Page 116 of The Alchemists

All of Seb’s natural grace abandoned him as he nearly tipped off the swing.

“You’re a Bellarius?” he choked out as he righted himself, gaping at her.

“No. I’m a Perkins. My mom was a Bellarius before she was disowned. I’ve never even met her parents.”

“But surely⁠—”

“Surely what?” She couldn’t keep from sounding harsh. “Even if I could, I don’t really want to go to the house of the man who cursed me to die.”

Sebastian clattered out of the swing, landing in the mud.

“You’re not saying—Hawthorn Bellarius was the one who carried out the curse?”

Lily wanted out of this conversation. Desperately. It churned up something dark and vicious inside her. Thinking of her grandparents always did.

“Oh, don’t act so surprised,” she snapped. “Is it really that much worse than pushing your own brother out a tower window?”

“What?” He looked stricken. “What are you talking about?”

“Bellarius isn’t the only Great House with bloodstains in the carpet. You know what I’m talking about.”

“How do you know about that? Who told you?”

Lily dug her heels into the mud to stop her swing. Across from her, Seb looked nauseous.

“My mom was betrothed to your uncle. They were friends growing up.” Seb just stared at her. “Just imagine—we could have been cousins.”

He shuddered. She watched his face work on something she couldn’t really understand, and then it cleared.

“Would you come?” he asked. “If you were allowed on the property?”

“What would be the point? So that I can see my awful grandparents, and the life another version of me could have had?”

“No!” he said emphatically. “So they can see you.” He gripped her hands; they were freezing from clutching the swing’s chain. “Lily, you’re amazing. I could pontificate on that fact for hours. Don’t you think you owe it to yourself to show them what they could have had?”

She’d never considered that the reverse of her statement could possibly be true. She wasn’t sure she wanted the reverse to be true. And even if they saw her and were sorry, what did it accomplish? Curses couldn’t be broken.

“This isn’t some ploy, is it? You don’t want me to come because you’re hoping for some sort of curse-breaking Hail Mary, do you?”

“Lily.” He almost smiled. “This tournament is really important to me. The gala is part of that, and I really want you to be there for it. Not to be melodramatic, but I’d be miserable without you, and would rather not go if you’re not.”

She couldn’t help smiling. “You absolutely mean to be melodramatic. Besides, you can’t not go. I don’t think it’s even allowed.”

He grinned fully. “I know. That’s why I really want you to come.”

“You’re impossible, Sebastian.”

SEB

“Ithought you weren’t going to help me.”

Seb stood on Chant’s doorstep, coat over his pajamas. In his glasses, his hair at its most boyishly floppy—which he hated—he felt like a weak reflection of the man in front of him. Chant sighed, pushing his hand through his own untidy hair. He held a small book in his other hand. He stepped back so Seb could enter.

“Someone has to keep you from getting caught,” Chant said, attempting lightheartedness and slouching against the back of his couch. “I wouldn’t be much of…whatever it is you think I am if I left you to this alone.” He gestured, ungenerously, at himself, then fixed Seb with a curious look and asked what he’d clearly wanted to ask for a while. “What is it that you see in me, Sebastian? Why is this what you aspire to?”

“What do you mean?” Seb frowned as he draped his coat over the back of the chair.

“You could be so much more.” Chant frowned back. “You could be one of the top Cantrèa players in the world. Instead, you want to spend the next decade of your life training to become an underpaid junior professor, if you’re lucky.”