Page 15 of The Scarlet Veil

I will not play pretend.

Then Cabot rears abruptly with a shriek, tossing his head, and nearly breaks my nose.

“Cabot!” I pitch backward, stunned, but he bolts before I can calm him, before I can do anything but steady myself against my sister’s headstone. “What are you—? Come back!Cabot!Cabot, comeback!” Heedless, he only picks up speed—inexplicably terrified—cantering around the bend and out of sight. The wagon ricochets off the cobblestones behind him. Crimson roses soar in each direction. They litter the cemetery like drops of blood, except—

Except—

I press against Filippa’s headstone in horror.

Except they wither to black where they touch the ground.

Swallowing hard—my heart pounding a painful beat in my ears—I look to my feet, where Filippa’s roses also curl and bleed, their vivid petals shriveling to ash. Putrid rot fills my senses.This isn’t real.I repeat the frantic words even as I stagger away, as my vision begins to narrow and my throat begins to close.This isn’t real. You’re dreaming.It’s just a nightmare. It’s just—

I almost don’t see the body.

It lies across a grave in the middle of the cemetery, toopale—nearlywhite, its skin bloodless and ashen—to be anything but dead. “Oh God.” My knees lock as I stare at it. Ather. Because this corpse is clearly feminine, her golden hair snarled with leaves and debris, her full lips still painted scarlet, her scarred hands clasped neatly over her chest, like—like someoneposedher. I swallow bile, forcing myself to move closer. She wasn’t here when I rode through with Cabot earlier, which means—Oh God, oh God, oh God.

Her killer could still be here.

My gaze darts to each headstone, each tree, eachleaf, but despite the storm this morning, all has fallen silent and still. Even the wind has fled this place, as if it too senses the evil here. Head pounding, I creep closer to the body. Closer still. When no one leaps from the shadows, I crouch beside her, and if possible, my stomach sinks further. Because I recognize this woman—Babette. Once a courtesan in Madame Helene Labelle’s infamous brothel, Babette joined Coco and the other Dames Rouges against Morgane le Blanc in the Battle of Cesarine. She fought with us. She—she helped me hide innocent children from other witches; shesavedMadame Labelle.

Two neat pinprick wounds decorate her throat where a pulse should be.

“Oh, Babette.” With trembling fingers, I brush her hair from her forehead and close her eyes. “Who did this to you?”

Despite her wan color, no blood soils her gown—indeed, she seems to have sustained no injuries beyond the small wounds at her throat. I pry her hands apart to examine her wrists, her nails, and a cross spills from her palms. She clutched it against her heart. I lift it incredulously, the ornate silver bright and brilliant even inovercast light. No blood. Not even a drop.

It makes nosense. She still looks as if she’s merely sleeping, which means she cannot be long dead—

“Mariée...”

When the leaves of a birch rustle behind me, I lurch to my feet, spinning wildly, but no one appears except the wind. It returns with a vengeance, whipping at my cheeks, my hair, urging me to move, to leave this place. Though I yearn to heed its call, the initiate spoke of bodies earlier.Bodies.As in... more than one.

Jean Luc.His name rises like a wall in the maelstrom of my thoughts.

He’ll know what to do. He’ll know what happened here. I take two hasty steps toward Saint-Cécile before stopping, whirling again, and tearing the cloak from my shoulders. I drape it over Babette. Perhaps it’s foolish, but I cannot just leave her here, vulnerable and alone and—

And dead.

Gritting my teeth, I pull the velvet over her beautiful face. “I’ll be back soon,” I promise her. Then I dash for the wrought iron gate without stopping, without slowing, without looking back. Though the sky descends in a fine mist once more, I ignore it. I ignore the thunder in my ears, the wind in my hair. It tears the heavy locks from my chignon. I push them out of my eyes, skidding around the gate—my sense of purpose plummeting with each step because Babette is dead,she’s dead, she’s dead, she’s dead—and collide headlong with the palest man I’ve ever seen.

Chapter Six

The Coldest Man

He steadies me with broad hands and a skeptical expression, arching a brow at my wild hair and wilder eyes. I look outrageous. IknowI look outrageous, yet still I seize his leather surcoat—it skims his powerful frame like a second skin, stark black against his pallor—and stare up at him, open-mouthed. Unable to articulate the panic in my chest. It continues to build as my mind catches up with my senses.

This man is paler than Babette.

Colder.

His nostrils flare.

“Are you quite well, mademoiselle?” he murmurs, and hisvoice—deep and rich, it seems to curl around my neck and trap me there. I repress a full-body shiver, inexplicably unnerved. His cheekbones could cut glass. His hair gleams strange and silver.

“A body!” The words burst from me awkwardly, louder and shriller than our proximity demands. He still holds my waist. I still clutch his arms. Indeed, if I wished, I could reach out and touch the shadows beneath his flat black eyes. Those eyes bore into me with cold intensity now. “Th-There’s—there’s a b-b-body back there.” I jerk toward the cemetery gate. “A corpse—”

Slowly, he slants his head to examine the cobblestone path behind me. His voice is scathing. “Several, I imagine.”

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