Chapter 35
ELARA
Her new prison was lavish. The best Anespérer’s money could buy.
A massive bed sat in the center of a room made of white marble walls inlaid with ruby filigree. A massive window overlooked the city. The first thing she’d tried as soon as the officer dumped her and left was to chuck an expensive-looking vase at the glass.
The vase shattered.
The glass did not.
She tried again with a chair.
Nothing.
No way out.
Elara had made her choice. She wasn’t a fighter like Fernand. She wasn’t a sneaky, lying little rat like Nik.
She chose to survive by playing the game.
Life under Lafontaine’s thumb was hardly a life at all, but it would allow her a chance to protect the Restes better than if she were dead.
At least as Souverain of Arts Culinaires, she could push for better nutrition and access to food.
She might even be able to offer education to those who wanted to learn how to cook.
It kept them safe.
It kept Chantal and Blai safe.
The sun crested the rooftops. She didn’t need the Objet d’Art letter to know how much time she had. Less than a day. By sunset tomorrow, she would be performing a farce of a finale in front of the Restes.
She curled her fingers into her sleeves for comfort, sinking into the smell of flour, sweat, and …
lavender. Nik. He was everywhere. In her hair and on her skin.
His phantom touches chased her into the private bathroom, where she shed her clothes and plunged her body in the hottest bath she could draw.
Then she scrubbed and scrubbed as if she might be able to pry him out of her memories by shedding her skin.
Bright pink and tingling, Elara floated, eyes losing focus on the garishly decorated white ceiling. With a deep exhale, she let the water swallow her up. When she emerged, she hoped it would be into a different life, one she hadn’t ruined so thoroughly.
It wasn’t until her lungs burned that she broke the surface with a gasp. Nothing had changed because wishes did not contain magie. This was her life now, and she had no choice but to see it through.
The water was frigid by the time she crawled out.
She found a bathrobe and a new dress laid out on the bed. A shiver chased through her at the idea of someone being in here, so she shoved a chair under the door handle for good measure.
She could deny the gifts, but putting on the old dress that so thoroughly reminded her of Nik wasn’t an option.
New dress on, she stood in the center of the room.
What the hell was she supposed to do now?
There wasn’t a reason to demand time to practice.
She could burn every dish tomorrow, and Lafontaine would still find a way to assure her victory.
Souverain Elara Rousseau.
What a fraud.
She flopped onto the stiff mattress, already missing the gentle plushness of—
No. Nik’s home had not belonged to her. It was just another prison. A place where he’d betrayed her just as his mother had betrayed the people who needed her most.
Elara curled up onto her side.
A faded brown book on the nightstand caught her eye. Its dingy color and frayed edges didn’t belong here.
Mama’s recipe book. Just inside was the contest envelope.
But as the finale approaches, let us not forget those a Souverain serves: the people.
Acid burned her belly. The only people the Souverains served were themselves. They just hid it artfully behind glamorous chateaus and sycophants who delighted in the trickle-down of power.
… it is important to show our citizens that we are united in their pain, and they are united in our victory.
United and yet she felt more lost than ever.
Nikolas had been content to mold her into a weapon to serve his father.
She still wasn’t sure what Lafontaine wanted from her other than devotion.
He wanted to create the title of Grand Souverain and bestow that honor upon himself, but what else? And why?
Elara crumpled the envelope and threw it.
Oh, Elara. Fernand had spoken to her like a child because she was one. He’d tried to make her see the truth about Lafontaine and Nikolas, that they were scheming together. Now she knew. But it was too late.
Elara finally released the scream that had been brewing in her chest since she’d learned of Gaetan’s death. The same one she’d swallowed the night her mother died and again after she’d degraded herself before the board of Directeurs.
She grabbed the closest thing she could find and threw it.
A lamp shattered against the wall.
It felt good to destroy something beautiful.
She threw a hand mirror next.
A perfume bottle. A chair. A brush.
She ripped the curtains from the bed and windows, toppled the furniture, and danced amid the debris. Her feet burned against the glass, but she didn’t care. If she had no control over her life from now on, she would use every ounce of her free will to destroy whatever she could get her hands on.
So she tore through the room like a hurricane until she grabbed the only item left.
Her mother’s recipe book
When had it become so worn? There were oil stains on the front she’d never noticed, and the corners of the cover were nearly bald. She remembered when it was new, the spine uncracked and pages empty. When the world was filled with hope, as brittle as spun sugar.
Elara flipped through the recipes she’d allowed to guide her life.
Every single one of them had wasted her time. Her life.
She stroked her mother’s slanted lettering. Clafoutis. The dish that had started this hell.
Elara ripped it.
The page fluttered to the floor.
It felt good to destroy something beautiful.
Page by page by page by page.
Until the remnants of Corinne Rousseau fluttered in the air.