The Beautiful and the Cursed

by Page Morgan

  “Come. I have something to show you,” Vander said.

  Curious, Ingrid climbed the twisting set of steps up to the fourth floor, coming out into a long, empty corridor. Electric lamps lit the way, though sparely. There were four doors, two on each side of the hallway, the walls covered in deep maroon silk. More bedrooms, was her initial guess. But why hide bedrooms away like this?

  She kept in Vander’s shadow as he walked along the rust-red carpet. “What has the mercurite done to Mr. Quinn?” Ingrid asked.

  Vander twisted the handle to one door and held it steady. “Have you heard about the mad hatters? The toxic amounts of mercury hatmakers are exposed to?”

  “The mercurite has made him insane?” she whispered.

  “Not quite. But he’s changed. The mercury has started to break down his tissues and organs. Some days he can’t even get out of bed. It’s also changed his behavior.”

  Vander opened the door then, and every thought about Carrick Quinn and poisonous mercury was set free.

  All she could see were books. The room was filled with them. Ingrid glided over the threshold, her jaw unattractively slack. Vander laughed.

  “I remember the first time I saw this room, too.” He shut the door behind them. It was completely silent inside. Ingrid could almost hear the dust motes floating through the air.

  “It’s beautiful.”

  Vander scratched his head. “No, not really. It’s a mess.”

  Yes, the shelves along all four walls sagged from the weight of so many books, and where some were placed upright with spines facing out, there were just as many tipped onto their sides, spines facing in. On most shelves, books and scrolls had been stuffed in to rest on top of other books, and there were at least a half-dozen towers of homeless books piled up on the floor.

  “It’s a beautiful mess,” she said, compromising.

  Vander straightened one leaning tower with his knee. “I thought you’d like it. But the collection is limited. This is an Alliance library. You won’t find Chaucer or Shakespeare, but if you want to know anything regarding the Alliance, demons, the Dispossessed, or the Angelic Order, this is where you’ll find the answer.”

  There was a book about the Dispossessed? Ingrid’s pulse fluttered in her neck. Luc will have felt that.

  “Why did you bring me here?” she asked, running her hand along the top book of one towering pile.

  Vander came up behind her without disturbing the floorboards. Not a single creak. It reminded her how much of a hunter he really was.

  “I don’t want you to fight demons,” he said. “I don’t want you in the sewers looking for crazy Dusters, or in any situation that puts you at risk. But I do want you here.” He touched her then, sliding his hands up her arms. “You belong here.”

  Did she? The words fell through her, unable to find a foothold anywhere. Did she truly belong there, with the Alliance? She didn’t want to fight, not like Gabby did. Ingrid couldn’t even imagine holding a sword and stabbing at a demon. It was all so violent and dangerous. But if she didn’t belong here, where did she belong?

  “I was supposed to go through this room … organize, categorize, read and research, and then be that one person any Alliance could turn to for answers,” Vander said, his hands still on her.

  A mellow spring of electricity went down through her arms, the way it usually did when Vander touched her for longer than a few seconds. She had started to wonder whether it was because they both had demon dust.

  “It made sense. I ran a bookshop—who better to be the Alliance academic?”

  “But you don’t want to anymore?” she asked, trying to focus. The mellow current had started to fizzle, leaving behind a lovely kind of weightlessness. When the last prickle dissolved, Ingrid slumped back against him. Her arms felt like they were made of silken ribbons instead of flesh and bone.

  Vander didn’t react. He only held her tighter. “It’s more a matter of time. My studies at the church are taking more of it than I thought they would.”

  “So you think I can do this?” she replied, seeing the stacks of books with new, overwhelming wonder.

  “Be an Alliance academic? Absolutely.” He turned her to face him. She needed the help. The silky feeling had spread to her legs.

  “Do you feel that?” she asked.

  A coy little grin worked at Vander’s lips. “I most certainly do.”

  She swatted him on the arm, though she was sure the slap landed like a goose feather. He feigned injury but then put on his sly smile again.

  “I mean it. I feel an electricity whenever we touch,” he said, stepping closer, leaving an inch, maybe two, between them. Ingrid already felt hot, and when Vander reached up to run his thumb across her lower lip, she thought she might combust.

  “Do you feel anything now?” he asked. Before she could answer, Vander had his lips against hers.

  Ingrid held her breath, her eyes still open.

  She shouldn’t be kissing him.

  Should she?

  Her lips moved on instinct. Her eyes slowly fluttered shut. Vander’s arms wound around her and tucked her body against his. Ingrid’s hands, trapped between her chest and his, gathered up fistfuls of his soft tweed jacket. Their kiss broke off and Vander tilted his head to press his lips to the curve of her jaw. He tasted her skin, nuzzling the slope of her neck, his breath hot. Vander held her tightly, his arms solid, his fervor rising. He felt so good and strong, and she began to yearn for his lips to climb back up to hers. If she should even be kissing him. A small voice called for her to stop and breathe. Step away. Vander’s mouth came back upon hers, silencing the voice altogether.

  The knob on the door to the library creaked, the hinges squealed, and Chelle stood, openmouthed, in the doorway.

  “Oh. Ah.” She averted her eyes as Vander pulled away and adjusted his spectacles. Ingrid stumbled back against a tower of books. They toppled into a heap.

  Chelle recovered first. “Your gargoyle is darkening our doorstep. He’s taking your brother and sister home but refuses to leave without you. Are you, ah, finished here?”

  If Luc’s sixth sense had felt the stirring of Ingrid’s blood, or the sudden stream of static that had strangely dissolved a minute later, then he very well might have entered the building to interrupt her.

  Or, Ingrid reasoned as she said an awkward good-bye to Vander and followed Chelle, he had simply grown tired of waiting for her. Why did she keep doing this to herself? Hope always felt so good and buoyant—until truth sank it. Luc could lust, not love. And Ingrid wanted love.

  Vander could love her. Perhaps he already did. She certainly hadn’t disliked kissing him, even though that small voice had implored her to stop. Still, kisses were one thing. Ingrid had to start thinking seriously about whether she could love Vander in return.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  The thing Luc disliked most about being the Waverlys’ driver was the amount of time he spent sitting on his ass, waiting. It wasn’t the cold, which tonight was more of a bone-chilling dampness. Or the horses, even though they smelled. No, it was just his backside, aching now that he’d been sitting on it for nearly two hours while Ingrid and her family ate a leisurely dinner in a restaurant near the Champs de Mars.

  The drizzly snowfall had amounted to a half an inch of dirty slush along the pavement. It gathered on the short brim of Luc’s driver’s hat and dripped steadily into his lap. Had it only been Lord and Lady Brickton dining out, Luc would have been more annoyed than he already was. But Ingrid was with them, along with Gabby and Grayson, and so Luc sat vigilantly in the driver’s box, doing something the other drivers lined up and down the curb couldn’t do: eavesdropping on his employers.

  It had become a disgraceful habit, but Luc couldn’t stop himself. There was something about this family that intrigued him. However, Lord Brickton was not a welcome addition. For Luc, he was one more human to protect, and for Ingrid and the others, he was a source of nervous tension. Ingrid, Gabby, Grayson, and even L
ady Brickton had all responded to his arrival with the same tightness in the chest, the same unease. It bothered Luc, the way this one man could have such an instant and dreary effect on them all.

  He had tried to figure out Lord Brickton a bit more by surfacing his scent a few times. The oil and leather filling his nostrils and falling into the back of his throat hadn’t told him much. So far all he’d learned was that Ingrid’s father was angry. Bitterly angry and unhappy.

  It was Ingrid whom Luc eavesdropped on now. It was so easy, her scent always just there whenever he thought of her. And he thought about her a lot. Too much.

  Ingrid was content. For the first time, he didn’t feel anxiety closing like fists inside his chest. He thought about checking in on Grayson, who had been in a constant state of discomfort for weeks now. He decided to stay with Ingrid a little longer. He could taste her sunshine. A watery morning light on his tongue. It was a pleasant contrast to the hard, cold bench, the drizzle, and the slushy streets around him.

  The chime at the base of his neck broke her scent’s spell. He focused ahead of the landau and saw a person walking toward him on the sidewalk. He wore a black wool coat and hat and held a black silk umbrella against the snow.

  “Gaston?” Luc called when the gargoyle’s face came into the yellowy light of a lamppost.

  Monsieur Constantine’s personal valet and heavenly appointed bodyguard raised the scalloped trim of the umbrella an inch and looked up at the driver’s bench.

  “Luc,” he returned with a dip of his head. Oddly enough, Gaston reminded Luc of a piece of wood: Solid, quiet, boring. Lacking in any personality whatsoever. He was a perfect servant. Most likely a perfect gargoyle, too.

  “Is your human here?” Luc asked, glancing toward the restaurant windows, fringed with russet silk drapes and filled with a low amber light.

  “No. I’ve come to warn you,” Gaston answered. Luc sat forward, curiosity piqued. “Monsieur Constantine had a visitor this afternoon, a man by the name of Robert Dupuis. I felt my human’s pulse spike when the man was shown into the orangery, and so I stayed close. Hidden, but close.”

  There were plenty of places to hide within Constantine’s miniature jungle. Luc and Ingrid had hidden under a domed canopy of furry pink moss once. He had nearly kissed her there.

  “Dupuis spoke of your human girl, the one who makes lightning,” Gaston said. Luc was listening fully now. “He told Monsieur Constantine that his interests in the girl will not cease, and that she should be turned over to them sooner rather than later.”

  “Who is ‘them’?” Luc asked.

  “I do not know,” Gaston answered. “I just know I do not like this man Dupuis. Neither does my human. Whatever his interests are in your human girl, they are not good.”

  Luc let the warning settle. Gaston had just done him a favor, which of course only made him suspicious. “Why seek me out to tell me this?”

  Gaston kept his expression as wooden as ever. “We are both Dogs, are we not?” They were. In fact, Luc and Gaston, with their dark coloring and green eyes, looked nearly identical when in true form. Ingrid had even mistaken Gaston once for Luc. But Luc hadn’t thought Gaston had such deep loyalty to other members of his caste.

  “We are,” Luc replied. He gave a nod, a silent thank-you, and Gaston turned to walk back down the sidewalk the way he had come.

  He didn’t have more than a second to contemplate who Robert Dupuis might be before another chime throbbed at the base of his skull.

  “More people sniffing around your humans, brother?”

  Marco approached from behind the carriage and stood streetside, next to Luc. Yann came up beside the bench seat on the sidewalk, closing Luc in properly. Marco and Yann had brought together the Wolves and the Chimeras into a steady Alliance. Theirs were the strongest castes, with the largest numbers and influence among the Paris Dispossessed. The Dogs ranked with the Snakes just below that, while the Monkeys and Goats and a few other castes languished in the background, generally unnoticed and unheard.

  “What do you want, Marco?” Luc asked, already wary.

  Marco was the butler for a family that stayed but three or four months of the year at his territory, a fine old place in Montparnasse known as Hôtel Dugray. His humans were not yet in the city for the season, so he was free to roam around, unencumbered by duty.

  How nice for him.

  “An update,” Marco replied. “Is yours still the only cursed soul at the abbey? I’m beginning to think our dear Irindi has forgotten all about you.”

  Marco and Yann had been checking in regularly to see if Irindi would follow through with her promise. They tended to visit the carriage house at night, when Ingrid and the others were asleep. Probably for the best, considering Marco and Yann had tried to kill Grayson. Ingrid hadn’t forgiven them just yet.

  “She didn’t forget,” Luc answered. Yann and Marco took a moment to adjust to his response. Usually Luc just told them to go to hell.

  “Anyone we know?” Marco asked, clearly excited.

  “No.”

  “How does he seem?” Marco pressed.

  “He seems very Dispossessed,” Luc said with a sigh. “He’s a gargoyle. He’s on my territory. What more do you need to know?”

  “Touched a nerve, have we?” Marco said with a snort of laughter. “Bring him to common grounds. Lennier will need to meet him.”

  Marco nodded to Yann before disappearing behind the carriage.

  “And keep your human girl off my bridge,” Yann said before following Marco. “If she’d been killed on it, I would have suffered an angel’s burn. I happen to like my scales the way they are, even if they become crusted with stone.”

  Luc watched him as he walked away. So Yann was slipping into hibernation, then. His bridge had been closed for quite a while. Marco, too, had gone nearly seven months without anyone to protect. If his humans didn’t arrive soon, he might descend into hibernation as well. The idea was enough to make Luc grin.

  He straightened his spine as the doors to the restaurant opened and the Waverlys emerged. Other carriages packed the curb outside the restaurant, so Ingrid and the others weaved through and began to cross the street to their own carriage. Luc hopped down from the driver’s seat, and his boots landed in an ankle-deep puddle of slush. Magnificent.

  He saw Ingrid first, her hat’s burgundy veil drawn down to her chin. He could see through it, though, and she was clearly biting back a laugh. Her lips struggled to remain level as Luc remained rooted in that cold puddle. Those lips, he knew, were like silk. Soft as the petals of a rose. Her pale hair a sheet of satin. He remembered running his fingers through the strands. Pulling her closer against him.

  Ingrid’s wavering grin flattened out, her eyes turning dark and serious. As if she knew what he was thinking of. Was he so transparent?

  He cast his eyes down to his soaked boots, but a shrill cry of alarm brought his attention back up. Each one of his humans, crossing to the carriage in a staggered line, had come to a reeling stop, eyes wide as they looked down the boulevard. Luc heard the clapping of shod hooves on the pavement. A horse and rider barreled down the center of the street, cutting a manic path between carriages and bicycles—and heading straight for his humans.

  “Ingrid!” Gabby screamed from where she stood, close to their landau, and Ingrid’s only thought was that at least her sister was safely out of harm’s way.

  Mama’s scream came from behind her, along with her father’s absurd warning to look out! But Ingrid’s feet refused to move. In her peripheral vision, she saw Luc running toward her, but even if he’d traded skin for scales, he wouldn’t have reached her before the horse cut her down.

  Something solid slammed into her from behind, pitching her forward and onto the wet pavement just as the horse’s muscular legs streaked by.

  “Goddamn it!” her brother—and rescuer—shouted. Grayson rolled onto his back and leaped up, chasing after the horse and rider while hurling profanities.

  H
aving reached her, Luc lifted Ingrid from the boulevard, his hands squeezing her shoulders, his voice shaking. “Are you hurt?”

  She didn’t answer. The rider had stopped farther down the road and turned back, as if to view the destruction he’d left in his wake. His blond hair was radiant in the bath of a streetlamp. He wore no hat to cast shadows over his face, so Ingrid could see him well. She knew that face.

  She’d fallen in love with it once.

  “Jonathan,” she whispered, tugging her shoulders free from Luc’s grip. “Jonathan?”

  He looked back at her, belting out wild laughter. With Grayson closing in on the horse, Jonathan’s laughter cut off. He merely grinned. It was the same cold smile Anna had given her before, in the profane cemetery plot.

  He drew up the reins and whirled around, charging off before Grayson could reach him.

  Gabby and Mama converged on her then, pushing Luc out of the way.

  “Are you bleeding?” her mother asked as her father bellowed for them to get out of the street before someone else ran them over.

  “Oh, your dress!” Gabby exclaimed, plucking at Ingrid’s top skirt, wet and torn from the slide along the pavement.

  “I’m—” Ingrid began, but couldn’t finish. She wasn’t fine. She wasn’t fine at all.

  “My God, that madman looked like Jonathan, didn’t he?” Gabby said as she helped Ingrid straighten her hat.

  “Don’t be absurd, Gabriella,” their mother said, breathless. “It couldn’t have been Mr. Walker.”

  Mama was right. It was absurd. Even though the rider had looked identical to Jonathan, it couldn’t have been him. What would he be doing in Paris, let alone trying to run Ingrid down in the street?