Page 33 of Shadows of Perl

“First time visiting Hartsboro.” He smirks. The girl ropes her arm around his, and they disappear into the trees. I race after them and realize there are all manner of fancy cars parked in and around this forest. We walk long enough for the girl to begin complaining about her heels sticking in the ground. He scoops her up in his arms, and she giggles as he nuzzles her neck. It makes my stomach turn. We pass several signs, all with the same warning.

100 ACRES OF PRIVATE HUNTING GROUNDS

ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK

“It’s there.” He points to a ditch full of a dark, sludgy substance.

“I don’t understand.”

He sets her on her feet, and she flips a blade out so fast I miss where it comes from. In a flash, silver scrapes against her skin, then its sharpened tip drips with blood. She holds the spot where she just nicked herself over the depthless ground. The ripples slope into precise angles until the thick substance shifts into a set of steep stone stairs cut into the ground. Beaulah requires a blood offering to get inside.

The woman tosses the blade in the air and I catch it.

“See you in there,” she says as the pool re-forms and the glimpse of stairway disappears.

“I take it she doesn’t like surprise visitors.” I swallow.

“Blood from an invited guest is all it needs.” He pricks himself, reopens the passageway, and disappears down the steps. I study the knife, the girl’s blood still wet on its tip. If it notifies her who is crossing the threshold into her property, she’ll know I’m coming. Will the magic know if my blood is bound to toushana?

I twist the blade, its metal gleaming in the moonlight, and an idea strikes me. He never said a person couldn’t enter twice. Without enough blood on the metal to drip, I dip the blade into the pool and wait. Please work. If I lose this knife, that’s it—I’m not getting in here. And this was the last place my mom was seen. The black pool thins, then shifts, bending in steady rhythm until there are stairs once again. I tuck the weapon in my sleeve and descend.

The ground closes above me. Ahead is a stone passageway. I follow it to an intersection, keep straight, and then listen for the footsteps. I reach a set of stairs to the ground above. I climb but freeze when I hear voices.

“I’m cold. She’ll be fine. Maybe she chickened out.” The girl from the car. I press against the stone. Her beau agrees. When the world above-ground is silent, I emerge from the tunnel beside a lush, winding water garden so tall I can’t see beyond it. Beaulah is either very paranoid or extremely clever. The path through the garden meanders through a maze of low-lying pools wreathed in bursts of colorful foliage. When I clear them, the grounds finally open up. And there is Hartsboro, the training ground for House of Perl, tucked away like a secret.

The old mansion’s brick is the color of midnight. It sits on a small hill, reached by an expanse of steps like I imagine I’d find at a fancy government building or museum. Black Roman-style Corinthian columns line the front, but I’m still too far away to read the words etched into the stone. Two levels form the central house; wings branch off to either side and wrap around a center courtyard, where gardens are arranged in the shape of a sun. The house’s farthest ends disappear into the surrounding trees. Sparkling lights, grand balconies, sweeping windows, and lush manicured lawn—it’s as magnificent as Chateau Soleil, but in its own way.

I bristle with irritation. Jordan grew up here. And he is the last person I should be thinking about.

I scrub the boy I used to love from my mind and step aside, tucking my chin down, as another couple in nice clothes passes. They hustle toward the estate but veer from the grand carved doors and instead detour around the building and disappear.

The main entrance gates are manned by Draguns. I have to find another way in. I hurry in the opposite direction, determined to avoid any more of Beaulah’s guests. I follow the stone walls on the perimeter of the grounds, careful to stay in the pockets of dark. But I stop when I notice, beyond Hartsboro, a blackness of thick, dark woods. The chill in the air deepens and my toushana coils fast, ready to strike. You’re alright. Calm down.

I round the estate’s wing. I’m skimming the side of it for some kind of entrance when laughter cuts through the silence. A voice is coming from beyond a wall of shrubbery. Laughter rings again, louder, closer. Rumors of what’s happened at Chateau Soleil are everywhere. Getting caught could mean death. Ice seizes in my chest, but I keep my hands loose. I won’t be easy prey.

I spot an iron gate in the wall of green when I hear the voice again. This time its familiarity turns my arms to gooseflesh. I lift the gate’s latch silently and ease myself through. Inside is an amphitheater trimmed in what must be a million roses. On a dais crowned in wrought iron is a pair of lovers tangled around each other. The girl rears her head back, hair spun up in an elegant bun at the crown of her head, the silks of her dress puddling on the floor, as a gentleman kisses up and down her neck. It’s too dark to make out either of them well, but I don’t recognize them. Maybe I misheard. I’m sliding a quiet foot backward toward the gate when her diadem glints in the moonlight. Radiant dark jewels intricately worked with gold metal sparkle. I know that showing. I move closer. A twig snaps under my foot.

The girl fumbles with her dress to cover herself, and I step closer for a better look. Her complexion is warm brown and hardly dusted with makeup. As if she’d need it. Her skin is smoother than velvet, and high cheekbones slope around her angular face, making her wide eyes pop. Her back is straight, her neck long, and her shoulders are pressed back, effortlessly elegant, poised despite the compromising moment I’ve found her in. If she wasn’t scrambling to cover herself, I wouldn’t know she was shaken at all. I recognize the sharpness of her jaw and aquiline nose and realize where I know her from. Why her diadem looks so familiar.

“Adola?”

Beaulah’s niece and heir to this House. Jordan’s cousin.

She leans into the light to see me, then gasps. I hold a finger to my lips in warning, darkness dripping from them. Adola gapes at the magic in my grasp, then her shock hardens into something else. Her lover fiddles with the buttons of the pants he just slipped on. That’s when I notice he is in plain clothes. No mask bleeds through his skin. There’s no House color in his wardrobe. This guy has no magic.

“How scandalous.” I join them on the dais to get a better look at the girl I last saw at the Summer Bloom Tea I hosted in my grandmother’s rose garden. She was so measured and poised. Now she’s struggling to re-dress, her earthy complexion pale with embarrassment.

“Quell, how are you?” She slips her arms into her dress, and the fellow with her hastily zips her up. “I’ve heard all kinds of things. I was worried.” She turns to him. “Go,” she urges. “Don’t speak of this to anyone.” His eyes snap to my magic. “Now.”

He darts off.

She smooths her skirt, but she hardly breathes. “Well?”

We’re alone. I could press my magic to her throat and force her to lead me inside. But if there’s another way…The Order wouldn’t bat an eye at getting rid of her little non-magical boyfriend. I stretch my fingers, then tighten them into a fist, calling my toushana back into myself.

“An Unmarked cannot look upon magic and live.”

She swallows.

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