14
Oona brings me back to my room after the rite, after the queen compels me to shift back to human in front of everyone. The young maid won’t speak to me, or even look at me, and her steps sound as uneven as her pulse. Even her scent has been tinged rotten. Fear , I realize. Fear smells… bad.
“I-I’m sorry,” I stutter awkwardly when we reach my door, a borrowed chemise soaking wet and sticking to my skin.
The purple dress is gone. It exploded into rags the moment I turned into a wolf while wearing it, though the court—the wolves—don’t seem to mind nudity.
Several transformed back into their human bodies and continued about their evening without bothering to don another set of clothing.
I turn to Oona. “About earlier, I didn’t know— don’t know anything.
I would never have compelled you otherwise. ”
Oona’s response is a sharp intake of breath. A suffocating scent of daisies. Her scent , I think. She smells like herself now.
She glances up with a widened gaze, though it narrows as she watches me. “Most people don’t speak with such honesty in this court. It’s a surefire way to expose one’s weaknesses.”
She’s right. I should stop speaking. I listen to the drip drip drip of water leaking from my dress onto the ground, however, and smell the floral scent of a maid who I almost forced to burn down her home.
I am not myself anymore. As much as it pains me to be this…
this creature … I don’t want it to ruin what remains of my humanity.
Oona has done no wrong. She was not at the beach. She is not nobility. She is not a threat in any way; there is no reason not to be kind to her. So, I am. “I’m kind of a walking weakness right now,” I admit quietly. “But I shouldn’t have let myself get so wrapped up in my emotions.”
She sighs and swears under her breath. “Come on, girl.” She yanks me into the room, slamming the door behind us. “You need to be made aware of some things right now. Go sit on your bed.”
I follow the instructions, if only because she doesn’t force me to obey.
She grabs a silver comb from my half-scorched vanity and a white ribbon, then sits beside me and begins brushing through my damp locks.
“Your eyes have made you a target of this court. Purple eyes have never been part of the hierarchy before. Regents have black eyes; Alphas have red eyes, gold for Betas,” she says, tugging viciously through a knot.
“Brown for Deltas, like mine.” She turns my head so I can look into her eyes.
“And Omegas are gray eyed. Like a stormy sea. But you really don’t need to worry about them; they do not exist within nobility due to their innate weakness. ”
Stunned speechless at her generosity, I can’t do much else besides gape. She begins to plait my hair into two French braids, pulling waves loose as she goes.
“What about…”
“Yes?” she asks. “You have this one opportunity to learn what you must before they bring you into their lessons. So ask it.”
“The girl at the lagoon… Lyra… Her eyes were blue.”
“The Oracle,” Oona says. “There are seven made every few centuries, and they are created under very special circumstances. Lyra was found as a pup—freshly changed at the age of twelve like most Born werewolves—rooting through a dumpster in New York. The Lone Wolf who discovered her meant to eat the girl. They’re rabid, horrid monsters, but they never last long.
This one in particular tore into Lyra like a fisherman gutting its catch, and promptly left the rest of her to rot when it found something better to hunt.
She died that night, beneath the moonlight, but then…
something happened. Something took hold of her.
And when she woke, it was with blue eyes and a head full of conviction.
She journeyed here, throwing herself at the mercy of Queen Sybil.
She knew things, you see. She heard whispers from the stars.
They saved her. Brought her back to life to be their messenger. ”
The story sweeps through my belly like a sickness, and I swallow roughly. “Why would the stars need a messenger?”
“Why are children demanding of their dolls? Because we all want control, dear, especially over those beneath us.”
Three candles flicker on my dresser, their wax melting onto the stems of a golden candelabra. Our shadows dance along the blackened wall, though the ash and smoke and wardrobe have been cleared. In its place is a coat rack, a single purple dress hanging from a swirling branch.
“Thank you for the new dress,” I say.
“You shouldn’t be wandering around in a chemise during lessons, but there wasn’t much else made in your size.
The queen will commission more, of course, but they won’t be here until your room is modified to your precise desires.
” Spying my confusion, Oona elaborates. “The nobility who live here design their rooms with the help of, well, us .” She releases my hair for a moment to tug on her apron.
“It is an honor to live within one of the seven palaces. Queen Sybil has requested that you be treated no differently than the rest of her court.”
An honor. I almost laugh.
“Unless,” she says, “you would like a red gown—”
“No,” I hurry to say. “No, thank you.”
Oona nods, tying little bows at the bottom of my braids. “There. Not so much a bird’s nest anymore.” She stands up to leave, but I catch her wrist.
“Lyra called me something. She said—”
“Truthseer,” Oona finishes with a nod. “Nobility are gifted with blessings from the stars under which they’re born, thanks to Castle Severi’s enchanted moon pool—it’s one of the reasons Ascension is so often held within our quarters.
All royals travel here to complete their First Rite.
Queen Sybil… She blessed you by allowing you to do the same, rather than forcing you to have your rite at the ocean’s banks in the human realm, as the lesser packs outside our walls do.
“Your gift has revealed itself to be that of observation. Not exactly an uncommon trait, but then again, most traits are born from those that already exist within the werewolf.”
I shake my head, not quite understanding, and she smiles. A sweet, gentle little grin. “You will know when someone is lying, Vanessa Hart. You have been gifted divine intuition.”
I nibble on my bottom lip until she stops me. “But… how ?”
Leaning against a dresser, Oona pushes her serpentine curls behind her ears. “Ask me my favorite color.”
My brows furrow. “Um, okay. What’s your favorite color?”
“Yellow,” she says confidently.
But my chest—something in my chest flares like a meteor burning through the atmosphere. It doesn’t fit. It’s wrong .
Lie , my mind—my gut—whispers. She’s lying.
I stare at her, and her smile widens. “You can tell, can’t you?”
“I—I think so.”
“My favorite color is blue,” she says next.
Another strike of heat between my ribs. “Wrong.”
“Green.”
More heat. A swallowed flame. “Liar.”
Her eyes scrunch, and her grin stretches. Oona tilts her head, and a pretty lock of hair dances over her mischievous gaze. “Now ask me if I set fire to your room.”
I snort at that. Obviously, there’s no need for confirmation, but I ask her regardless. Her answer, however, is less straightforward this time.
“It was not I that set fire to your room,” she says. A lie. And I know it’s a lie because I watched it happen, but… I feel it. Not a flare of wrongness or the searing of a lie, but an explosion of warmth, of comfort, of home .
“How are you telling the truth right now?” I ask quietly.
“How do you think, girl?”
I rack my brain for an answer. How could she bypass a gift from the divine? “You’re… twisting your words somehow. You’re insinuating that I set the fire.”
“Close.” She flicks a finger against her nose with a secretive wink.
“But the exact manipulation does not matter so much as the act of being manipulated. I was thinking that the torch set the fire, and thus, I did not lie to you. Superior gifts… They are not so simple as unwrapping a present and donning your new scarf. They can be tricked. They can be outwitted. Often, they can even be cursed. Be smart about your intuition. Listen to all—not just what you wish to hear.”
And finally, she says, “Pink.” And though I can hear her heart rate slow and her breathing spin into an easy, soothing rhythm, I can also feel the honesty in the words. The truth settles in my chest, curling up like a cat atop a blanket.
“Pink is your favorite color,” I say.
“Yes.” She tugs her loose curls. “But my mother always told me I look hideous in the color, which, truth be told—and I suppose it must be told with you around—I think that only made me like it more.”
I smile at her. My first smile in days. I think about leaping up and throwing my arms around her too. I don’t care that she’s a wolf; I want to hug her. I want to call her my friend.
She seems to notice this and rolls her eyes, though her own smile doesn’t fade either.
“Your talent will come to protect you, Vanessa, so long as you understand how to use it.” She turns toward the door.
“Tomorrow, one of your peers will fetch you for class. It’s in the south bastion of the castle.
The instructors won’t expect much of you on your first day, but rest. Keep your wits about you.
This court…” She lowers her voice to a breath of a whisper.
“Werewolves are close. Our strength lies in our numbers. But nobility aren’t like the majority of wolves—they are constantly warring for more.
For power . Keep your cards close to your chest. Reveal them to no one.
You have been outed as a weapon tonight, and they will either want to use you… or destroy you.”
Oona exits with an ominous click of the door, and I pull my knees into my chest. Bury myself under a thick, wool blanket.
Truthseer.
Untested potential.
I have the power to compel most others, and the power to know when they’re lying.
The gifts couldn’t be more applicable, but…
right now they feel like a burden. I’m not sure I’m clever enough to outwit this court or understand their tricks.
And I’m certainly not trained enough to win in hand-to-hand—or fang-to-fang—combat.
Even if I sense a lie, what am I going to do with that information?
I lay my head onto a tall pile of pillows, but they feel wrong. Too soft. Too luxurious. A tangible display of how much the court has done for me when all they want is whatever I am—whatever my abilities will provide them.
I slide to the floor, abandoning the blanket on the bed. I would rather sleep curled up on the rug than betray Celeste—betray myself —by playing their games. I don’t need their wardrobes of clothes or their mountains of pillows.
“I love it here,” I whisper.
Another flare shoots through me, red hot and wrong. Lie.
“This has been a gift. The court is wonderful.”
Lie. Lie.
“I never want to leave.”
Lie.
I watch the moon sink lower and lower as the night wears on through the stained-glass window and the snake silhouettes begin to devour the rose first and then each other.
Tomorrow, I’ll be surrounded by my peers for the first time.
So I won’t fight. I’ll be calm. Stoic. Let them fear me. Let them wonder what I’ll do next.
But I’ll listen. I’ll observe. And if one of them outs themselves as the killer, I will lie in wait until I’m ready. And then I will attack.
After hours, I drift to sleep thinking of murder. Once more, I dream of death.
When I wake, I am covered in blood.