Chapter Thirty-Two
I had to give my fiancé credit: However callously I’d brushed aside his claims during our carriage ride, it seemed Noé understood his former friend far better than I did.
Dorian Drake appeared unchanged from my last encounter with him prior to his dismissal as a judge in the Vainglory, when he’d sequestered me in Fortblanche’s far reaches to interrogate me about the whereabouts of Bastian’s missing key.
Tonight, he was dressed in a dark suit, the glossy ruff of an ascot at his throat.
A pocket watch hung from his waistcoat, polished brass; on his left thumb, he sported a fat golden ring, crowned with a ruby and glinting in the candlelight as though brand-new.
Arranged in a semicircle around him were six silkwitches.
Unlike Dorian, the girls were positioned in varying states of repose, clad in identical white dresses with their hair tidily bound up in beaded silver cauls.
I recognized Mireille Laurent’s corn-silk tresses on the figure to the far left of the group, though I could not make out the rest of her features.
Her face was hidden from me, covered from forehead to chin by a gauzy scarlet veil. A veiled lady.
My heart stopped. Slumped in his armchair, Dorian settled his attention on my fiancé, his blue eyes scornful. “And Noé is here, too,” he continued. “How sweet. Do you let her tote you around everywhere, old friend?”
He held out an empty crystal glass as he said it.
In response, the silkwitch nearest to him shot up from the moldering sofa she was sprawled on and poured him a measure of red wine from a bottle tucked behind it.
Like Mireille, she, too, was wearing a veil, so that all I could see was the subservient dip of her head as she filled Dorian’s cup, then retreated.
It made her appear spectral, an anonymous, faceless woman in the dark.
As she passed the drink to him, I forced my thoughts into order.
Based on the former judge’s opening words to me—his mention of an invitation—it appeared that my guess in the carriage had been correct, and Mireille’s seemingly accidental dropping of her monocle during the Maiden’s Race hadn’t been such an accident at all.
Dorian had evidently been hoping to lure me here.
But where was here exactly? And why had I been summoned?
I spoke. “The advertisements in the papers,” I said, meeting Dorian’s stare. “They’re yours.”
He smirked. “And you’ve been asking questions about them,” he replied with a nod.
“Even pestering my idiot uncle for clues as to my whereabouts, or so I’ve heard.
I do still have a few friends in Fortblanche.
” Exhaling, he sipped moodily from his wineglass, then set it down.
“I figured if you wished to speak to me so badly, the least I could do was oblige your request.”
His eyes still trained on mine, he lifted a hand and motioned to the silkwitches.
“Ladies! My friends and I require privacy. Go mingle—and remember, no free favors.”
Obediently, they rose, filing past Noé and me through the curtain to our backs.
I attempted to catch Mireille’s gaze as she brushed by me, but her veil made it impossible, disguising her expression completely.
All I made out was the flutter of something beyond the fabric—her lashes as she blinked, perhaps—like a moth behind a curtain, and then she was gone.
Once the last girl had slipped out through the drape, Dorian relaxed.
“You know,” he said, “running a business is an exhausting affair. The sheer effort it’s taken me to get this place off the ground—I’ll be candid and say it’s been more than I ever expected to expend in my lifetime.
” His fingers drummed against his glass, his attention slipping from me to Noé.
“I really dislike having my solitude disturbed,” Dorian continued to my fiancé.
“I’ve done as your father requested and made myself scarce since the Vainglory.
Why has your witch persisted in digging around for my name? ”
Noé had left my side. He’d been drifting around the perimeter of the room while Dorian was speaking, halting every so often to examine the furnishings on which the other silkwitches had been lying.
At the former judge’s address, he paused.
“You invited her here,” he said. “You don’t wish to ask her yourself? ”
Dorian smiled. “You came with her. Is she your pet, or are you hers?”
Noé chuckled. There was a long hesitation in which none of us said anything at all, until, finally, my fiancé spoke. “Why are your girls veiled?”
The former judge paused. Noé’s tone was non-accusatory; he spoke with a soft, almost amused cadence, like he was asking Dorian to explain a joke. For the life of me, I couldn’t tell what he meant by it. “Dor,” Noé went on, looking his friend in the eyes. “It’s…odd.”
To my great shock, Dorian flushed. “Veiling them makes my guests feel more comfortable,” he replied.
Defensive. Noé had played on his pride—clever.
“You know how the public can get about witches. They believe if a silkwitch can’t look them in the eyes, they won’t be able to use their Wit to hex them, or do whatever other superstitious nonsense the fishwives whisper they might.
” He lowered himself back into his chair, reaching—sulkily, I thought—for his wine. “It’s good for business.”
Noé appeared unimpressed. “And what kind of business are you running?” he asked. “Henri Claudel seemed excited by it when I ran into him out there. But you know I’ve always felt him to possess poor taste.”
Dorian wiped a dribble of wine from his chin.
“You never liked Claudel,” he chided. “I have told you a dozen times at least—your friendship with Eliot Lear has soured you. Henri is a nice enough fellow, but because Lear thinks him tactless, you refuse to involve yourself with him.” He paused.
“I wonder,” he mused. “Is that why you picked Miss Lovett as your victor? Good enough for Lear, good enough for you—yes? You know I always preferred Lavoie.”
Noé didn’t reply. His eyes were blank, a dead gray like a winter dawn.
Finally, Dorian conceded. “This”—he started, motioning again to the chamber—“is a mutually beneficial arrangement. Whatever tragedies I suffered as a result of your Vainglory, the competition at least proved to me how many desperate silkwitches exist in our nation, willing to go to almost any length to avoid a life in the cloisters. I merely offer girls of that kind a leg up.”
Settling lower in his chair, he worked his thumbnail into the wood grain.
“The witches you encountered here are all husbandless,” he said.
“They’ve agreed to hand over a portion of the hair in their dowers to me, and to work here until they reach twenty-one, in exchange for my services as a matchmaker.
Even mostly…retired…from society as I am, the Drake feelers still have quite a long reach.
Whenever I hear of a Weaver in search of a wife, I make sure my girls’ names are on all of his friends’ lips.
And in return…” He grinned. “You’d be astounded how fascinated most non-Weavers are by silkwitches, even as they fear them.
They’ll pay exorbitant amounts to see one close-up—more to experience the effects of their Wits, if they so desire.
And all under the capable supervision of a sorcerer, able to contain the girls if they act out…
” A hesitation—he glanced up to wink, sly and jaunty.
“As far as engagements are concerned, it’s no sure bet, but not everyone can win Noé Alaire, I suppose. ”
His cold eyes slid to me. I recalled Henri’s question to Noé in the front chamber—witch or stitch, he’d asked.
Now I thought I could deduce the meaning of it.
The witches—the chance to see them, to interact with them—they were the first part of Dorian’s enterprise.
And the stitch…the magesilk Dorian Wove from the hair he collected, I assumed.
A stitch of thread. In a horrid sort of way, it tracked.
I met Dorian’s gaze. “And what of your own engagement?” I asked. “You aren’t married, I see.”
Dorian chuckled. “Oh, I’m the top prize,” he replied, spreading his hands.
“My girls know that whoever amongst them impresses me the most stands a chance at becoming a Drake herself. It’s proved to be an exemplary motivator.
” He glanced toward Noé. “Lou”—he named his longtime silkwitch fiancée, whom I’d never met—“broke off our betrothal after the whole to-do with Tremblay. I rather think she regrets her choice now. Her twenty-first birthday is coming up soon, you know. Only a few months until she goes to stay with my uncle.”
He sounded positively gleeful about the prospect of it. His delight sickened me to my core. “You’ve made your own Vainglory,” I said.
Dorian nodded. “Precisely.”
My lip curled. Before I could reply, Noé broke in. He’d finished with his examination of the room and was wandering back in my direction.
“Speaking of the Vainglory,” he said. “One of your girls was sighted in Fortblanche the night of the Midway Ball. In the tunnels first, then in the house itself later on by my father’s butler. On both occasions, she was described as wearing a veil.” His brow arched. “What was she doing there?”
Dorian wrinkled his nose. “One of my girls?” he echoed. “She can’t have been. This place didn’t exist during the Vainglory.”
He gestured at the dingy space around us. Noé and I exchanged glances. “Come on, Dor,” he said. “Her disguise matches the outfits your girls wear exactly. You expect me to believe it’s mere coincidence?”