Page 143 of The Scarlet Veil

Lou’s eyes narrow. “Why?”

“Because the blood of a Dame Rouge is poisonous to their enemies. If her blood doesn’t harm him, you’ll know we’re telling thetruth. Please, Lou,” I add quietly when she still doesn’t move. “Let us prove it.”

“You’re asking me to risk my best friend’s life.”

“I’m asking you to trust me.”

After several long seconds, Lou nods—just a single, short dip of her chin—and Coco, Reid, Beau, and Jean Luc seem to melt from the very walls of the corridor. I gape at them in disbelief, heart lodging in my throat, and hardly register the sharp bite of blood magic. “It’s up to you,” Lou murmurs to Coco, but the latter has already pressed the tip of her sharp nail to her thumb. It draws a single bead of blood.

The entire room seems to inhale.

Ignoring the vampires’ reaction, Coco moves to brush past me, but I catch her sleeve at the last minute, suddenly terrified. “Ifyouthink of him as an enemy, will it still—?”

“I don’t want him to be my enemy, Célie.” She eases my hand from her arm with a wary expression, yet a sympathetic one too. “You said that you trust him,” she says simply.

I can do nothing but watch as she crosses the no-man’s-land between us and Michal, her finger outstretched all the way. When she halts before him, expectant, his eyes flick to mine. His poor skin shines raw and pink in Lou’s artificial sunlight, but if it bothers him, he does not say. Still looking directly at me, he swipes the blood from Coco’s finger. His skin doesn’t bubble, doesn’t blister, but for good measure, he lifts her blood to his mouth next, sucking it gently while we wait with bated breath.

Nothing happens.

My entire body sags with relief becausenothing happens, andwhen Coco turns to me and smiles, the miniature suns in Lou’s hands wink out instantly. I blink in the sudden semidarkness, fighting back tears, as Lou saunters forward and loops her arm through my elbow. “Well, then,” she says matter-of-factly. “That changes things, doesn’t it?”

Yes, it does.

When she pulls me into a hug, I can’t stop the first tear from falling. It trickles into her hair as she laughs and squeezes me tighter, as Coco hurries to join and wraps her arms around us both. “We’ve missed you, Célie,” Coco whispers.

A sob builds in my throat as we hold one another. “I missed you too.”

Odessa whisks Lou, Coco, Reid, Beau, and Jean Luc into an antechamber off the ballroom several moments later, and Michal does his best to appease his half-healed guests. At his orders, the musicians drain several goblets of blood before returning to their posts on the dais and striking up a lively tune. Dozens of attendants weave through the mutinous crowd with still more goblets—this blood somehow fresh, somehowwarm—and dispense them with haste.

Within a quarter hour, every vampire in the room looks bright and shiny and new again.

Except for their eyes.

Sharp and spiteful, they track Michal as he too accepts a goblet, as he downs its contents in a single swallow. Almost instantly, the burns on his skin fade to smooth alabaster. Before I can approach him, however, Lou and Coco burst from the antechamber in theirnew costumes—Lou as a svelte black cat and Coco as the green fairy.

I can’t help but smile as they beeline in my direction.

Monsieur Marc didn’t have time to sew their costumes, of course, but he fitted them best he could based on my descriptions. Lou’s black tights and gown fit her like a glove, as does the shimmering emerald number he procured for Coco. Michal suspected my friends would want to make an entrance when they arrived on Requiem, and he was right. Their entrance couldn’t have been more conspicuous.

With these costumes, however, our trap hasn’t gone completely awry.

If the Necromancer—whereverhe is—witnessed their overly warm arrival, he also would’ve witnessed our reconciliation. To anyone watching, we’ll look like estranged friends reuniting for a masquerade on All Hallows’ Eve—and for most intents and purposes, we are. We’re friends reuniting for a masquerade on All Hallows’ Eve who justhappento be plotting the downfall of a sadistic killer. Instinctively, my gaze flits around the room, searching for any sign of a new and unfamiliar guest—an impossible task, unfortunately, as I would’ve needed to memorize every face in the room before the enchantment lifted.

“Me-ow,” Lou says, circling me and examining my gown in earnest now. “And here we thought you’d been taken hostage. Are thoserealdiamonds?”

My face heats as Coco leans closer to inspect my capelet. A wicked grin splits her face in two, and she feigns a wistful sigh. “To think, he could’ve kidnappedmeinstead.”

“You’re uproariously funny, Cosette.” Beau—who Monsieur Marc befitted in the harlequin costume of a court jester—scowls as he storms up beside us, tugging at his too-short, spangled sleeve. Little bells jingle on his hat with each step. “Can you believe this? King of all Belterra—with alionas my coat of arms—and they’ve stuck me in a clown suit.” He jerks his chin irritably at a passing vampire, who wears the golden chain mail of a knight. “Now that—thatis a costume for royalty. I can’tbelievethis—”

Coco presses a kiss to his cheek with a laugh. “You aren’t king here, Beau.”

“No, you most certainly are not.” Lou raises her brows in appreciation as Michal approaches. Apparently, all her reservations vanished when he drank Coco’s blood and survived to tell the tale. Waggling her brows, she nudges me in the ribs and says, “Welldone, Célie.”

If possible, my cheeks flame even hotter. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Don’t you?” For all her talk, a truly delighted smile breaks across her freckled face when she spots Reid in the crowd. He follows Michal’s path, wearing the mechanical mask and dark suit of a clockwork man. His sleeves and pant legs, however, have been rolled several times, as if the suit originally belonged to a giant. I narrow my eyes at Michal, who gazes back with an air of supreme satisfaction. “Shall I explain it to you?” Lou asks innocently.

Behind Reid, however, is Jean Luc.

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