Blood & Honey

by Shelby Mahurin

  “Water.”

  She downright scowled then, abandoning her saccharine act. With a wave of her hand over the pot of perry, the spiced scent in the air vanished. The sharp bite of magic replaced it. Mouth pursed, she poured crystal-clear water into my cup. Pushed it roughly toward me.

  My gut twisted, and I crushed my palms against my eyes. “I told you. I don’t want to be around—”

  “Yes, yes,” she snapped. “You’ve developed a renewed aversion to magic. I understand. One step forward, two steps back, and all that rubbish. I’m here to give you a gentle push back in the right direction—or a not so gentle one, if necessary.”

  I fell back to my pillow, turning away from her. “I’m not interested.”

  The next second, water doused the side of my face, my hair, my shoulder.

  “And I am not finished,” she said calmly.

  Spluttering, pushing aside my sopping hair, I lurched upright once more to seize control of the conversation. “The men in the tavern knew I’m the king’s bastard. How?”

  She shrugged delicately. “I have contacts in the city. I requested they spread the word far and wide.”

  “Why?”

  “To save your life.” She arched a brow. “The more people who knew, the more likely it was to reach Auguste—and it did. You’re wanted alive, not dead. Once he discovered the connection, I knew he’d want to see you again, to . . . study you. Your father is nothing if not vain, and children make impeccable mirrors.”

  “You’re insane.”

  “That is not a polite word.” She sniffed and smoothed her skirts, folded her hands in her lap. “Especially in light of Louise’s new situation. Do you call her insane?”

  “No.” I forced my clenched teeth apart. “And you don’t either.”

  She waved her hand. “Enough. You’ve made it perfectly clear you don’t desire a friendship with me—which is fortunate, indeed, as you’re in desperate need of not a friend, but a parent. It is to that end I now speak: we will not defeat Morgane without magic. I understand you’ve had two less than ideal experiences with it, but the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. You must put aside your fear, or you will kill us all. Do you understand?”

  At her tone—imperious, sanctimonious—anger tore through me, sharp and jagged as shattered glass. How dare she speak to me like a petulant child? How dare she presume to parent me?

  “Magic is death and madness.” I wrung out my shirt, stalking to join her at the table, tripping over my bag in the process. Swearing viciously at the tight quarters. “I want no part of it.”

  “There is more in this earth than in all your Heaven and Hell, yet you remain blind. I have said it before, and I will say it again. Open your eyes, Reid. Magic is not your enemy. Indeed, if we are to persuade Toulouse and Thierry into an alliance, I dare say you’ll need to be rather less critical.”

  I paused with a fresh cup of water to my lips. “What?”

  She regarded me shrewdly over her own cup. “The entire purpose of this endeavor is to procure allies, and two powerful ones have just landed in our lap. Morgane will not expect them. What Morgane does not expect, Morgane cannot manipulate.”

  “We don’t know they’re witches,” I muttered.

  “Use that thick head of yours, son, before it falls from your shoulders.”

  “Don’t call me son—”

  “I’ve heard of Claud Deveraux in my travels. What lovely Zenna professed is true—he surrounds himself with the exceptional, the talented, the powerful. I met a woman in Amandine years ago who’d performed with Troupe de Fortune. Rumor had it she could—”

  “Is there a point to this?”

  “The point is that Toulouse and Thierry St. Martin—probably even Zenna and Seraphine—are not what they appear. No one batted an eye when Lou revealed herself as a witch. They were far more concerned with you as a Chasseur, which means someone in this troupe practices magic. Claud wants you to befriend Toulouse and Thierry, yes?”

  You might have more in common with them than you think.

  I forced a nod.

  “Excellent. Do it.”

  Shaking my head, I downed the rest of the water. As if it were that simple. As if I could disguise my disdain for magic and—and charm them into a false friendship. Lou could’ve done it. The thought curdled in my gut. But I could neither forget that look in her eye at the pub, nor the way she’d removed my Balisarda to control me. I couldn’t forget the feel of the Archbishop’s blood on my hand. My ex-brethrens’ blood. My chest tightened.

  Magic.

  “I don’t care if the St. Martins are witches.” My lip curled, and I pushed away from the table. We’d stop for dinner soon. I’d suffer even Deveraux’s singing to escape this conversation. “I have no intention of bonding with any of you.”

  “Oh?” Her eyes flashed. She too sprang to her feet. “You seemed intent on bonding with Beauregard. You seemed to care a great deal about Violette and Victoire. How do I earn such coveted treatment?”

  I cursed my own carelessness. She’d been listening. Of course she’d been listening—filthy eavesdropper—and I’d shown her my soft underbelly. “You don’t. You abandoned me.”

  In her eyes, our last moment on Modraniht unfolded. Those thousand moments. I shoved them all aside. “I thought we’d moved past this,” she said softly.

  I stared at her in disgust. Yes, I’d given her peace with her last breath, but that gift—it’d been for me too. She’d been dying. I couldn’t spend the rest of my life haunting a ghost, so I’d let her go. I’d let it all go. The pain. The bitterness. The regret. Except she hadn’t died, she hadn’t left, and now she haunted me instead.

  And some hurt couldn’t stay buried.

  “How does one move past being left to die in a garbage bin?”

  “How many times must I tell you? I didn’t—” She shook her head, color heightened and eyes overbright. Tearful. Whether angry or sad, I didn’t know. Her voice was small, however, as she continued. “I am sorry, Reid. You’ve led a tumultuous life, and the blame in part is mine. I know this. I understand my role in your suffering.” Catching my hand, she rose to her feet. I told myself to pull away. I didn’t. “Now you must understand that, if given the choice, I never would’ve left you. I would’ve forsaken everything—my home, my sisters, my life—to keep you, but I cannot change the past. I cannot protect you from its pain. I can protect you here and now, however, if you let me.”

  If you let me.

  The words were living things in my ears. Though I tried to bury them, they took root, suffocating my anger. Swathing my sorrow. Enveloping it. Enveloping me. I felt—warm, unsteady. Like lashing out and railing against her. Like falling down and clutching her skirt. How many times had I wished for a parent to protect me? To love me? Though I’d never admitted it—never would admit it—the Archbishop, he hadn’t been—

  No. It was too much.

  I pulled away from her, sinking onto my cot. Staring at nothing. A moment of silence passed. It might’ve been uncomfortable. It might’ve been tense. I didn’t notice. “I love pears,” I finally mumbled, near incoherent. She still heard. The next second, she’d pressed a hot cup of perry into my hands.

  Then she went for the kill.

  “If you wish to defeat Morgane, Reid—if you wish to protect Louise—you must do what is necessary. I am not asking you to practice magic. I am asking you to tolerate it. Toulouse and Thierry will never join us if you scorn their very existence. Just—get to know them.” After a second of hesitation, she added, “For Louise.”

  For yourself, she’d wanted to say.

  I stared into the perry, feeling sick, before lifting it to my lips. The steaming liquid burned all the way down.

  The White Pattern

  Lou

  After two hours of trudging through the shadows of La Fôret des Yeux—pretending not to jump at small noises—a sudden realization clubbed me in the head.

  Gabrielle Gilly was Reid’s half siste
r.

  I studied the little girl’s back through the pines. With her auburn hair and brown eyes, she clearly favored her mother, but when she glanced at me over her shoulder—for the hundredth time, no less—there was something in her smile, the slight dimple in her cheek, that reminded me of Reid.

  “She keeps looking at you.” Ansel tripped over a stray limb, nearly landing face-first in the snow. Absalon leapt sleekly from his path.

  “Of course she does. I’m objectively beautiful. A masterpiece made flesh.”

  Ansel snorted.

  “Excuse me?” Offended, I kicked snow in his direction, and he nearly tumbled again. “I don’t think I heard you correctly. The proper response was, ‘Goddess Divine, of course thy beauty is a sacred gift from Heaven, and we mortals are blessed to even gaze upon thy face.’”

  “Goddess Divine.” He laughed harder now, brushing the snow from his coat. “Right.”

  Pushing him away with a snort of my own, I bounded atop a fallen log to walk beside him. “You can laugh, but if this plan of ours doesn’t go tits up, that’ll be my title someday.”

  Pink crept into his cheeks at my vulgarity. “What do you mean?”

  “You know—” When the log ended, I hopped down, shooing Absalon away again. “—if we kill Morgane, I’ll inherit the Triple Goddess’s powers in her stead.”

  Ansel stopped walking abruptly, like I’d clubbed him in the back of the head. “You’ll become the Maiden, Mother, and Crone.”

  “Goddess Divine.” I smirked, stooping to pick up a handful of snow, but he didn’t share my humor any longer. A furrow appeared between his brows. “What’s with the face?” I asked, packing the snow between my palms. “That’s how it works. La Dame des Sorcières possesses divine power as a blessing from the Triple Goddess.”

  “Do you want to become La Dame des Sorcières?”

  I hurled the snowball at a tree, watching as it exploded on the limbs. What an unexpected question. Certainly no one had ever asked it before. “I . . . I don’t know. I never thought I’d live past my sixteenth birthday, let alone plot a revolt against my mother. Inheriting her divine power seemed far-fetched, even as a child.”

  He resumed walking, albeit slower than before. I fell into step beside him. But after several instances of him glancing at me, looking away, opening his mouth, and shutting it again, I’d had enough. I made another snowball and chucked it at his head. “Out with it.”

  With a disgruntled look, he knocked the snow from his curls. “Do you think you’ll be able to kill your own mother?”

  My stomach twisted unpleasantly. As if answering some unspoken call, Absalon dropped from a pine overhead to saunter along behind me. I didn’t look at him—didn’t look at anyone or anything but my own boots in the snow. My toes had gone numb. “She hasn’t given me a choice.”

  It wasn’t an answer, and Ansel knew it. We lapsed into silence.

  The moon peeked out overhead as we continued our search, dappling the forest floor in light. The wind gradually ceased. If not for Nicholina floating along like a specter beside Ismay and Gabrielle, it would’ve been peaceful. As it was, however, a bone-deep chill settled within me.

  There’d been no sign of Etienne.

  If I am to consider this alliance, you will find Etienne before the first light of day. Do we have a deal?

  As if I’d had a choice.

  When I’d called for a pattern to find Etienne—standing at the edge of camp with everyone’s eyes on my back—the golden threads had tangled, coiling and shifting like snakes in a nest. I hadn’t been able to follow them. At La Voisin’s expectant look, however, I’d lied my ass off—which was why I now wandered through a random copse of spruces, trying and failing not to watch the sky. Sunrise couldn’t be too far away.

  I took a deep breath and examined the patterns again. They remained hopelessly knotted, spiraling out of control in every direction. There was no give. No take. Just . . . confusion. It was like my third eye—that sixth sense enabling me to see and manipulate the threads of the universe—had . . . blurred, somehow. I’d never known such a thing was possible.

  La Voisin had said someone was shielding Etienne’s location from us. Someone powerful. I had a sick suspicion who that might be.

  After another quarter hour, Ansel sighed. “Should we maybe . . . call out for him?”

  “You should.” Nicholina cackled in front of us. “Call him, call him, let the trees maul him, boil and butter and split and saw him—”

  “Nicholina,” I said brusquely, still keeping one eye on the patterns. “I think I speak for everyone here when I say to shut up.”

  But she only drifted backward, clutching the inky hair on either side of her face. “No, no, no. We’re going to be the best of friends, the three of us. The very best of friends.” When I arched an incredulous brow at Ansel, she cackled louder. “Not him, silly mouse. Not him.”

  A branch snapped ahead, and if possible, she laughed all the louder. “The trees in this forest have eyes, little mouse. She spies, she spies, she spies, little mouse—”

  “Or it could be a wounded Etienne.” I unsheathed my knife in a single, fluid movement—unnerved despite myself—and whirled toward the noise. “You should go investigate.”

  Still leering, Nicholina vanished between one blink and the next. Ismay stared ahead, visibly torn between investigating the source of the noise and protecting her daughter. She clutched Gabrielle’s hand tightly.

  “Go.” I approached them with caution, but I didn’t sheathe my weapon. The hair on my neck still prickled with unease. She spies, she spies, she spies, little mouse. “We’ll take care of your daughter.”

  Though Ismay pressed her lips together, she nodded once and slipped into the trees. Gabrielle waited until she’d gone before sticking her hand out to me, wriggling with excitement.

  Then she opened her mouth.

  “My name is Gabrielle Gilly, and you are even shorter than they said. Practically elfin! Tell me, how do you kiss my brother? I heard he’s as tall as this evergreen!” I tried to answer—or perhaps laugh—but she continued without breath. “I suppose I should call him my half brother, though, shouldn’t I? Maman doesn’t like you being here. She doesn’t like me knowing about him, but she’s gone for the moment and I don’t really care what she thinks, anyway. What’s he like? Does he have red hair? Nicholina told me he has red hair, but I don’t like Nicholina very much. She thinks she’s so clever, but really, she’s just weird. Too many hearts, you know—”

  “Hearts?” Ansel shot me a bewildered look. As if realizing his poor manners, he hastened to add, “I’m Ansel, by the way. Ansel Diggory.”

  “The hearts keep her young.” Gabrielle continued like he hadn’t spoken, nodding in a matter-of-fact way. “Maman says I shouldn’t speak of such things, but I know what I saw, and Bellamy’s chest was stitched shut on his pyre—”

  “Wait.” I felt a bit out of breath myself listening to her. “Slow down. Who’s Bellamy?”

  “Bellamy was my best friend, but he died last winter. He lost his maman a few years before that. His sister was born a white witch, see, so his maman sent her to live at the Chateau to have a better life. But then his maman went and died of a broken heart because Bellamy wasn’t enough for her. He was enough for me, though, until he died too. Now he’s not enough at all.”

  “I’m sor—” Ansel started, but Gabrielle shook her head, sending her auburn hair rippling around her shoulders in an agitated wave.

  “Strangers always says that. They always say they’re sorry, like they’re the ones who killed him, but they didn’t kill him. The snow did, and then Nicholina ate his heart.” Finally—finally—she paused to draw breath, blinking once, twice, three times, as her eyes focused on Ansel at last. “Oh. Hello, Ansel Diggory. Are you related to my brother too?”

  Ansel gaped at her. A laugh built in my throat at his gobsmacked expression, at her inquisitive one, and when it finally burst free—brilliant and clear and brig
ht as the moon—Absalon darted into the boughs for cover. Birds in their nests took flight. Even the trees seemed to rustle in agitation.

  As for me, however, I felt lighter than I had in weeks.

  Still chuckling, I knelt before her. Her brown eyes met mine with familiar intensity. “I cannot wait for your brother to meet you, Gabrielle.”

  She beamed. “You can call me Gaby.”

  When Nicholina and Ismay returned a moment later—Nicholina trilling about naughty trees—Gaby scoffed and whispered, “I told you she’s weird. Too many hearts.”

  Ansel swallowed hard, casting a dubious look at Nicholina’s back as she drifted farther and farther ahead, leaving the rest of us behind. Ismay walked much closer than before. Her rigid spine radiated disapproval.

  “You really think she—eats hearts?” he asked.

  “Why would she do that?” I asked. “And how would they keep her young?”

  “Your magic lives outside your body, right?” Gaby asked. “You get it from your ancestors’ ashes in the land?” She plowed ahead with her explanation before I could answer. “Our magic is different. It lives within us—right inside our hearts. The heart is the physical and emotional center of a blood witch, after all. Everyone knows that.”

  Ansel nodded, but he didn’t seem to know at all. “Because your magic is only accessible through blood?”

  “Gabrielle,” Ismay said sharply, lurching to a stop. She didn’t turn. “Enough. Speak no more of this.”

  Gaby ignored her. “Technically, our magic is in every part of us—our bones, our sweat, our tears—but blood is the easiest way.”

  “Why?” Ansel asked. “Why blood over the others?”

  In a burst of clarity, I remembered the tour he’d given me of Cathédral Saint-Cécile d’Cesarine. He’d known every detail of that unholy place. And what’s more—he’d spent much of our time in the Tower poring over leather-bound books and illuminated manuscripts from the library.

  If Gaby’s curious nature served, he’d found himself a like-minded friend.

  “I said enough, Gabrielle.” Ismay finally turned, planting her fists on her hips to block our path. She took care not to look at me. “No more. This conversation is inappropriate. If Josephine knew—”