or remember him, if little moments like this will stop making the cut reopen, spilling fresh blood and pain. His picture stirs memories I’d worked hard to bury deep inside me, rattling and shaking them like sand in a flipped hourglass. How can I still feel this way about him when the thought of Rémy makes me smile?

  I close my eyes and imagine arriving at the palace and facing Sophia. I see her surrounded by her pets—both human and animal—wielding her power, and him sitting on the throne beside her, slumped in the chair with a perpetual scowl on his face. I wonder what will happen to him when we stop Sophia from becoming queen. Has he grown to love her? Has he grown to support her?

  The boat jerks.

  “Drop your anchor,” a voice commands.

  I peek out from behind the drapes. A sleek black boat slides up beside our watercoach.

  “Edel,” I whisper hard.

  She doesn’t stir.

  I jostle her arm.

  She jumps.

  “Someone is outside.”

  I whistle. All the teacup dragons wake up. I slip them into my pouch, where they curl back together and resume sleeping. I scramble to repack our things. My skin, my heart, my bones all thrum with panic.

  There’s a rumble as feet hit the ship’s deck. Edel and I move to the center of the chamber, standing back-to-back, bracing for whoever comes through the door.

  I place my hand on the knife Rémy gave me. Still spotted with Valerie’s blood. My fingers buzz with the tingle of the arcana rising inside to protect me.

  The door opens.

  Three women enter wearing dark gowns edged in white, their faces covered with smiling iron masks. Etched spiders dot across their cheeks. Crowns of strange pink flowers twist around their heads.

  “Don’t touch us,” Edel hollers.

  One of the women laughs. “We don’t plan on it.” She pulls out two small thuribles. The metal burners explode with thick acrid smoke.

  Edel coughs and clutches her stomach. The night-lanterns snuff out.

  I wave my hands in front of my face as a dull ringing reverberates in my ears, but it’s no use. My lungs fill with smoke, and the light disappears as I feel myself falling.

  I fall in and out of a dream. Maman replaces Sophia. We’re in the library at Maison Rouge. The space is dark and somber, furniture upholstered in deep maroons, crimson velvets, and rich golds, with heavy shaded lanterns sitting on each table. Tall bookshelves line the walls, the varnish giving them a bloody glow. Spines reveal legal titles—beauty and toilette laws, city decorum statutes, and royal family protocol—stretching back to the very beginning of Orléans. A large portrait series of Belle generations hangs from a mosaic ceiling by glittering strings. I’m small, skipping behind her from aisle to aisle, chasing her trailing nightgown.

  “What are you looking for, Maman?” I ask.

  She smiles back at me, her eyes alive with wonder and excitement. “A fairy tale that I want to tell you.”

  “I thought you knew all the stories.” I catch her and slide my hand into hers; it’s warm and strong. “You said you did.”

  “I do, but I need to get the details of this one just right. It’s about the Beauty Trials and the everlasting rose. Did Madam Du Barry tell you about that?”

  “No.”

  She smiles. “You’ll see.”

  We sneak through more aisles until she pauses before a shelf of red-spined books. She runs her fingers across them, and I mimic her.

  “Aren’t they lovely?” she says, pulling out a thin volume.

  “Yes,” I say.

  She cracks it open, sniffs the parchment, then puts it under my nose. “And they smell like...”

  “Ink,” I reply.

  “Magic.” She kisses my forehead. “Come, petite abeille.” She leads me to one of the cushioned window nooks in the library. We look out over the Rose Bayou to the left—white trees holding their crimson petals and imperial boats navigating the waters to our canopied dock, and the forest behind our house to the right—

  all-consuming darkness as far as the eye can see.

  She opens the book, traces her long white fingers over the calligraphy, and scans the page. “Before the Goddess of Beauty decided to return to her husband, she had to trust someone to take care of us.”

  “How did she do it?” I ask.

  “If you listen, I will tell you.” She pushes a finger against my nose. “So many questions before letting the story unfold. She established the Beauty Trials to draw out the right woman who could be trusted to take care of us.”

  “What’s a trial?”

  “A test.”
She points to pictures in the book of the Goddess seated on a throne made of Belle-roses. “She wanted to make sure the woman would have the right qualities.”

  “Like what?”

  She taps the picture of a line of women.

  “Some of the same qualities that you have, little fox. Determination, strength, kindness, loyalty, fortitude, and most of all, selflessness.”

  My eyes soak in the pictures of various women standing before the Goddess. “What did they have to do?”

  “See this chest here”—she traces her finger over the drawing—“it contains objects that start a divine series of challenges.”

  “Who won?”

  “You don’t remember the first queen of Orléans from your history lessons?”

  I shake my head. She purses her lips.

  “Don’t tell Du Barry,” I plead. “I don’t want to have to write any lines.”

  “Madam Du Barry,” she corrects.

  I sigh.

  “Never. Our secrets are ours.” She winks at me. “Queen Marjorie. She was the first monarch of the House of Orléans. The Goddess also gave her an everlasting rose.” She flips a page in the book and taps a picture of a black-and-red rose growing from blood-soaked soil.

  “What’s that, Maman?” I ask, circling my finger over the ink-drawn petals.

  “A symbol that represents us,” she replies.

  My eyes widen. “Do you think she misses us? Do you think she’d ever visit?”

  “I think if we needed her, she would come.” She taps my nose. “But otherwise I think she’s done with this world. She sent us. We are her everlasting roses. Our blood, her blood, is what has rescued this world and allows it to thrive.”

  “Can we call her on one of the circuit-phones? What if we really need help one day?”

  She takes my hand in hers, knitting our fingers together like threads of white and brown yarn. “I don’t think she’d send us here without being able to protect us if something went wrong.”

  The light from a single night-lantern is a shock, pulling me out of my dreams and back into this new and strange reality. My surroundings sharpen around me.

  A dungeon.

  A cage.

  Metal bars lock us inside a cave. Long, pointed cylinders push through the stone ceiling like the spikes on a gigantic teacup porcupine.

  My eyes are sore, burning with the memory of acidic smoke, but I spot Edel curled up on the floor a few feet away. A cold tremor jolts through my body as I begin to remember what happened. The metallic scent of stagnant water and steam tickle my nose. I lick my lips and wince. My lower lip is split at the corner and the taste of salt stings my tongue.

  How long have we been asleep? How long have we been down here?

  I touch my pocket. The poison bottle is still buried deep. I touch my stomach. The waist-sash is gone. The dragons gone. The dagger gone. The maps gone. The beauty caisse with the sangsues gone.

  Terror drowns me.

  “Edel.” I touch her shoulder gently. “Wake up.”

  She groans and turns over, clutching her head. “What happened? Where are we?”

  “I’m not sure.” I struggle to get on my feet. My body sways as if we’re still on the Fashion Minister’s watercoach. My skull is light as a perfume blimp.

  I stagger to the bars—curved, black, and containing no visible door.

  “Who were those people?” she says, agitation sharpening her voice.

  “I’ve seen those masks before, but I can’t remember where.” I strain to look through the bars. There’s nothing but a great pit with water at the bottom of it. The view sends a wave of nausea through me. Sea-lanterns drift about, spreading tiny ovals of light over craggy rocks. The hiss of steam and the plunk of unknown objects falling into water sound in the near distance. A long stretch of black cables disappear into the darkness overhead.

  “Hello!” I shout.

  My voice bounces off every wall. Edel massages her temples. I shake the bars, and my own headache intensifies. I lean against the cool rock wall and breathe until it subsides.

  Edel stumbles as she pushes herself up. She cradles her head. “I feel sick.”

  “This is exactly how I felt after Sophia tampered with my food.”

  Edel inspects the bars and tugs on them too. There’s no give. Even if we could remove them, there would be no place to go, no ledge to help us escape. We’d fall more than a hundred paces into whatever lies below. That darkness. That water. Those craggy rocks.

  “What would Rémy think of what we’ve gotten ourselves into?” I say.

  “That we should’ve skipped seeing the Fashion Minister—or even Valerie. That we should’ve gone straight to Charlotte,” she replies.

  I can’t argue with her. But we did need the money to get to Charlotte—not that we have any of it now.

  A loud popping makes us jump. Edel and I move closer to each other.

  A rickety carriage putters along the black suspension cable.

  Edel and I hold hands.

  The door opens to reveal a snug compartment covered in threadbare velvet and thick navy trim.

  A face appears, shadowed by the soft night-lantern—a boy about our age with a crooked grin and a strange excitement lighting his eyes. He inches closer, trying to balance as he leans out, and pushes a slender basket through the bars.

  “Where are we? And who are you?” Edel barks.

  “That’s not a nice way to greet someone who just brought you food,” he challenges her. His hair is so dark it could be the night sky itself folded into waves.

  Edel kicks the basket aside and its contents spill. “I’m not nice, and I don’t have to be. You people are holding us against our will.”

  He smiles at her. “Well, it’s nice to meet you, too. Would you like to know how the weather is?”

  “I want to know where we are,” she replies.

  I gather up the food and inspect it, my stomach growling. A wedge of cheese and dried meat. I scarf down my half while Edel continues to spar with the boy. Her cheeks hold a flush and her hands are balled into fists at her sides. The way they go back and forth reminds me of how I used to talk to Auguste. The memory is a burning knot, and I swallow more food to bury it.

  “You’re at the mouth of the Goddess of Death’s caves. We just call it the Grottos. I grew up on a nearby island—though no one even registers it on an official map of Orléans. If you live out here, you’re considered unlucky. Not worth accounting for.”

  “Let us out.” Edel tries to shake the bars again, but they don’t budge.

  “I’m afraid I can’t do that. You’re in the web now.”

  “He’s right,” a voice calls out.

  We look up and spot a woman in an open-top dirigible, the words ORLÉANSIAN AIR-POST on it scratched out and replaced with THE SPIDERS. “Quentin!”

  The boy jumps, almost falling. Edel reaches through the bars and grabs hold of him before he tumbles.

  “See, I knew you could be nice,” he says, earning a scowl from Edel.

  “You weren’t paid to chat, only to deliver food,” the woman says. She’s gray like a Gris, her eyes glowing embers with impossibly long eyelashes. Her curly black hair is pinned into an elegant knot, and beautiful. “Scurry along home now. I’d hate to have to tell Lady Arane about this. She’d dock your wages.”

  “Yes, my lady. May your threads be strong.” He bows his head, she nods, then he cuts his eyes back at Edel. “See you around, hopefully.” He shuts the carriage door, and it inches its way back down into the darkness.

  Edel’s eyes are fixed on the woman floating in front of us. I abandon the food and stand at Edel’s side.

  The woman studies us quietly. “I haven’t seen a Belle up close in some time.”

  “It looks that way,” Edel spits out.

  “Your commentary doesn’t bother me. I’ve quieted those instincts.”

  “Who are you?” I ask.

  “I am an Iron Lady,” she replies.

 
A glimmer of hope springs up inside me. “You’re on our side.”

  “What?” Edel says to me.

  “You support us.” I press my face against the bars.

  “We support our cause, and whatever will help us achieve it.” She crosses her arms over her chest.

  “And what is that? Locking us up? Why didn’t you summon the guards?” Edel grips the bars. “Why torture us?”

  “You call this torture?” She laughs and motions at the basket of food. “At this very moment, our future queen is finalizing her preparations to turn your favored generation into cows, to live in her farm prison where you shall be milked, your power bottled and shipped around the kingdom. The rest she will dole out to every household that can afford it.”

  Edel and I exchange glances.

  “We are no friends to Sophia. I’ve read your papers. You know that,” I say.

  “But you’ve been used as instruments of power. We must ensure you aren’t loyal to her in any way. Proximity to power can distort one’s allegiances, can make you align with something that wishes to use you, just so you can be close to it.”

  “And why should we trust you?” Edel says. “You poisoned us and locked us up.”

  “Sleeping gas. It wasn’t poison. Many nurseries use it to help babies fall asleep. You took a long nap. Only a few hours,” she says. “We will determine if we can trust each other. You will join me on my dirigible, but once we get to the ground, you must wear these over your head.” She holds up two sacks. “If you refuse, you can stay up here until you change your minds. Quentin will not be returning with more food, and hunger may coax you into making the right decision.”

  Edel and I make eye contact. She grits her teeth. But we have no time to argue.

  “Yes,” I reply for both of us. “We will come with you.”

  She uses a skeleton key to unlock the cell. Edel rushes forward like a storm cloud eager to burst with thunder and lightning and wind. I grab the back of her dress before she reaches the ledge and hold her close. The rage inside her almost seeps through her skin, a humming tuning fork sending ripples out.