Chapter 3
Cate
Harold’s dire warning is all I can think about for the several days that follow.
Even the official word of the monarchs’ surrender isn’t enough to distract me.
What will happen to Andra and me if the club is forced to close?
What will happen to Meri and Tes, the rest of the girls, Gifted and not, who call La Puissance home?
In many ways, living in the club has kept us sheltered.
Our location in Stratford City, the center of Avon, has kept us from having to endure the horrors of most of the fighting during the Uprising, as most of the violence was focused on the monarchs.
Living here has also kept us insulated from extreme enforcement of the laws against the Gifted.
While none of the monarchs can claim kindness toward their Gifted populations, Scota has at least stopped the senseless murders encouraged in some of the other provinces, and they don’t kill the pregnant Gifted like they do in Talia and Venezia.
If the club closes and we are forced to return to our birthplaces, what will that mean for the girls from the more dangerous provinces?
Despite the Uprising’s victory and the promise to restore our rights, these things take time, and we will not be afforded protections overnight. Neither will prejudices long held magically disappear.
I’m so lost in my thoughts, wallowing in the possible scenarios and their implications, I don’t see Bianca rush into the kitchen, where I’ve been too busy thinking to eat much of my breakfast, my tea and toast already gone cold.
“Cate, come quickly. It’s Andra.” Fear lines Bianca’s green eyes, and she doesn’t need to elaborate or ask twice.
I’m out the door before she’s finished her sentence, racing up the creaking wooden back stairs to the room next to mine. I shove through the door and find my twin sister curled up in a tight ball on the chaise longue, rocking so violently I’m surprised she hasn’t fallen to the floor.
“Cool water and a towel,” I command Bianca, grasping one of Andra’s chilled hands in mine. “It’s okay, I’m here. I’m right here.” I whisper soothing platitudes, smoothing back her sweat-soaked hair from her sticky forehead.
Bianca hands me the requested items, then bolts from the room. She knows what’s coming and doesn’t want any part of it. She also knows enough to keep anyone else from entering the room.
Dabbing Andra’s clammy skin with the damp towel, I continue to whisper. “I’m here. You can let it out now. I’m here.”
Her grip on my hand tightens, and when her mouth opens, it’s not my sister’s voice that rings out.
Her words are guttural and ragged, several octaves deeper than her usual tinkling pitch.
“Things bad begun make strong themselves by ill. What’s done cannot be undone.
Foul whisperings are abroad. Unnatural deeds do breed unnatural troubles.
” Andra’s body spasms, her limbs releasing their tight grip as she collapses flat on her back on the chaise.
“Shhhh, shhhh. You’re all right.” I dip the towel in the cool water once more, wringing out the excess before placing it on her forehead.
Her chest heaves with stilted breaths for several minutes before returning to its natural rhythm. Her eyes remain closed, but her voice returns to normal, though her words come out in the barest of whispers. “What did I say?”
I hand her a glass of water. “Nothing that made any sense.”
She opens her eyes so she can take small sips from the cup until she is able to pull herself into a seated position. “Nothing has made any sense lately. Not since…”
I wait for her to finish her thought, but when she doesn’t, I don’t push her.
Not all of Andra’s visions are as violent as this one, but lately they have been more and more unpredictable in both nature and outcome, like her command over her Sight is slipping.
She hasn’t had Sightings like this since we were kids, back before she knew how to control and harness her Gift. The whole thing turns my stomach.
“I miss Diana,” she says softly, and I squeeze her hand gently.
What I wouldn’t do for a bit of Diana’s insight and wisdom in these moments.
Andra hesitates, sitting up cautiously, her mouth opening like she has more to say but doesn’t want to say it.
I sit next to her on the chaise, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“It’s the same vision every time, Cate.” Her voice is heavy with worry, so unlike the bright chatter I’m used to hearing from her.
Fear stirs in my belly. “What did you See?”
“Blood. And a dagger.” She swallows thickly. “And Harold.”
That fears grips me from the inside out. “Harold is going to die?”
She shakes her head. “He’s wearing a crown.”
My brow furrows because it doesn’t make any sense. Harold isn’t royalty, but even if he were, the monarchs have just been overthrown. No one will be wearing a crown from this point on.
A quiet knock taps on the door and after a beat, Bianca’s head pokes into the room, her red curls a cloud around her face, pale with worry. “I’m sorry, I know this is bad timing, but Harold is requesting we all join him in the main salon.”
Andra and I exchange a heavy look. Harold doesn’t gather us all together unless there is some kind of major situation.
Given the dire warnings that just spewed forth from Andra’s vision, combined with what I know about the state of the club, I don’t know that I want to hear what Harold has to say, don’t know that any of us are ready for even more upheaval.
Bianca joins us at the chaise, taking one of Andra’s hands in hers. “Nothing physically wrong with you, then,” she declares once her healer’s Gift has managed a full assessment.
“Come on.” I rise, pulling Andra to standing next to me, and paste on a wide smile. We are the same height, the same coloring, though Andra has always been lanky where I am nothing but curves. “Let’s go see what the big fuss is.” I inject my voice with a levity none of us feels.
The main salon is already crowded with people when we arrive.
Many have congregated on the stage, and just as many clutter the small café tables circled around it, where each night our patrons await our dazzling performances.
A few are perched on the balconies that rim the room, leaning over the tarnished gold railings.
It’s early enough in the day that we all wear our casual clothes—cotton dresses and linen tunics and plain trousers—enjoying the comfort before we don our intricate and bold, and sometimes restricting, costumes for the evening.
The main hall of La Puissance is vast, and in the nighttime hours teeming with people and booze and music.
I’ve always loved it during the day, when our voices echo around the empty space, when the natural light shines through the skylights.
The stage is the focal point of the main salon, framed by heavy, mottled crimson curtains and lined with gas-powered flames that have caught more than one frilly skirt on fire. Wide enough to hold a chorus of twenty girls, today it looks like a gaping maw, dark and empty and vast.
Bianca, Andra, and I find an empty table and slide into the waiting seats.
It looks like every member of the club, from performers to bartenders to musicians, has gathered.
As my eyes take in the group—people from every province, a vast array of skin tones and accents, as many Gifted as permitted, even more with no Gifts to speak of—something fierce and protective surges through me.
Things might look bleak, but I know there is nothing that can tear this group, this family, apart.
Meri, Tes, Rosa, and Helen find seats at the table next to us, and from the tense smiles we exchange, I can tell none of us knows what to expect.
A hush falls over the room as Harold enters. He’s dressed in his finest tuxedo, the one he normally wears only when important patrons are dining in his box at the club, complete with top hat and his fanciest cane. And he’s not alone.
A tall woman, hair as dark as the ebony keys of the piano, eyes a bright amber, accompanies Harold as he strides confidently into the room.
Her face is stoic and not a single hint of emotion shows as she takes in the room, takes in the group of us waiting.
Her long black dress is as severe as her features, her corset tight, fabric covering her from the top of her neck down to the tips of her fingers.
Never has a woman looked so thoroughly out of place in La Puissance.
Harold claps his hands together for silence, though the buzz and chatter ceased immediately when he entered.
“Friends, my darlings, thank you all for being here this lovely afternoon.” A wide smile breaks across his face and with it, a sense of ease spreads through the room.
If Harold is beaming like this, whatever news he has to tell us cannot be bad.
At first, I relax with the rest of the crew, but when I take in Andra’s face, something leaden drops in my stomach.
She looks as though she’s seen a ghost; what little color was left in her cheeks after her vision has been drained away.
I reach for her hand and her ice-cold fingers squeeze mine in a silent warning.
“I know this may come as a surprise to some of you.” Harold’s eyes find mine but flit away before I can latch on.
“But I have been feeling lonely for some time now, wondering when or even if I might ever find that perfect person with whom I wanted to spend the rest of my life.” Harold reaches back, joining his hand with the woman’s.
She doesn’t smile. “And I’m delighted to announce I have found that woman. And we have been married.”
An audible gasp echoes around the room with his pronouncement. Andra’s fingers are holding mine so tightly I fear I might lose circulation in my hand. My hand automatically drifts to the dagger at my thigh, not sure what the threat she senses is, but wanting to be ready for it.
“My dearest darlings, it is with greatest pleasure that I introduce you to my new wife, the Lady MacVeigh.” Harold says the words with such a flourish that applause breaks out, leading to raucous cheers and cries of congratulations.
Those around us leap out of their seats, rushing to grant hugs and handshakes to the new happy couple. No one at my table moves, Bianca having sensed that something has gone seriously wrong.
“Look the innocent flower but the serpent under it,” Andra whispers to no one in particular.
My eyes turn from my sister back to the front of the room, where Harold and his new bride have begun to distribute glasses of champagne. I find Lady M’s eyes easily as she is staring right at me.
No. It’s not me her eyes are locked on. It’s my sister.
Andra’s face goes an even starker white and she sucks in a sharp breath.
Lady M’s eyes drift from Andra to me. Her expression morphs quickly, hiding her shock with a smirk so devastating it chills my blood.