Page 45 of The Shadow Bride

Odessa presses onward before I can express my relief. “So?” she asks Michal. “Is it true?”

“And if it is?”

“If itis,” she whispers, “I would urge you to reconsider assigning Pasha and Ivan to babysit Célie.” She flashes me a vaguely apologetic glance. “Our priority should be ridding the isle of these abominations and protecting our people—as well as closing thedoorwayFrederic tore through the veil.”

She heard me on the ship, I realize.

“They aren’t coming through that one.” Michal speaks almost absently, surveying the street overhead rather than looking at her. It feels almost... disrespectful, like he cannot be bothered with this conversation, but that also cannot be right. This is Michal. Everything bothers him, especially things regarding his precious isle. “They seem to be tearing through the veil near their graves—not that any such limitation exists once they’re in our realm. The revenant at the fleuriste’s fled halfway across the city before they trapped it.”

Odessa stares at him in horror. “Are you saying a new door is created with each revenant?”

He lifts a shoulder. “I assume they’re more like windows, but alas, I cannot see them—not like the other.”

My brows contract at that. Michal shouldn’t be able to perceive the veil, and neither should anyone else. “You can actually, er—seethe door Frederic created on All Hallows’ Eve?”

“Not the veil itself, no.”

My frown deepens. “Then how do you—?”

Odessa seems much less concerned with the particulars.“Never mind all that,” she snaps, waving an agitated hand at the peculiarity around us. “Do you have any ideas on how tomendall these wretched holes?”

At last, Michal’s eyes reluctantly meet mine, and in them, I see his answer.Me.I am the Bride, after all, and the only one with any real experience tearing and mending the veil. He flicks his gaze away. “I have plenty of ideas, Odessa, but none I am going to discuss here.”

“Odessa,” Dimitri says quietly when she opens her mouth to argue. Her teeth snap shut in a furious smile.

“Very well.” Then, speaking through them as if unable to help it— “Revenants aside, Michal, the outside world now knows of our existence after All Hallows’ Eve. The huntsmen know of our island, and they know of our weaknesses too.”

“Jean Luc isn’t stupid.” Though every vampire in the harbor can still hear me, I lower my own voice and hasten to reassure her. “The Chasseurs would never come to Requiem—”

“They came for you once. They could come again.”

I blink at her, shocked. She never mentioned any of this while in Cesarine, or even on the ship during our return journey. Perhaps if she’d voiced her fears, we could’ve assuaged them in private, but she never said a word. My frown deepens. “I don’t—” I shake my head to clear it. “Jean Luc is just angry with me right now. He lashed out this morning, but after he calms down, he’ll realize this is a fight he does not want and cannot win.” I squeeze her elbow and force an encouraging smile. “The Chasseurs will not come here again. I promise.”

For a split second, she looks like she wants to argue—with me or with Michal, I do not know—but she returns to herself just asquickly.Like the flip of a coin.My unease deepens at the abrupt shift in her expression.

It’s a familiar one.

Afamilialone.

And it takes all of my resolve not to linger on the comparison between her and Dimitri.

“Forgive me, darling.” With a sigh, Odessa lifts the hood of her cloak to cover her hair, and raindrops cascade around her shoulders like tiny jewels. “I meant no offense. I left my parasol in the witch’s flower bed,” she adds defensively to Michal, who still glowers, “and you know how I loathe being damp.”

He rolls his eyes and returns his attention to Pasha and Ivan. Though I open my mouth to question her further, Dimitri shakes his head in warning, and I close it once more.

When the carriage at last rolls to a halt in front of us, I almost believe the altercation never happened. Neither Michal nor Odessa mentions the scent of Death or threat of invasion again. Unsure what else to do, I follow their lead and step up beside the wild-eyed horses. They toss their great heads in agitation as thunder cracks, followed immediately by another fork of lightning.

The dazzling light illuminates a gilt crest upon the carriage door as Michal opens it. Wreathed in flames, what appears to be acrosslies opposite a horned dragon upon the black lacquer. “Is this your coat of arms?” I ask despite myself.

He gives the crest a distracted glance before handing Odessa into the compartment. Something in her bearing still feels... off, somehow. Strained. I cannot explain it, but she takes great care to avoid my gaze as she settles upon the bench. “My father was a cleric,” Michal says shortly.

“What?” Blinking in genuine surprise, I accept his hand and ascend into the carriage after her. “You never told me that.”

“You never asked.”

When he shuts the door behind me with a definitivesnap, I frown between him and Dimitri. “Are you two not joining us?”

“Not yet.”

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