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“We should find Dromeda,” she said, both wanting to leave the party and so very much wanting… one more dance.
“I’ll go.” Penbrook rubbed his nose, ridding the tip of dust.
Fia nodded. “I’ll see about having the coach brought round.”
They stepped into the hall, shaking cobwebs from their hair, and in the hallway lined with chandeliers, they parted. Which was what they would do when all this was over—whether they broke the curse… or not—so she might as well get used to his absence now.
CHAPTER 21
Fia slipped outside into the quiet. At the front of the estate, the sounds from the ball faded away, and the only music was that of the crickets chirping. It felt colder than the garden, without the warmth of the lantern light and all those pressed-close bodies. The only person here besides her was the same attendant who had greeted them upon arrival in that livery of russet and sage, and she came to attention at the sight of Fia.
A swipe of her hair behind her ear. “Miss?”
“Could we fetch our carriage, please?” Fia said, giving Andromeda’s name.
“Already?” The girl cleared her throat, smothering her surprise. “Excuse me, of course.” With that the attendant set off, heading to the side of the manor where the carriages presumably waited. Probably wondering why anyone would want to leave the ball before dawn.
But Fia had the grimoire, so it wouldn’t be prudent to stay. Not when Sebastian Smith might discover what they’d done.
She still couldn’t quite believe it.
Her finding spell had worked, and maybe she shouldn’t trust her magic to behave again, but she was here, at the Willows, the last place her mother had ever drawn breath. Chances were she’d had her spellbook with her when she’d come to collect whatever night-wild magic she’d been after. Although the Cloaks insisted no spellbook had been recovered after a wide-ranging search of the property, Fia had always wondered if it might still be here. Hidden somewhere beyond the reach of their magic.
Perhaps in the very place she’d imagined seeing her mother as the carriage had approached the manor.
Fia couldn’t leave without looking.
Skipping down the stone steps, she let the stars light her way. Thinking of Sable all those months ago beneath the same sky, but one struck through with lightning.
“It’s brilliant,” she’d said to Fia so many times, on those nights the spellshop had rattled with thunder and silver had flashed beyond the window.
To Fia, the sentiment had seemed just as elusive as the love that Sable thought was so difficult to capture. “How so?” she’d replied, hoping her mother would fall into a story.
“Lightning is raw with magic, especially at night. It wants to strike.” When another streak had crackled radiantly beyond the glass, Sable had touched Fia’s wrist, her fingertips warm and welcome, and they’d laughed at the raised hairs along her arm. “See there, how it’s charmed you.”
But it wasn’t the magical charge in the air or the spectacle of silver splintering across the night sky that had affected Fia. It was simply having her mother at her side.
She tucked the precious memory away, wishing Sable had left all that untamed magic well enough alone.
At the bottom of the steps, she turned for the willows, their weeping branches hanging low and waving in the wind, just as they had in Penbrook’s drawing. She ducked beneath their boughs, chasing the ghost of her mother, wanting so much to feel something of her here. But there was only the autumn scent of leaves and their rustling.
Determined, she gathered the very same spell she’d used to find The Book of Ribs and called for her mother’s spellbook instead, remembering to be gentle—to ask instead of command.
Will you let me find you?
Her heart thumped and thumped as golden dust spun up from her fingers and into the air.
If the grimoire had reached out to her with cords of hair and strings of skin, she wishfully thought her mother’s spellbook might extend the glimmer of a hand to hold the way Sable had offered it in life. But there was nothing. Only the same emptiness Fia always felt.
She leaned against the trunk of the nearest willow, letting it weep for her. Feeling numb and foolish.
“Will you let me find you?” she whispered again, the words brittle on her tongue as golden dust drifted around her. But the spellbook refused to answer.
The wind rushed through the branches of the willow, and she pushed past them in frustration, only to immediately stop short.
Sebastian Smith waited just steps away.
He watched her with that always-serious look—his dark brows drawn sharply together, his mouth a straight, disdainful line—like he knew she’d gone through the manor and taken The Book of Ribs. Thank goodness she didn’t have it on her! She could deny it. She could scream. She could shoulder past him and run.
