Page 71 of Bloodgrove

“It is a tragedy. Saint is dead.”

The woman smiled thinly and squeezed his hand once more. Saint had not been a nobleman, not one of their close circle, merely a supplier of body parts and siren scales.

“May I see the wounds?” Balto asked, his eyes darting across Will’s black mourning clothes as though he might see through them. “I heard they bit you everywhere.”

“Go away,” Elodie snarled.

And then Saint was cremated while his father wept.

Then life continued.

Now and then, Will felt Elodie’s searching gaze upon him whenever conversation fell silent. He could almost see the questions resting on her tongue. Why were you in the harbor district that night? What did you want from Saint? Why did the vampire keep you alive? But she remained silent, and Will used his little free time to search the city archives. He looked for everything he could find about the king. Still, there was nothing about his coronation, no reports of public appearances, even in records so old that the paper crumbled between Will’s fingers.

Only the seemingly endless list of Red Hands made Will pause.

Vero Lancet died in the twenty-third year of his tenure, and Vincent Ormonde, second-born son of House of Ormonde, was appointed Red Hand by His Royal Majesty.

In his mind, Will tore down the dining room and rebuilt it, as he had so often over the past few days. It was a black monster, darkly paneled and dominated by the long table at its center. An immense painting had once hung behind Elodie at the head of the table, a depiction of the Wild Hunt, but now the space stood empty, throwing the room strangely out of balance.

He had enjoyed ample time to redesign the room in his imagination these past few days because Duke Wilkinson insisted on coming to dinner every evening. As though the Red Hand meant to mock Elodie, Wilkinson had been appointed to the Senate. If it hurt her, she did not show it. Nor did she reveal how she suffered beneath her fiancé’s casually delivered insults. When he mocked her shallow life, her love of dresses, her invitations: “That is why you have not been appointed to the Senate. The Red Hand cannot take you seriously when you distract yourself with such useless things. But that is for the best. Now you need not fight for the position, because your husband will be a senator for you.”

Will had nearly torn the napkin in his lap, but rather than voice his opinion and perhaps be thrown from the house, he redesigned the dining room in his mind.

For that reason, today’s silence was almost a pleasant change as they waited for Duke Wilkinson. Only Elodie was growing impatient. She was already dressed for the full-moon ball, and Will suspected Wilkinson was keeping her waiting for precisely that reason. These balls were her arena, and therefore he had to humiliate her now.

As at every full-moon ball, she wore blood-red, tonight in the shade of half-congealed ox-heart blood. What made it truly unique, however, was the white pearl embroidery, which formed small snowdrifts across her shoulders and gathered at her hip as though she had walked through a snowy forest. Even her hair, arranged by her maid into a tall, dark crown, was threaded with pearls.

At last, Elodie sighed and fell back into her chair at the head of the table. “Hedgefort, please find out what is delaying my fiancé.” The moment the butler left the room, she focused upon Will.

“What?” she snapped.

Will smiled but straightened. Complaining about her fiancé would not make things easier for Elodie, so he used the opportunity to ask something else. “Why does everyone compete for the Red Hand’s favor when they could simply kill him and take his office?”

Elodie’s hand froze halfway toward her wineglass. “What do you mean?”

“Your uncle became the Red Hand by killing his predecessor, did he not?”

“How did you come to that conclusion?”

Will adjusted his cuffs and trained his expression into neutrality. “Something the vampire said. Then I searched the records⁠—”

“Vampires do not speak,” Elodie interrupted.

“This one did.” Will preferred not to mention that his blood was probably the reason. “But it made me think about your plans. Perhaps it is time you explained them to me. How many people know that one can kill the Red Hand and claim his office?”

Elodie pressed her lips together and was spared the need to answer when Hedgefort entered and bowed.

“Duke Wilkinson sends his apologies and requests that you depart for the ball without him.”

“It is one month before our wedding, and he believes he doesn’t need to be at my side!” Elodie snarled, but regained control the next moment. She exhaled audibly. “Hedgefort, serve dinner and call for the carriage. We will leave shortly.”

With one eyebrow raised, Will watched Elodie stare at her soup as though it were poison. The pea-foam soup glowed green in return.

“Will, I can practically hear your thoughts!”

He laughed but said nothing. As always, the food was magnificent, though visually peculiar.

“What would you prefer to discuss?” he said after a while, once Elodie had finally started eating. “The fact that you are sacrificing yourself for a fiancé who despises you, or your plan to commit high treason?”