Blood & Honey

Jean Luc fell into mutinous silence. I turned to Coco. “Open the door. Please.”

She stared at me for several tense seconds. “No,” she said at last. “You could die. I know you don’t care, but Lou does. To everyone’s surprise, I do. I won’t supersede her efforts to protect you—and even if I wanted to, I can’t open this door. No one can but the witch who cast the enchantment.”

A snarl to rival the werewolves’ tore from my throat. “I’ll do it myself.”

When I willed the patterns to emerge, however, none did. Not a single strand of gold. Not a single voice in my head. Furious, desperate, I turned to Toulouse, ripping the tarot deck from his shirt pocket. I shoved a card into his chest, and now, now, gold finally flared in my vision.

To know the unknown, you must unknow the known, the voices whispered.

Nonsense. Riddles. I didn’t care. Choosing a pattern at random, I watched as it exploded into dust. “Reverse Strength,” I snapped, and Toulouse grinned, glancing down at the card. “It means intense anger. Fear. A lack of confidence in one’s own abilities, a loss of faith in oneself. In some cases—”

“—it is a loss of one’s identity altogether.” He chuckled and flipped the card to face me, revealing an upside-down woman and lion. Despite the horrific circumstances, triumph burst in my chest. Toulouse’s grin spread. “It’s about time too. You had me worried for a moment.”

I jerked my chin toward the door. “Can you help me?”

His eyes dimmed. “Only Lou can open that door. I’m sorry.”

Fuck.

“On to the cemetery, is it?” Deveraux clapped his hands. “Marvelous! Might I suggest we tarry forth? Time continues slipping away from us.”

I nodded, breathing deeply. Forcing myself to calm. He was right. Each moment I’d bickered was a moment wasted—a moment Morgane tormented Célie, a moment Lou slipped farther away. Two desperate problems. One potential solution? I wracked my brain, thinking quickly. Analytically.

Lou would find Célie. Of that, I was sure. She had a head start. She had knowledge. She had incentive. No, there wasn’t a force in Heaven or Hell—including Morgane—that would prevent her from succeeding in this. I didn’t need to find Célie. If I found Lou, I’d find them both.

Lou was the target.

And if a small part of me hesitated, remembering Coco’s premonition, I ignored it. I moved forward. I threw an arm across Ansel’s chest when he followed the others to the door, shaking my head. “I told you to guard the tunnel.”

His brows furrowed. “But the tunnel is locked. No one is going through it.”

“Just stay here.” Impatience sharpened my voice. I didn’t care to soften it. Too much was at stake. At Modraniht, he’d proved more hindrance than help, and now we’d allied with enemies. Any one of them could turn on us in the tunnels. Ansel proved the easiest prey. I tried again. “Look, Zenna and Seraphine are staying behind too. Look after them. Keep them safe.”

Ansel’s chest caved, and he turned his burning gaze to the ground. Pink tinged his cheeks, his ears. Though he looked as if he wanted to protest, I was out of time. I could humor him no longer. Without another word, I turned on my heel and left.

There was nothing stiller than a cemetery at night. This one was small, the oldest in the city. The Church had stopped burying citizens in its soil long ago, favoring the newer, larger plot beyond Saint-Cécile. Now only the most powerful and affluent members of the aristocracy rested here—but even they weren’t buried, instead joining their ancestors in the catacombs below.

“The entrance is there.” Deveraux nodded to a statue of an angel. Moss grew on half her face. The wind had effaced her nose, the feathers on her wings. Still, she was beautiful. Words engraved onto the crypt beside her read Nous Tombons Tous. I didn’t know what it meant. Fortunately, Deveraux did. “We all fall down,” he said softly.

When I swung open the door, a gust of stale air rose to meet me. A single torch lit the narrow, earthen steps.

Beau stepped too close behind, peering into the darkness with unabashed apprehension. “Does the plan remain the same? Do we separate?”

Instead of looking below, Deveraux gazed upward at the night sky. Moonless tonight. “I don’t think that’s wise.”

“We’ll cover more ground if we do,” Jean Luc insisted.

Foreboding lifted the hair on my neck as I climbed down the first step. “We stay together. Blaise, Liana, and Terrance can lead us to Lou. They know her scent. She’ll be with Célie.”

“You place an awful lot of confidence in that witch.” Jean Luc shoved past me, tugging the torch from the wall and lifting it higher. Illuminating the path. The ceiling pressed down on us, forcing me to stoop. “What makes you so sure she’ll find her?”

“She will.”

Behind me, Beau and Coco struggled to walk side by side. “Let’s hope the Chasseurs don’t find her,” she muttered.

The rest filed in after them, their footsteps the only sounds in the silence. So many footsteps. Jean Luc. Coco and Beau. Deveraux, Toulouse, and Thierry. La Voisin and her blood witches. Blaise and his children. Each equipped. Each powerful. Each ready and willing to destroy Morgane.

A tendril of hope unfurled in my chest. Perhaps that would be enough.

The first passage wore on interminably. Though I thought the tight space inconvenient, it didn’t bring the sweat to my skin as it did Jean Luc. It didn’t make my hands tremble, my breath catch. He refused to slow, however, walking faster and faster until we reached our first split in the tunnel. He hesitated. “Which way?”

“The crypts should be just past the eastern tunnel,” Beau whispered.

“Why are you whispering?” Despite her objection, Coco whispered too. “And which direction is that?”

“East.”

“Left or right, jackass?”

“Cosette,” Beau said in mock surprise, “do you not know your—?”

A sudden wind doused the torch, plunging us into absolute darkness. Panicked voices rose. Swiftly, I reached for the wall, but it wasn’t where it should’ve been. It wasn’t there. “What the hell is going on?” Beau cried, but Liana interrupted, cursing violently.

“Something just cut me. Someone—”

Nicholina’s scream splintered the tunnel.

“Nicholina.” La Voisin’s voice pitched high and sharp. My own throat felt tight. When I brushed wool in front of me—Jean Luc’s coat—his fingers seized my arm and held on. “Nicholina, where are you?”

“Everyone stay calm,” Deveraux commanded. “There is strange magic here. It plays tricks—”

The torch sprang back to life abruptly.

Blood spattered the tunnel floor. A handful of panicked faces blinked back at me in the light. Too few. Far too few.

“Where is Nicholina?” La Voisin seized Blaise’s coat and slammed him against the wall, baring her teeth. I’d never seen her exhibit such uncontrolled emotion. Such fear. “Where is she?”

Blaise shoved her away with a snap of his teeth, charging down the tunnel and shouting for Liana and Terrance. A quick glance confirmed they too had vanished—along with the majority of blood witches. I searched the remaining faces, weak with relief when Beau and Coco nodded back at me, clutching each other. With a start, I realized Jean Luc still held my arm. He released me at the same instant.

Deveraux’s face was drawn. “Thierry has disappeared as well.”

“I swear I saw—” Toulouse started, but the torch extinguished again. His voice went with it. Forcibly. When Deveraux called after him, he didn’t answer. Blaise’s snarls echoed through the narrow tunnel, amplifying, heightening our frenzy, and something—something snarled back. La Voisin shouted, but I couldn’t hear over the blood roaring in my ears, my own shouts for Beau and Coco—

Then she and Deveraux went silent too.

Forcing myself to focus, I summoned the patterns. Sifted through them on instinct, discarded them at the slightest touch. I needed fire. Not as a weapon. As light. Anger, hatred, bitter words—they’d all provide the expedient. I cast them aside without hesitation, searching for that single spark of energy. Something simple. Something . . . physical?

There.

I chafed my palms together—just once, with just enough pressure. Heat sparked. A flame flickered to life, illuminating the newfound blister on my finger. Like I’d rubbed actual kindling instead of skin. The air took care of the rest, and the fire grew in my hand.

Only Beau, Coco, Blaise, and Jean Luc remained in the tunnel with me.

The latter stared at the fire with an inscrutable expression. He hadn’t seen it yet. My magic.

“They’re gone.” Beau loosened his grip on Coco, face pale. “They’re just gone.” He glanced up and down the tunnel with wide eyes, hesitating at the blood by our feet. “What do we do?”

Jean Luc answered for me, relighting his torch with my fire. Turning to the eastern tunnel. “We continue.”



Paradise Lost



Lou