Page 152 of The Mask Falling

“Except this conversation is pointless now,” Nadine said bitterly. “I took any dirty job I could get my hands on so I could scrape enough coin together for the two of us. And Jaxon took it all.”

The long hours she had spent away from the den, busking her fingertips purple. I had been too wrapped up in my own plots to see Nadine hatching her own.

“I understand why you’d want to go. Especially now,” I said. “And I’m sorry you lost the money.”

“Yeah. Me, too.” Nadine sighed. “Guess we can always save up more, unless we make some rich friends here.”

That reminded me of my own plans to get money to the Mime Order. I needed to get out of here and back to the safe house, try to explain things to Ducos. The black smoke that had poured from the palace must have been visible from twenty miles away. Everyone in Paris must have seen and smelled it.

I threaded my arms into a cardigan, and Zeke helped me rise. “I’d better introduce myself to Le Vieux Orphelin,” I said, pressing his wrist in gratitude. “Could you let me know if Arct— Warden comes back?”

“Sure,” Nadine said.

“Thanks. Is there somewhere I can wash?”

“A hot spring,” Zeke confirmed, with a pleased look. “At the end of the tunnel.”

“A hot spring in Paris?”

“I know.” He chuckled. “I guess you get to live in luxury when you spend time with the Underqueen.”

****

The sanctuary was something like the other carrières, but it had a cozy feel, and the limestone walls were reinforced with brickwork. A warren of caverns branched off a central arched tunnel, which was lit by skulls with candles in their mouths. Each skull was identified by a name on a plaque:etteilla, la trianon, la voisin. I touched three fingers to my brow.

Breathing still ached. My legs wobbled. I kept one hand on the wall as I peered into some of the grottoes. One was hung with paintings that had somehow escaped the Supreme Purge, when the French had burned any object—be it painting or sculpture, numen or relic—that failed to conform to the values of Scion. Some paintings showed angels in the religious sense, the creatures after which voyants had named a class of spirit. Others didn’t strike me as illegal, but they were raw and twisted in a way most Scion denizens would find unsettling. One portrayed a screaming man, an eagle clawing at his liver.

The next room housed illuminated manuscripts, prayer books, scrolls, and grimoires, most of them displayed on stands. A third held a collection of exquisite numa. This place was a museum not only to all that Scion had taken away, but to our history. The lost history of clairvoyants.

Among the tomes was a leather-bound book of prophecy, written in several languages. One tercet had been underlined in red. I studied the crabbed and smeared writing.

The scion will awaken thrice in blood—

once for life, once for a crown,

once to bring the tower down.

There were dreamscapes nearby. I glanced once more at the book before I left.

In the opposite chamber, I found Renelde playing a silent game of tarocchi with La Tarasque. Both of them looked tired. Nearby, Ivy was zipped into a sleeping bag, dead to the world. Save for a graze on her brow, she looked unhurt. Peaceful.

“Oh. Underqueen,” Renelde said. Her eyes were raw. “Good to see you awake. How are you feeling?”

“Could be worse.” I gathered the cardigan around myself. “You?”

“As well as can be expected.” She put down the cards. “Malperdy . . . was a little brother to all of us.”

“I’m sorry. He seemed kind.”

“He was.” With a sigh, she nodded to the woman opposite her. “This is Cam, otherwise known as La Tarasque.”

“Underqueen,” Cam said in a low-pitched voice. Her flaxen hair trailed in a messy plait to her waist. Though they resembled one another, she had a broader nose and a smaller chin than Léandre. “I want to thank you for helping me in the tunnels. I had just been possessed.”

“Don’t mention it. Is Ivy all right?”

“Yes.” Cam turned toward her. “She is welcome to stay with us for as long as she wants.”

“Léandre wanted to talk to you as soon as you woke,” Renelde told me. “Will you see him?”

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