“But… but he didn’t manage to kill you,” said Mallory. “What are you even still doing here? Why aren’t you dead? And why are you a bird?”
Gabrielle squawked once, then grimaced. “I took the vows that bound me to him. When he spilled my blood, it tied me to his dark magic, and to my wedding ring, forever.”
“Your wedding ring?” Mallory grabbed her sister’s hand and lifted it up—showing the simple gold band and emerald that Anaïs had worn every day for years. “This wedding ring?”
Gabrielle nodded. “Where the ring goes, the spirit goes. I can never travel far from it, and can never be free until the spell is finished—or he is expelled from the mortal world.”
“Where the ring goes, the spirit goes?” Anaïs said. “You mean… the bird that lived in the apartment with us. That was you?”
“Yes,” said Gabrielle. “I have tried to watch over you, as well as I could. As I have watched over every generation since my dear daughter was born.”
“Watched over us?” said Mallory. “You could have turned into a human this whole time! Why have you stayed a bird? So manythings you could have told us, explained to us. The séance. My magic…”
“I must choose carefully how much time I spend in this form,” said Gabrielle, her expression more fierce than regretful. “When I am human, my body ages, but I learned long ago that to stay a bird is to remain between worlds, not alive and not dead.”
“How long have you taken that form?” Anaïs asked gently.
Constantino muttered, “Too long.”
Gabrielle whapped him with the feather, but… it was just a feather, and didn’t do much beyond amuse him.
“Besides,” Gabrielle added, snapping her focus back to Mallory. “I have helped you! I saved you from those feux follets. You would have been smashed thin as a crêpe if you’d thrown yourself from that tower.”
Mallory shuddered. “That was you?”
“That was me,” Gabrielle affirmed. “You are welcome.”
Grumbling a chastisedthank you, Mallory studied her ancestor. Bird. Witch. The one who got away. Her heart thumped as she sorted through Gabrielle’s words.
You must finish what was started.
Bastien is possessing him.
Where the ring goes, the spirit goes.
She thought of the ring that had been discovered on a dismembered finger behind a wine barrel. She thought of Triphine, who had not left the house in Morant for more than a hundred years, suddenly appearing in the carriage on their way to Comorre. She pictured the hook she’d seen beneath Armand’s vanity—holding Triphine’s ring along with the others. It was because he’d takenthe ring out of Morant that Triphine had been forced to come with them to the estate deep in the countryside.
Her thoughts were a blizzard, and she found it impossible to wade through them. Armand was being possessed by a wicked spirit. Gabrielle Savoy was alive. Le Bleu needed five sacrifices to become immortal. Armand might be a liar and a thief, but maybe he hadn’t tried to kill her after all.
“Triphine,” she whispered, counting off on her fingers. “Lucienne. Béatrice. Julie. And… you.” She squinted at Gabrielle. “Except he didn’t kill you.”
“No, but he married me. Which is why sacrificing either ofyou”—she bobbed her head at Mallory and Anaïs—“would suffice. You carry my blood.”
“Or he could marry someone else,” said Fitcher. “Find a new sacrifice.”
“Yes,” said Gabrielle. “But it will take time to woo another into marriage.”
“Will it?” said Anaïs, smirking at Mallory. “How long would it take for him to seduce some unsuspecting young lady, do we think? Reasonably speaking?”
Mallory flushed. Armand—no,Bastien—hadn’t needed to get her to marry him. He’d only needed her to trust him enough that he would have the opportunity to kill her when he was ready to. How long had that taken?
Not nearly long enough.
“If you ask me,” said Constantino, gathering the coffee cups and returning them to the tray, “the fact that this ghost specifically wants one ofyouseems like a valid reason to never go back there again. I say—onward to Stivale!”
“No,” said Anaïs, horrified. “If we don’t put an end to this, Le Bleu will find another victim. He will use Armand to woo and murder some other innocent girl. We can’t let that happen. Can we? Mallory?”
Mallory scrunched up her shoulders. “I don’t know. I guess innocent girls shouldn’t be so easily taken in by a pair of pretty blue eyes.”
