Page 52 of The Scarlet Veil

“No one is testing you,” Dimitri says at once.

“That remains to be seen,” Odessa says at the same time.

Dimitri casts his sister an accusing look. “Odessa.”

“What?” Shrugging, she examines her nails with cool indifference. “Would you prefer I lie? She hasn’t yet met D’Artagnan, and everyone knows he’s therealtest.”

“Who is—?”

At that moment, however, a truly enormous cat pokes its head up from the basket of fabric between them. With thick charcoal fur, protuberant amber eyes, and a squashed face, it might just be the ugliest creature I’ve ever seen—and if its low growl is any indication, it feels rather the same way about me.

“Shoo.” Hissing the word, I nudge the basket away with the tip of my boot. Because this is getting absurd. The cats on this isle have created a completely unnecessary situation for me, and now one of them has managed to follow me into adressshop. “Go on.” I reach down, upending the basket to force the creature out of it, resisting the urge to open my jaw and pop the sudden pressure in my ears. “Get out of here. Leave me alone.”

If a cat could scowl, this one would. “Rather cocksure, aren’t you?”

The words fall like bricks over my head.

Because this cat—he seems to havespokenthem, and I must really, truly have succumbed to hallucination now. Surely I must’ve imagined it. Surely its mouth did not just move like a—like ahuman’s. Hearing disembodied voices is one thing, but cats—they cannot speak. They cannotscowleither, and—I glance in disbeliefto Odessa and Dimitri. “Did either of you hear—?”

“Célie,” says Odessa with wry amusement, “please allow me to introduce the magnificent D’Artagnan Yvoire, original proprietor of this lovely little boutique and Monsieur Marc’s elder brother.”

I stare between them for a beat, convinced I misheard. Surely she didn’t just imply that this distinctly four-legged creature once owned a dress shop, andsurelyshe didn’t imply that said creature is also Monsieur Marc’skin. “But”—I feel compelled to state the obvious—“he’s acat.”

Stretching atop the spilled fabric, D’Artagnan surveys me with scathing apathy. “An astute observation.”

I exhale a harsh breath before turning to Dimitri. “And—and youcanhear him, right? The cat is—er, he’s actually talking? This isn’t happening inside my head? Or—or perhaps not some strange new sickness of the isle?”

“These voices,” D’Artagnan says dryly, “just how long have you been hearing them, precisely?”

Dimitri shakes his head in exasperation. “Just ignore D’Artagnan. Everyone else does.”

At the sound of his voice, however, D’Artagnan’s ears flatten, and the tip of his tail begins to flick. My frown deepens. I should feel relief, of course—and thank God others can hear this wretched cat too—but gooseflesh erupts down my neck instead. Probably from the chill in the shop. Thereisan enormous hole in the ceiling, after all, and I have too little experience with talking cats to assume anything about their behavior—except that this one boastsverypoor manners.

“As you can see, he doesn’t particularly like me either.” Rising from his seat, Dimitri casts a disapproving look in D’Artagnan’sdirection before patting my shoulder in a sympathetic gesture.

And at that precise second, a gust of cold wind bursts through the branches overhead.

“Mariéeee...”

The pressure in my ears spikes to actual pain through my temples, but I bolt upright anyway, glancing around the shop in alarm for any sign of flickering ethereal light.Not again.I nearly weep at the pressure, at the looming sense that someone or something lingers just out of sight.Please not again.

“Mademoiselle Tremblay?” Dimitri’s face twists in concern, and he removes his hand at once, stooping slightly to peer into my eyes. “What is it?”

“Nothing.” My eyes continue to dart, however, searching for that damning silver light. “It’s nothing.”

“Your face has gone white as a sheet.”

D’Artagnan’s eyes glitter in unapologetic amusement. “Or perhaps as white as a... ghost?”

I stiffen at the implication, turning slowly to stare at him. “Why would you say that?”

Though he merely licks his paw in response, his silence—it speaks volumes, and it grows loud enough to muffle even the debilitating pain in my head. Because heknows. Hehasto know. His use of the word cannot be simple coincidence, which invites the question—can D’Artagnan see them too?

The... ghosts?

Cats are guardians of the dead, Célie. I thought everyone knew that.

I swallow hard, forcing myself to take deep, steadying breaths through the dread. Whatever D’Artagnan might be, it isn’t a simple cat—ofthatmuch I am now sure. “How—” A trickle of sweattrails between my shoulder blades as I kneel beside him, as my teeth threaten to chatter in the cold. “How exactly did you come to... to look like this, monsieur?”

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