Twenty-Two - Felix
???
I watched Isawrite in a journal, her hand gliding over paper without hesitation, and wondered if she was actually writing her thoughts or just enjoying the ease of using the Truth-made pen.
I was supposed to be practicing truth-telling, asking Isa questions when I thought I had the spell properly cast, but I could not get the power to settle around her as I had once before. Granted, I had spent more time studying the shape of her lips and trying to decide the exact color of her eyes—russet—than actually focusing on the magic. Nevertheless, the first hints of a headache had just formed behind my eyes, and I released the node power.
“Even if I could master this power in the next five minutes, I will still be rubbish at questioning Marc.”
Isa looked up from her journal. “If you master the power, it doesn’t matter if you are rubbish at questioning. You can ask him directly what he is up to and he will have to answer.”
“And he can still hide the truth from me, even then. I think you should question him instead. You figured something out this afternoon without even trying.”
“I don’t know that I’d put it quite like that. I heard something that confirmed that your suspicions are well placed, but I didn’t uncover a secret.”
“But you could have if you hadn’t stopped pushing him. I know you did it because I didn’t want him to know I was onto him, but I think it would have been better if you had kept going. Next time, you should keep going.”
“I can only push so far without him realizing it is an interrogation.” She shrugged. “He’ll stop answering at that point, and there will be nothing I can do about it.”
“I understand. I still think you should do it. You are better at this than me.”
Isa looked away, and a faint hint of pink dusted her cheeks.
“I’ll try to truth-tell him,” I continued, wondering why such a straight-forward statement—I wouldn’t have even considered it a compliment, just a fact—made her blush. “But either way, I want you to do the questioning.”
???
We waited anotherday and a half. Isa wanted to catch Marc as off-guard as possible and hoped I might master my magic. I still could do no more than the enchantment on the castle already did, but I decided it was time to summon Marc, anyway. The plan was to explain away Isa’s questioning as her attempt to understand what we had already discovered. She could honestly say she preferred to hear about things than read through notes in a journal.
Marc narrowed his eyes when he saw Isa in my office, sitting behind my desk, then he smiled and focused on me as if nothing was amiss. “You wanted to see me, Your Grace?”
I tilted my head toward the empty chair in front of my desk before settling down so that Isa had an unobstructed view of the secretary. “Please sit. Miss Cardh has some questions she wanted to ask us about the research we conducted before her arrival.”
Marc shifted his smile to Isa. “Was the journal I provided not enough?”
Isa didn’t bother with a polite smile. “I want to make sure I understand everything.”
“What questions do you have?”
Isa looked down at the journal splayed open in front of her. She had written out several questions the day before, going over what she hoped to learn with me. She explained that she would adapt as she heard Marc’s answers but wanted to have a few things prepared. Writing certain questions out ahead of time would also help as she noted Marc’s answers. Apparently she had a shorthand she used to record what she heard with her magic, but sometimes recording everything interrupted the flow of questioning too much.
“You found His Grace in the great hall after Lady Cecily cursed him, correct?”
I listened to the questions and answers, but most of my attention was on the power I drew from the node and my attempt to force Marc to answer.
“Correct. The butler and I helped Duke Felix hide his transformation from the rest of the staff. What does this have to do with our research?”
The magic hadn’t infused the air around Marc. He didn’t have to answer. But I had been right; he was too proud to avoid answering Isa’s questions. I only hoped she could keep him from discovering this was an interrogation until after we had answers.
I shouldn’t have worried. She knew exactly how to make Marc dance to her tune.
“Your notes mentioned the fact that Lady Cecily was not around when His Grace was discovered, nor was there any sign of the paper she had used to curse him. You didn’t say how you recognized His Grace.”
“I didn’t know the cat was Duke Felix until he spoke.”
Isa wrote out his answer, adding a series of dots and dashes above and below the words. “His Grace has you hunting the archives for scrolls with only one signature. How have you structured your search?”
“We do not know how the archives are organized, so I have had to rely more on luck than anything else.”
Her pen didn’t stop moving, but Isa’s gaze transferred to me. “How many of the Truths listed in your notes did you know about before starting your research, Your Grace?”
Isa had warned me that she would ask me questions, too, but it still took me off guard. I had expected her to switch to questioning me if Marc seemed antsy, but her style seemed to thrive on confusing everyone around her.
“Perhaps a little over half of them?”
Her pen still moved, and I wondered why. She couldn’t read me. She gave me the same look as on the first morning she had questioned me. “Could you be more specific?”
“Not really. I don’t remember the exact number of Truths I documented. I suppose I discovered five or six by reading my ancestor’s journals.”
“Marc, when did you start working at Rose Castle?”
Instead of answering, Marc raised a brow in my direction. “Are all these questions really necessary, Your Grace? I’m not sure I see the relevance.”
“I’m not sure I do either,” I drawled, “but Miss Cardh has a fondness for asking about everything. The sooner we answer, the sooner we can both return to our own research.”
Isa glared at me, and I could not tell if it was an act or if she thought I meant my words and she was truly angry. “You’re the one who made it so that I am required to do everything in my power to break the curse. I can’t break the curse if I don’t understand anything going on in this castle.” Her attention shifted to Marc. “For your information, the question is relevant because it tells me how familiar you are with the archives. So, I’ll ask again. How long have you worked at Rose Castle?”
“Two years.”
“You found more than one scroll with an heir’s contract. Where were they located in the archives in relation to each other?”
For a half-hour, the questions kept coming. Isa jumped from topic to topic, throwing questions at both of us in a barrage that didn’t leave room for thought. She’d ask Marc one thing, then five questions later, follow up on his answer after seeming to have dismissed it. The secretary was clearly annoyed, but he didn’t appear to be on guard or nervous.
I wondered what Isa had learned, for the answers I heard told me nothing useful. I gave up trying to truth-tell Marc, letting the power slip away.
Then Isa slipped in a question that I almost ignored, it sounded like so many of her earlier, seemingly pointless questions.
“How many scrolls with only one signature have you seen?”
“Five.”
My head snapped up from where I had rested it on my front paws. At the same instant, Marc realized what he had said. He had seen five contracts with a single signature but only shown me two.
I didn’t have to think about it. Magic poured out of me, supplemented by the node, and washed over Marc in a tidal wave of power only I could see. I stood up. “Where are the scrolls you didn’t show me?”
He fought the need to speak, but the magic pressed on him. Finally, through gritted teeth, he answered. “The archives.”
I pulled on the node’s power, pouring more magic into my truth-telling. “Show me where.”
The magic broke, snapping back into me and through me into the node. The backlash sent me reeling, and only Isa’s quick reflexes kept me from tumbling off the desk to the floor.
She caught me in her arms, cradling my body against her chest. In that moment, the pain was worth it. The next, it was nothing compared to the fear that this might be as close as I’d ever come to wrapping her in my arms.
Holding a cat meant nothing to her. She might have prevented me from falling, but her focus was still on the secretary. “Where in the archives, Marc?”
My thoughts cleared a little more, and I revised my assessment. Isa wasn’t focused on the secretary; she was focused on breaking the curse. She was asking the question I should have while I had Marc in my power. But I had given an order instead of asking a question, breaking the magic’s hold. And now, I didn’t think I’d be able to call up any power for the rest of the day at least. My head pounded, and just the thought of trying to look at magic was enough to make me dizzy.
Marc tilted his chin into the air. “I don’t have to tell you. I don’t have to tell either of you. And I won’t.”
I lifted my head from Isa’s arm. “And I don’t have to give you free run of my home or allow you access to the archives. Until you are ready to tell me about the other contracts you found, you will be confined to your room.”
The secretary sneered. “I’m not a child to be punished. Don’t forget, you need me more than I need you. Who will go to Leort if I am locked up? Isa can’t under the terms of her contract.”
Though part of me wanted to remain in Isa’s arms, I extracted myself, stepping back onto the desk. “You just made a trip. Another won’t be needed for more than a week at least. And Berklay will find a way to get a message to me if you don’t show up for your next scheduled meeting.”
“Then I guess we’ll see who lasts the longest.”
Marc stood up, and Isa mirrored his movement. There was an unsettling tension running through her where she stood behind me, as though she was on the verge of flight, holding the motion back through sheer willpower. It distracted me enough that I didn’t respond to Marc before he walked out of my office.
“Quick.” Isa scooped me into her arms once more. “What room do you want him locked up in? He’s going to make a run for it, so we need to summon him to a room now if you don’t want him to leave the castle.”
I didn’t bother to ask how she knew, or insist that I could walk on my own. “Third floor. We’ll use his bedroom.” I consulted my sense of the castle, then braved the pain of looking at the magic around me so I could pluck a single strand. “He’s going to the front door.”
Isa ran. “Can we still summon him once he is out of the castle?”
“So long as he is on the hillside. But I locked the front door. We have a little time.”
She didn’t slow, though her breath came out in gasps by the time she reached the third floor. “Two. Flights. Of stairs. Shouldn’t. Leave me. This. Winded.”
“You sprinted up them while carrying a duke. I think you’re doing fine. Fourth door on the left.”
Isa jogged down the hall to the room, set me on the floor, and stepped inside. I heard her hum as she triggered the summoning spell that allowed a living creature to be pulled through the castle to the summoner’s location. A pity the spell didn’t allow moving people around with the same freedom as furniture. Isa wouldn’t have needed to run up all the stairs, then.
Marc materialized in the middle of the room.
While he bent over, his reaction to the spell similar to Isa’s, she leapt back into the hall and slammed the door shut. I managed to lock the door before my vision went fuzzy. Then black.