“How did you infect Kornephoros just now?” I asked.
“Injected him with pure Emite blood, which speeds up the process. Don’t ask how I got it.”
“Is there a cure?”
“Yeah. Aura.” Cade took a tissue from his pocket and dabbed his eyes. “Unfortunately, they lose the ability to feed as soon as the half-urge is in them. Salt and human blood restore that ability long enough for them to find a voyant and start healing.”
Sealed vials of blood in the colony, ready to be delivered to the Ranthen. Just in case.
“You learned this through experimenting on Kornephoros,” I said.
“I didn’t have a choice in the matter, Paige. Ménard told me to find their weaknesses, their secrets. He doesn’t want to get his own hands covered in this sort of unnaturalness.”
Kornephoros himself seemed unable to speak. He was heavy in his chains, chest heaving.
“The Rephaim told us they would shield us from the Emim. We swallowed it whole,” I said. “What we actually did was let a bunch of potential Emim into the highest circles of power.” I breathed out through my nose. “Humans. The chumps of the universe.”
“Not all humans, in this case,” Cade muttered. “England has believed for centuries that it has a divine right to do whatever it wants. The fact that these angelic figures chose it as their seat of power . . . I assume it only deepened that sense of superiority.”
“Oh, yes,” Kornephoros said throatily. “I was there. Worthless, proud, hidebound men. All too willing to exchange their true power for the delusion that gods had descended to bless them.”
I could believe it.
“When I got back, I told Ménard about the Rephaim training us to fight the Emim.” Cade scrunched up the tissue. “Even though he was sickened, he thought, like our ancestors, that we might need their protection. But he still didn’t want them in France.”
“So he avoided signing the Great Territorial Act. Nashira sent Kornephoros to intimidate him,” I recounted. “Ménard imprisoned him, and together you discovered . . . this. That the Emim are former Rephaim. And that ended any doubts Ménard had about the need to overthrow them.”
“He realized they were two sides of a coin. Vectors of unnaturalness.”
“Has he told Tjäder?”
“If not, he will. Not that Tjäder needs further persuasion that the Rephs have to go. She saw them herself.”
As I stood there, cold inside and out, a thought occurred to me.
“Cade,” I said quietly, “is this also what happens if Rephaim don’t take aura for long enough?”
“I wondered the same, but I haven’t tested it. Kornephoros is my only lab rat. I don’t want to lose him just yet.” Cade cut him a glance. “I asked, but he hasn’t been forthcoming.”
“I can’t imagine why.”
Kornephoros looked between us.
“You must be clever, Paige Mahoney, for my cousin to have chosen you for an ally,” he said to me. “Perhaps you are beginning to understand the dangers of your little revolution.”
I looked back at him. A picture was forming, darker by the moment.
“At present, the Emite threat remains . . . in hand,” he went on. “Should Inquisitor Ménard oust us from Scion, however, we will be forced to the outskirts of civilization, leaving us more vulnerable to the half-urge.” He canted his head. “We Rephaim can be ruthless, but we can also be reasonable. We can be moved to mercy, or persuaded to promote human interests. Where would you find yourselves if that compassion was engulfed by mindless hunger?”
“In hell,” I said. “The only way to stop it would be to seal every last one of you back in the Netherworld.”
“Yes. Sadly, that is no longer possible, since the veils are now eternally torn.” His gaze bored into mine. “Scion is how we coexist, dreamwalker. You ought to leave the anchor well alone.”
11
Changeling
Cade had a cleaner and larger room than mine, upholstered with tawny satin. There was even a radio. A Vigile had brought us a platter of cold meats and fruit, hot saloop, and a log of white cheese. A fire crackled beside us. This, then, was how Ménard rewarded submission.
“You should eat, Paige.” Cade swallowed his mouthful. “You need your strength.”
The meats glistened in the ashen sunlight. I looked toward the window, my gaze distant.
I was more clearheaded now that we had left the cellar. Down there in the dark, with Kornephoros, every word had rung with doom. Up here in the attic, I was calmer. I could think.
“My first thought was that Ménard must plan to expose the Rephaite presence in our world,” I said, breaking a minute-long silence. “To rally people against them. Drive them out.” I shook my head. “But no. He wouldn’t do that. It would mean open war, and he already has enough war to manage. There are too many risks. Too many potential outcomes.”
“You’re getting to know him already.” Cade began to peel an orange. “For someone who detests fortune-tellers as much as he does, Ménard hates not being able to see the future. No, he’ll keep the truth close to his chest and try to remove the Rephaim quietly.”
I nodded once. Cade ate the orange and poured winter cordial into two cut-glass tumblers.
“He plans to keep everything the same in Scion, except for the balance of power.” He slid one toward me. “He wants to spin the wheel. Turn the anchor. In his world, amaurotics will be on top and Rephaim at the bottom. Voyants still get crushed in the middle, naturally. He’ll use Sheol II to keep unnaturals in their place. All unnaturals.”
I grasped the arms of the chair. Trying not to sound too interested, I said, “Do you know where Sheol II is?”
“No. They wouldn’t share that kind of state secret with an unnatural, even a house-trained one.”
“Frère never let it slip?”
He glanced at me. “You mean pillow talk?”
“If the shoe fits. I assumed that was how you were getting all this information about Ménard.”
“Luce isn’t stupid, Paige. She just happens to get off on screwing an unnatural on the sly,” he said. “Possibly because her spouse thinks any, er, loss of control invites the æther.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Seriously?”
“I know. Ces amaurotiques.” He gestured vaguely. “To answer your question, no, Luce did not disclose the location of Sheol II, and I would be on the guillotine by morning if I asked.”
There was a trace of bitterness there.
“I thought he didn’t want Sheol II on French soil,” I said. Cade picked up a glass without comment, and I paused to think. “But now it’s here, he’ll use it.”
“Exactly. He wants it to be a prison for all of us—Rephaim and voyants. That way, we can keep feeding them.”
“He only needs a certain number of us to do that. I presume he’ll kill the rest.”
Cade lifted his glass to his lips. “He’s not called the Butcher of Strasbourg for nothing.”
Chills flickered up my sides.
“Sheol II would also keep the existing Emim away from other areas,” Cade added. “Amaurotics can continue with their lives, untouched by the whole unnatural lot of us. That’s how it will be until he figures out a way to remove the Rephs without creating more Emim.”
“So that’s why Ménard is footing the bill for all your . . . experimentation.” I closed my ice-cold hands around my glass. “Someone must have come looking for Kornephoros.”
“Of course.” Cade tucked a slice of cured sausage into his mouth. “The Grand Overseer, no less.”
Jaxon. It was the first I had heard of him being in Paris. I tried to keep my expression calm.
“He arrived here in November. Ménard told him Kornephoros never showed,” Cade said. “I don’t know whether he believed it or not. Still, he did finally persuade Ménard to sign the Great Territorial Act.”
I could well believe that Jaxon had been the one to convince him. Words were his finest weapon.
“Is the Grand Overseer in Sheol II now?” I asked. “To your knowledge.”
“I don’t know everything. I’m just a canary,” Cade said dryly. “But I would assume so.”
“And you’re okay with all of this.” I raised my eyebrows. “After all we went through in the first colony, you think we should leave this second one alone and allow Ménard to execute his grand plan.”
“Yes.” His face betrayed his disquiet. “I don’t like it, Paige, but war is a long game. I believe we should support Ménard until he succeeds in disempowering the Rephaim.”
“And how does Ménard succeed in that, exactly?” I was skeptical. “He might have got lucky with Kornephoros, but he could never capture Nashira or Gomeisa. You’ve seen their power.”
“I’ll work out how to take it. I am going to find a way to destroy them without turning them. If that means I have to starve Kornephoros and see what happens, so be it.”
As I scrutinized his face, I noticed the shadows under his eyes, darker than mine. Deep lines laced around them when his expression changed.
“I don’t suppose you know anything about Rephaite weaknesses,” he said. “Having worked so closely with them.”
“Only that they’re very averse to the poppy anemone, which you clearly already know.”
“Yeah. I brought seeds back from the colony. Contact with those flowers constricts their auras,” Cade said. “It also makes them look a bit like Emim—necrotic. Kornephoros sometimes calls that disfigurement half-urge, too, even though it’s not the same condition. Just mimics the early stages of it. So . . . false half-urge.”
“All those fancy words and that’s where they choose to recycle.”
Cade chuckled. “Rephs.” He reached into his pocket and took out a single red bloom, slightly crushed. “Strange little things,” he murmured. “Almost like someone put them here to warn us.”
Without answering, I sipped my drink.
I did know another Rephaite weakness. I knew that a certain Netherworld substance could behead them, and I doubted they could get up again after, half-urge or not. Gut instinct warned me against telling Cade, perhaps because it felt for all the world like I was telling him how to hurt Arcturus.
Arcturus. Somewhere deep inside me, resentment simmered like a hearth of hot coals. He had warned me about his secret, but I was still frustrated with him for keeping it from me.
“I couldn’t sense Kornephoros at first,” I said.
“You wouldn’t have. I’ve been experimenting with Emite blood,” Cade explained. “I discovered it cuts the subject off from the æther. It also makes them much harder to detect.”
“You’ve learned a lot.” I tapped the arm of my chair. “That’s what they gave me before the meeting.”
“Yes. It makes it hard to use our gifts,” Cade said. “The human body can’t tolerate pure Emite blood very often, though. My self-experimentation involved a lot of puke.” He sat back. “Ménard expects your answer tomorrow night, in the Salon Vert.”
“You think any of this has changed my mind about working for him?”
“I hoped it would.” Cade met my gaze. “I imagine he wants you as bait, or a bargaining tool. He knows how much Nashira wants you, and how much your survival will discredit the Rephaite-supporting Weaver. In the meantime, he’ll treat you well and keep you safe.”
He really thought this was an attractive offer. His face was full of resolve, his eyes bright with it. To my surprise, he reached across the table and placed a calloused hand over mine.
“Stay,” he said. “We can make this work, Paige. Just wait a few more—”
Before I had a chance to cut him off, the door swept open, and he dropped my hand as if it were poisonous. Luce Ménard Frère stood in the doorway, dressed in black and white.
“Je veux lui parler seule.” She sliced a glance toward Cade. “Quittez ma vue, anormal, tout de suite.”
He left without a word. Frère didn’t look at him. Instead, she watched me, and I watched her.
“Stand up,” she said in English.
I rose. Frère crossed the room at her leisure, taking in what remained of the food. When she was near, she scaled and peeled me with her gaze. Her lips were red, her lashes brushed with lampblack. The last time I had seen her face this close, I had been looking into a mirror.
She backhanded me. I could feel that she had thrust every ounce of her loathing into the blow, but her hand was weak, inexpert. Her spousal ring still cut my cheek.
“That,” she said, “is for polluting my home. For drawing breath where my mother lived.”
I forced myself to look back at her, my cheek throbbing. That was when I saw what was in her other hand: a heavy-looking fire iron, ending in a blunt hook.
“And this is for fouling my body. For my child,” she said softly. “For whatever your despicable violation might have done to them.”
Before I could speak, she struck me hard in the knee, buckling my leg, then belted me across the ribs. And straight away, I was back in the room, the white room where Vigiles had mauled and spat on me. This time, I made no attempt to fight back. I curled straight into a ball.
It felt like years before the beating stopped. She hit old bruises and made new ones. The worst part was when the iron smashed my elbow, sending a shock all the way to my fingers and jolting heat into my eyes. All I could think was that I had to protect myself without hurting Frère. Ménard would not see that as self-defense. Neither would the Vigiles.
When the iron split my lip, anger overcame self-preservation. I flung out a hand and grabbed her weapon, and our gazes locked across it. My arm was stronger than hers. Both of us were panting. Her face was smeared with perspiration, pupils down to punctures.
“If you dare contaminate my body with your presence again, espèce de monstruosité, I will make sure yours is a hell to inhabit.” When Frère jerked my chin up, her manicured nails dug into my skin. “Benoît seems to think you have value, but I know you will always work against us.”
“I know something, too,” I whispered. “I know your secret, Luce.” Her nails pressed deeper. “Your child is unnatural. You’re an unnatural progenitor, and your precious Benoît will kill you for it.”
Her hand was white-knuckled on the iron. A flicker of apprehension crossed her face.
“Touch me again,” I said, “and I will tell him.” Blood leaked down my chin. “I will send you to the guillotine you love so much.”
Little by little, her composure returned. So did her cruel smile.
“Benoît would never hurt me for falling under unnatural influence. Vigile,” she called, and handed the iron to the one that came. When he was gone, she turned back to me. “Do not imagine you have any power over me, anormale. Here, you are the marionette.”
She drew a silk handkerchief from her skirt and wiped my blood from her ring with it. The bite of metal filled my mouth. My threat had just rolled off her, and I couldn’t fathom why.
“Your father tried to save his own skin, you know.” She looked down at me. “They examined him for information on your whereabouts. Do you know what he told them?”
I reached for a reply, but the words refused to come. Even if she intended it to hurt me, she was offering me knowledge about his final hours, and I owed it to him to listen.
“He swore you had never belonged to him. That you were not his child,” Frère told me. “He renounced you, calling you a changeling and all manner of superstitious babble.” She tossed the handkerchief into the fire. “It might have saved him, had Vance’s plan not necessitated his death. He went to the block despising you.”
The handkerchief lay in the hearth. I focused on it. The intricate lacework. The blood-spotted silk. It would have fetched a few coins at the black market. Enough to fill a hollow stomach.
“His head is staked on the Lychgate. I hear Weaver had it boiled in brine to keep it fresh,” Frère said. I kept my gaze firmly on the handkerchief, watching as the flames consumed it. “Because your father
was a servant of the anchor, you could not love him enough to save his life. Do not tell me that, as Underqueen, you did not have the means to try.”
Her wristwatch let out a small ping before I could answer her charge. Frère glanced at it, then shoved my head down to the floor and strode away.
****
The Vigiles threw me back into my own room and locked it. There was no fire or food. Even the mantle had been withdrawn. I washed the blood from my chin and huddled up on the daybed, preserving warmth as best I could.
My father had been tortured before they murdered him. I tried not to imagine what they might have done to draw my whereabouts from his lips.
He had called me a changeling. A fey creature. When I was still young enough for a cot, my grandmother had hung a pair of iron scissors nearby, to ward off any fairy that might carry me away and leave a síofra in my place. Years before, she had done the same for my father and aunt.
Frère was Scion-born. She couldn’t know the word changeling unless he really had said it. He had never given much credence to the stories my grandmother honored, but with his last breath, he had used them against me. He had refused to acknowledge me as his daughter—or, apparently, as human.
He must truly have been afraid of me. All my life, he had been afraid. I hadn’t imagined it.
I shook myself. People changed under torture. I had not given in on the waterboard, despite the pain and humiliation, but Suhail Chertan had been under strict instructions not to do any enduring damage. My father could have suffered anything.
Exhaustion sank its hooks into me. I would have a fresh coat of bruises by morning. Frère lacked strength, but anger and a foot-long bar of iron made for a powerful combination.
I had to get out of here. Ducos needed the information I had.
Except I still didn’t have the location of Sheol II. Even after a sound beating, the thought of leaving without that knowledge was too bitter to swallow. Twice I had come close enough to taste it. Twice it had eluded me. Instead, I had unexpected knowledge, and I had no idea what to do with it.
The Mask Falling Page 20
