Page 21 of The Scarlet Veil

“Right. Well, then, you should know that I didn’t want to come, and I wholeheartedly agreed with Lou when she said you should be here—”

“With all due respect, Your Majesty”—I spread the sketches with a hand, staring at the charcoal faces without seeing a single one—“if anyone in this room had wanted me here, I would have been here.” If Lou hears the bitterness in my tone—the heartbreak—she doesn’t show it. And why would she? She has always been a master of secrets. Just like my sister. “Are these the victims?” I ask Jean Luc. I do not look at him either.

He touches my shoulder tentatively. “Célie—”

I jerk away, fighting tears once more. “Arethey?”

He hesitates. “Yes.”

“Thank you. Was that so very difficult?” Now I do look at him, and the indecision in his gaze nearly breaks me. There is guilt there, yes—perhaps even remorse—but there is also reluctance. Hestilldoes not want to include me. To confide in me. Unable to bear it another second, I sweep the whole of the sketches into my arms, refusing to acknowledge the ones that I drop. They flutter slowly to the floor as I turn on my heel and march to the door. To Beau, I sniff, “I would say it was lovely to see you again, Your Majesty, but not all of us can lie as adeptly as you.”

I ignore the others completely, slamming the door behind me and dropping another few sketches in the process.

This time, I do bend to reclaim them—my entire body shaking—and startle at the moisture flecking each drawing. Tears. I wipe a furious hand across my cheeks and straighten. When hasty footsteps sound from behind the door, I dart up the corridor and into the library room, unwilling to confront any of them again. Not directly, anyway. Some might call itfleeing, some might call ithiding, but some might be wrong. Some mightsaythey want to protect me, but what theymeanis they want to coddle me. Tomanageme.

I will not be managed.

I will show all of them.

Retreating to the corner of the library—out of sight of the door—I press between two corner bookshelves and flip through the sketches once more. This time, I force myself to study each face as the council room door bursts open, as Jean Luc’s boots pound up the corridor. Though he calls for me, I ignore him, shrinking farther into the shelves, staring furiously at the sketch of the loup garou. He lies in the same peaceful supine position as Babette, his hands half-transformed and clasped against his chest. The same puncture wounds at his throat.

“Célie,wait.” When Jean’s resigned voice passes by the library door, I breathe a sigh of relief. “Come back. We need to talk about this—”

I don’t want to talk, however. Not anymore. Now I study the trees surrounding the loup garou’s corpse instead; I lift the sketch to peer closer at his clawed hands, searching for any sign of a cross. There isn’t one, of course. Jean Luc would’ve asked about Babette’scross if each victim had been found with one. Butwhywas the loup garou caught between forms? Was the killer interested in the wolf or the man? Perhaps the man shifted to defend himself?

“Célie!” Jean Luc’s voice trails up the staircase, and I relax slightly as it goes, letting my head thud against the bookshelves. I take a deep breath. Perhaps I can creep out before the others conclude their meeting. I flick through the sketches one last time, recognizing none of the crime scenes save one: Brindelle Park, a sacred grove of the witches.

As a child, I stared at the spindly trees outside my nursery window more times than I could count. My mother loathed the faint scent of magic that wafted from their leaves, permeating our yard, but it secretly brought me comfort. It secretly still does. To me, magic smells lovely—like herbs and incense and wild summer honey.

I have not been home in months.

Shaking my head, I study the sketch as Jean Luc’s voice fades overhead. Curiously enough, it was not the Dame Blanche found in Brindelle Park, but the melusine. Though I cannot place her silver face, her gills and fins remain intact, which means the killer did not dispatch her here. Melusines’ two fins transform into legs when they leave water. He must’ve killed her underwater and dragged her body ashore, but again...why?

“Célie?” Jean Luc’s voice grows louder once more, sterner, and his feet fall upon the stairs like anvils. “The guards didn’t see you come upstairs, so I know you’re down here. Don’t ignore me.”

I tense, eyes darting around the room. I do not want to have this conversation. Not now. Not ever.

He bursts into the library before I can fleeorhide, and hisgaze finds mine immediately. I have no choice but to square my shoulders and step out to greet him, to pretend I’ve been waiting for him all along. “It took you long enough.”

His own eyes narrow. “What are you doing in here?”

I wave the sketches in unapologetic agitation. “Studying.” Though he opens his mouth to respond, I plunge ahead, speaking over him loudly. The door remains open but I cannot bring myself to care. “The killer moved the melusine’s body. They might’ve moved Babette’s as well, which means we should try to find a connection between each location—”

Crossing the room in three strides, he pries the sketches from my hands and places them carefully upon the nearest shelf. “We need to talk, Célie.”

I glare between him and the sketches. “You’re right. We do.”

“I never meant to involve you in all this.”

“That much isveryclear.”

“It’s nothing personal.” He scrubs a weary hand down his face. Dark stubble shadows his once clean-shaven jaw, and his bronze skin looks ashen, as if he hasn’t slept in days. Part of me aches for him, aches at the burden he has carried alone, but a larger part of me aches for myself. Because he didn’tneedto carry it alone. I would have carried it with him. I would have carried itforhim, if necessary. “This investigation is classified. Father Achille and I haven’t released information of these deaths to anyone outside that council room.”

“Why isFredericinside that council room?”

He shrugs, and the gesture feels so apathetic, sodetached, that my spine snaps straighter in response. My chin jerks higher.“Don’t be like this,” he mutters. “Frederic found the first body. We couldn’t keep him out of the loop.”

“Ifound Babette’s body!”

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