Chapter 8
Delphi woke still on the threadbare couch that Tenebrys had dumped her on the previous night. Someone had put a blanket over her while she had been sleeping, but she hadn't heard anyone come in.
She sat up slowly, wincing when pain lashed against her ribs. She unlaced her corset and lifted her tunic. Dark bruises were flowering on her ribs and sternum from where she had been carried for hours the previous night.
"Just what I need," she muttered. She pulled out a breast band from her bag and put it on. There was no one here who would chide her for not wearing a corset, and it was too painful to put back on.
She stood and stretched, looking around. Sunlight was coming through the glass windows, darkened by dirt and dust.
The laboratory looked like a mirror of the one Narcisse always set up wherever they moved.
That would have been enough evidence for Delphi to know that he had been there before.
She touched the books that she had placed on the worktable the night before.
She reached for them and stopped. No, she wasn't ready for what they held. Not yet.
Delphi heard Tenebrys bolt the door the night before, but now it sat ajar.
Had he come back in and given her the blanket? It seemed unlikely. He had been so pissed off that he had barely looked at her.
So much for my fantasy dream man, she thought and rubbed a hand over her face.
How had he managed to get into her dreams anyway?
Narcisse had known how to protect his own dreams and hadn't bothered to teach her.
"How fucking like him," she grumbled under her breath.
What else had Narcisse been hiding all these years? She wasn't an idiot. She always knew there were things he didn't teach her.
He had an idea in his head that only men could be promising alchemists. It was one of the reasons she had learned all that she could from any books she could get her hands on.
Delphi's stomach grumbled angrily. She needed to find some food before she could think straight.
She opened the door a bit further and looked about the hall. There was no one around, so she slipped out of her room.
In daylight, the chateau's slide from splendor to squalor was even more noticeable. What had happened to turn it to such a state?
Delphi had worked in enough big houses over her life that she had no problem finding the kitchen. It didn't look like it had been used for decades either. Did Tenebrys and the others just eat their food raw?
Delphi searched the cupboards, but they were bare except for spices whose freshness she was uncertain about. They were better than nothing. She smelled the cinnamon, closing her eyes to savor its scent.
"Sweet goddess, you smell good," she whispered.
Spices were a rare commodity in Grisvallon. Even in the larger towns, spices like cinnamon and saffron were affordable only to the very rich. They had to come all the way from the hot southern realms like Kisharu. She put the cinnamon down and kept exploring.
Delphi shoved the back door open, pushing hard. Grass had grown up behind it, but she made a crack wide enough for her to squeeze between.
She stepped carefully through the overgrown garden until she found a well and pulled up a bucket of water. There were no bugs or worms in it, and it appeared clear with no foul odors. She would boil it first, just to be careful, but at least she wouldn't go thirsty.
Delphi had been poor for almost as long as she could remember, so she knew how to forage for things to eat. She found blackberries growing over one corner of the garden, gathered some, and then looked at the rows of untended beds.
The chateau was enormous and had once housed many people, so the kitchen gardens were extensive. Why had no one tended to them?
She dug out some potatoes that had survived the odds. Rosemary and thyme were next, their bushes grown wild and massive.
Delphi didn't know what Tenebrys's plans were for her, but if she were going to be a prisoner indefinitely, she would need to sort the garden out again to feed herself.
Delphi sighed. "Not like I haven't lived off less before."
She pulled weeds as she went, uncovering fresh shoots of onion and garlic, tangled vines of tomatoes, pumpkin, yarrow, and lavender.
In Grisvallon, the spring had started, but it was warmer here, and there seemed to be more that was already good enough to eat.
Would Tenebrys even bother telling her where they were located? She had been thinking about the coat of arms that she had glimpsed the night before, trying to place it.
She couldn't recall all the details, but during her studies on the war with the fae, a family of shifters living on the border between the realms had helped to rally shifter clans from Runefjell to aid the humans in driving the enemy back into Faerie.
The shifter family's motto involved something about the light in darkness. If this was their land and chateau, then what had happened to the rest of them?
The people of Grisvallon had lived side by side with the Mistwood, but Delphi had never heard of them talking about this place.
Had the town's memories really changed that much in thirty years? Maybe Grisvallon hadn't fought in the wars at all. Their lives revolved around farming, then having babies to help with it. Round and round it went. They weren't warriors of any kind.
Delphi would have to ask Tenebrys if he ever bothered to talk to her again. There was so much she wanted to know. She also wanted a chance to convince him that she was nothing like Narcisse.
Why do you even care if he does? He's taken you prisoner and told you he wants you to suffer.
Walking through the gardens that morning didn't feel like suffering. It felt freeing not to have to worry about what mood or how hungover Narcisse would be that day.
Delphi was lightheaded by the time she stopped working and took her small haul of fruit and vegetables into the kitchen. She retrieved her bucket of water, rinsed out a dusty cast-iron pot, and then filled it.
There was wood still in the box beside the cooking fireplace, but no kindling. She was tired and hungry, so Delphi summoned her magic and lit the logs.
A shiver went through the kitchen, a shift in the air that had Delphi whirling around. No one was there.
"Bloody spirits," she whispered, and because she knew better than to mess with the unseen world, she set aside some of her fruit and food and put it on a windowsill as an offering.
Delphi made a tea of ginger root and lemon grass and explored the kitchen cupboards. Whoever the staff had been, they had kept it orderly, and there were more utensils and pots and pans than she knew what to do with.
A door that she thought was another pantry cupboard led down into a cooling cellar lined with marble to keep food fresher for longer.
A glass jar at the bottom of one cupboard was filled with soap flakes, so Delphi did what she always did when she felt ready to rage against the world and began to scrub things. She would need to have a clean space to cook in anyway.
While she worked, she tried to sort through any memories she had of Narcisse mentioning work that he and her mother had done.
Narcisse had always been more than eager to talk about the glory days of his youth. He had never mentioned working for Tenebrys or the full details of how Cassia had died giving birth to her.
So many women died in childbirth, so Delphi had accepted that explanation from him as fact and moved on.
Had Narcisse lied to her about that as well?
He never told her that Cassia had worked with him, assisting him in his alchemy, either. He had always gotten Delphi's help when he needed the extra boost of magic. He didn't have a drop of it, so it must have passed to Delphi through her mother.
Had he used her magic for his own gain too?
Sometimes, Delphi had liked to imagine that he had once been less of a bastard, and that the grief for his lost wife had turned him into the selfish father he was.
Delphi could have been handed over to an orphanage or some nuns to raise instead, but he had kept her alive long enough until she could do it for herself.
He had made a point of keeping her by his side, even when she had reached a marriageable age. Not two days ago, he had stolen her money and spent it, just so there was no way she could have escaped him.
Delphi stopped scrubbing and tried to steady her breathing to calm her anger. She might be a prisoner now, but at least she wasn't his prisoner.
Tenebrys had fucked with Narcisse's plans by taking her, and she couldn't help but feel a little bit pleased by that.
A polite tap on the door had her lifting her head. A tall figure came into the kitchen, and Delphi tried not to gape at him. Where Tenebrys was mostly lion, this male was like a wolf.
"You have been busy this morning," he said, looking about with pale blue eyes. He placed a sack on the table. "I thought I would bring you something to eat, seeing how the king is too busy brooding to remember you need feeding. I'm Felix, by the way."
"Delphi," she said and peeked into the bag. Inside was a haunch of venison. It was more meat than she had been given in a long time. She smiled at him. "Thank you, Felix. This is very kind of you."
He cocked his head, his pointed gray wolf ears twitching. "You aren't afraid of me. Aren't I monstrous to you, little one?"
Delphi stared him in the eye. "Strange, perhaps, but not monstrous."
Delphi's mind flashed back to the witch burning. She would never forget the eager and blood thirsty faces of the crowd and judges. Their hatred would be imprinted on her mind forever.
"I have seen real monsters, and they don't bring strangers food," she added.
"I see. You are more polite than I expected of a child of Narcisse," Felix said, studying her carefully. "You look a little like your mother. Otherwise, I would never pick you to be his offspring."
Delphi ran a hand over the back of her neck. "I don't know if Tenebrys will listen to me, but I really had no idea my parents were ever at this place. He probably wants to kill me and get it over with, but I would like to try and help undo whatever Narcisse did."
"You're not lying. I would be able to smell it if you were," Felix said, eyes widening in surprise.
Delphi crossed her arms, her frustration finally bubbling over. "I have no reason to lie to you! Narcisse has always been a bastard, but I had no idea he was capable of magic. Selling ineffectual erection tonics is more his style, not this kind of transmutation."
She dared to step closer to look at the bone plating on Felix's biceps. "These are arcane symbols. I have never seen him use anything like them in his alchemy work."
"That's because they were Cassia's forte," Felix replied. "Your mother was a witch of considerable power and learning. I could never figure out how Narcisse managed to win such a woman as his wife."
"He never told me anything about her. I have one of her books that contains natural remedies and recipes. No arcana. Narcisse never said anything about her magic."
Felix's wolf tail flicked in irritation. "That doesn't surprise me. He was always jealous of her abilities, and I have no doubt he would be jealous of yours too."
Delphi snorted. "My abilities. Right. I can help heat things, light a fire, and warm some water. Everything else I do is science. It's using the right amount of herbs to create a decent medicine. That's about it."
Felix shook his head. "I doubt that's all you can do.
We shifters are magical creatures, and we can all smell power on you.
Just because you don't know how to use it doesn't mean it's not there.
I would start by looking through your parents' old things.
Ten has kept the lab locked up since they fled, and they left a lot behind. "
"Can you tell me what happened? Why did they run? Why didn't they stay to keep helping you all?" she asked, pushing her hands through her snarled curls. "None of this makes sense."
"Talk to Ten. It's not my place to tell you anything," Felix said, turning to leave. He paused by the door. "Be patient with him. He's a grumpy bastard, but you would be dead already if he didn't like you."
Somehow, Delphi highly doubted that. It didn't matter how his touch had made her burn in the dreams he had sent her. None of that had been real.
He had whispered sexy words to her and used her to get to her father. That was all. She should have been scared by the thought that such a creature's hands had made her feel that way. Instead, she was hurt that he had taken advantage of her loneliness.
Delphi looked back at the haunch of venison, wondering how she could eat so much meat before it went bad. At least, for the moment, she would enjoy a full stomach and hope that Tenebrys calmed down by the time she ran into him next.