“No.” With the curt shake of his head, Blaise lowered his voice to a whisper. “Children, I have already told you, our debt is fulfilled—”

Liana clasped his hands together, holding them between her own. “Our debt is not yours. Adrien was your son, Père, but we didn’t know him. He’s a stranger to Terrance and to me. We must honor this debt—especially now, beneath the face of our mother.” She glanced up at the full moon. “Would you have us spurn this obligation? Would you disavow Terrance’s life so quickly after she restored him to us?”

Blaise stared down at them both for several seconds. Finally, his facade cracked, and beneath it, his resolve crumbled. He kissed both their foreheads with tears in his eyes. “Yours are the brightest of souls. Of course you must go, and I—I will join you. Though my debt as a man is fulfilled, my duties as a father are not.” His eyes cut to mine. “My pack will remain here. You will never step foot in our lands again.”

I nodded curtly. “Understood.”

We turned and raced toward Cesarine.

A Promise

Reid

Blaise, Liana, and Terrance outdistanced us by the next morning, promising to return with reconnaissance of the city landscape. When they found us again—a mere mile outside of Cesarine, hidden within the trees near Les Dents—they delivered our worst fear: the Chasseurs had formed a blockade to enter the city. They checked each wagon, each cart, without bothering to hide their intentions.

“They’re searching for you.” Liana emerged from behind a juniper in fresh clothes. She joined her father and brother with a grim expression. “I recognized some of them, but I didn’t see Jean Luc. He isn’t here.”

“I assume he went straight to my father.” Beau readjusted the hood of his cloak, eyeing the thick congestion of the road. Though his expression remained cool and unaffected, his hands shook. “Hence the blockade.”

Lou kicked the juniper’s branches in frustration. When snow fell into her boots, she cursed viciously. “That sniveling little shit. Of course he isn’t here. He wouldn’t want an audience to watch him piss down his leg when he sees me. An appropriate response, mind you.”

Despite her brazen words, this crowd made me uncomfortable. It’d grown worse the nearer we’d drawn to the city, as Les Dents was the only road into Cesarine. Part of me rejoiced so many had come to honor the Archbishop. The rest didn’t know how to feel. Here—with every face and every voice a reminder—I couldn’t properly dissociate. The doors to my fortress rattled. The walls shook. But I couldn’t focus on that now. Couldn’t focus on anything but Lou. “Are you all right?” she’d whispered earlier when we’d hidden amongst these trees.

I’d studied her face. It seemed she’d reversed her disastrous pattern, yes, but appearances could be deceiving. Memory lasted forever. I’d certainly never forget the sight of her braced within that frozen swamp, fingers contorted, expression cold and hard as the ice at her feet. I doubted she would either. “Are you?” I’d whispered back.

She hadn’t answered.

She whispered to her matagots now. A third had joined us overnight. A black rat. It perched on her shoulder, eyes beady and bright. No one mentioned it. No one dared look in its direction—as if our willful disregard could somehow make it less real. But the set of Coco’s shoulders said the words she didn’t, as did the shadow in Ansel’s eyes. Even Beau cast me a worried glance.

As for the wolves, they wouldn’t go near them. Blaise’s lip curled when Absalon sauntered too close.

“What is it?” Taking her hand, I pulled her apart from the others. The matagots followed like shadows. If I knocked the rat from her shoulder—if I wrapped my hands around the necks of the cat and fox—would they leave her in peace? Would they haunt me instead?

“I’m sending word to Claud,” she said, and the fox disappeared in a cloud of smoke. “He might know how to get through this blockade undetected.”

Beau craned his neck, eavesdropping unapologetically. “That’s your plan?” Skepticism laced his voice. “I know Claud somehow . . . shielded you in Beauchêne, but these aren’t bandits.”

“You’re right.” An edge clipped Lou’s voice as she faced him. “These are huntsmen armed with Balisardas. I got lucky with Jean Luc—I knew his buttons, and I pressed them. I distracted him, disarmed him. His men didn’t dare hurt me while he was under my power. But he isn’t here now, and I doubt I’ll be able to disarm all two dozen of them without quite literally setting the world on fire.” She exhaled impatiently, stroking the rat’s nose, as if to—as if to calm down. My stomach twisted. “Even then, we’re trying not to raise the alarm. We need a quick and quiet entrance.”

“They’ll be expecting magic,” I hurried to add. Anything to keep her from changing strategy. Anything to keep her from the alternative. “And Claud Deveraux hid us along Les Dents. Maybe he can hide us here too.”

Beau threw his hands in the air. “This is a completely different situation! These men know we’re here. They’re searching every wagon. For Claud Deveraux to hide us, he’d need to quite literally make us disappear.”

“Do you have another plan?” Both Lou and the rat glared at him. “If so, by all means, please share with the class.” When he didn’t answer, she scoffed bitterly. “That’s what I thought. Now can you do everyone a favor and shut the hell up? We’re anxious enough as it is.”

“Lou,” Coco admonished in a low voice, but Lou only turned away, crossing her arms and scowling at the snow. Of their own volition, my feet moved—my body angled—to shield her from the others’ disapproving looks. She might’ve deserved them. I didn’t care.

“If you’re going to reprimand me, you can piss off too.” Though she wiped furiously at her eyes, a tear still escaped. I brushed it away with my thumb. Instinctive. “Don’t.” She jerked, swatting my hand, and turned her back on me too. Absalon hissed at her feet. “I’m fine.”

I didn’t move. Didn’t react. Inside, however, I reeled as if she’d struck me—as if the two of us hurtled toward a cliff, heedless, each pulling at the other. Each pushing. Both desperate to save ourselves, and both helpless to stop our trajectory. We were careening toward that edge, Lou and I.

I’d never felt so powerless in my life.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, but she didn’t acknowledge me, instead shoving Jean Luc’s Balisarda into my hand.

“We didn’t have time earlier, but while we’re waiting . . . I stole it for you. To replace the one I lost.” She pressed it harder. My fingers curled around the hilt reflexively. The silver felt different. Wrong. Though Jean Luc had clearly cared for the blade—it’d been recently cleaned and sharpened—it wasn’t mine. It didn’t smooth the jagged edge in my chest. Didn’t fill the empty hole there. I slid it into my bandolier anyway, unsure of what else to do. She continued without enthusiasm. “I know I might’ve gotten a little carried away in the process. With—with the ice. I’m sorry. I promise it won’t happen again.”

I promise.

For days I’d waited to hear those words, yet now they rang hollow in my ears. Empty. She didn’t understand the meaning of them. Perhaps couldn’t. They implied truth, trust. I doubted she’d ever known either. Still—I wanted to believe her. Desperately. And an apology from her didn’t come lightly.

I swallowed against the sudden tightness in my throat. “Thank you.”

We stayed quiet for a long time after that. Though the sun crept across the sky, the queue hardly moved. And the others’ eyes—I felt them on us. Especially the wolves’. Heat prickled along my neck. My ears. I didn’t like the way they looked at Lou. They knew her only as she was now. They didn’t know her warmth, her compassion. Her love.

After what you’ve done, be grateful I do not demand your blood, Louise le Blanc.

Though I trusted they wouldn’t harm me, they’d made no such promise to her. Whatever madness this day inevitably brought, I wouldn’t leave them alone with her. I would give them no opportunity to retaliate. Forlorn, I traced the curve of Lou’s neck with my gaze. She’d knotted her white hair at her nape. Tied another ribbon around her throat. All at once so familiar yet so different.

I had to fix her.

When the sun crested the trees, the fox at last returned to us. She nosed Lou’s boot, staring up at her intently. Communicating silently with her eyes. “Does she . . . speak to you?” I asked.

Lou frowned. “Not with words. It’s more like a feeling. Like—like her consciousness touches mine, and I understand.” Her head snapped up. “Toulouse and Thierry are coming.”

Within minutes, two familiar black heads parted the crowd, proving her right. With a crutch under his arm, Toulouse whistled one of Deveraux’s tunes. He grinned at Liana, tipping his hat, before grasping my shoulder.

“Bonjour à vous,” he told her. “Good morrow, good morrow. And fancy meeting you here, Monsieur Diggory.”