Chapter Eleven #2
Thaddeus was hardly her first fiancé to have a similar arrangement, and it wasn’t lost on Mavis that the mistresses were almost always Lack blooded—good enough to bed, but never to wed. In fact, the only mark thus far who she knew for certain hadn’t had a mistress when he proposed to her was Arden.
Mavis forced her mind back to the con with Thaddeus. “It’s no matter—there are other ways to convince a man to end things.”
“Chewing with your mouth open?” Leif suggested.
“That snorting laugh you do has worked a charm,” Rafe added.
Mavis smiled. The second phase of the con was always her favorite. “All that and more.”
“Ready to sign?” Rafe asked when she finished.
Mavis sighed, setting her coffee down on the table and making her way around to where Rafe stood, holding the heavy golden fountain pen out to her as if it were a poisonous snake—which wasn’t far from the truth.
The first time she’d signed a Luster contract, she’d been unprepared for the jab of pain when she made the final clumsy flourish of her made-up name, dropping the pen on the table with a clatter and closing her hand tight against the wound it made on her palm.
She’d known about the betrothal custom, of course, but she hadn’t expected it to hurt.
As Leif had explained, the pens were created using the combined magic of metal and poison workers to serve one purpose.
When a contract was signed, the signees’ palms were pricked with a poisoned needle to ensure that the terms of the contract would be fulfilled.
There was a long history behind the use of the pens, which Leif had eagerly recounted but Mavis hadn’t paid attention to, too fascinated by the indigo ink that stained her palm in just a few short minutes—one her betrothed would have a mirror of.
It would disappear when the contract was dissolved, but until then it would be there, a reminder of her commitment.
Now, she braced herself as she took the fountain pen from Rafe and pressed the gold tip to the paper, where she was supposed to sign.
It was best to do it quickly and get it over with, so she signed Delphinia with all the flourishes and curlicues she never used when signing her true name, and before she could lift the pen from the paper, it struck, and Mavis sucked in a breath.
When she looked at her palm, a bead of red bloomed at the center, and when she took the gauze Leif held out to her and dabbed it away, she saw the small indigo blot, just the size of a pea.
Tomorrow it would be ever so slightly larger, and the day after that, and the day after that until the contract was fulfilled in one way or another.
The longest it had taken her to finish a con was two months, with Arden, and by the time he finally signed the document to break the engagement, the mark was almost large enough to cover her palm entirely.
Should she try to run before the contract was fulfilled, apparently the stain would spread to cover her body and turn deep red, the drop of poison the pen injected turning lethal.
That last bit was only a rumor—one Mavis had a difficult time believing, though she had never risked putting it to the test.
“Now the fun begins.” Rafe’s voice drew her attention to him. “Should we take bets on how much more you can wring out of Mayles before he breaks it off?”
“You always suggest that, and you always lose,” Leif pointed out, earning a glare from Rafe.
“I’ll have to pace myself this time around,” Mavis reminded them, still staring at the indigo dot. “No doubt it’ll take Arden longer to convince Oriana to marry him than it will for me to convince Thaddeus not to marry me.”
Neither brother responded, but when Mavis glanced up, she caught them exchanging a look. “We agreed, didn’t we?”
Leif offered an apologetic smile. “We did, but the longer we stay, the more dangerous it is.”
“Believe me, I’m every bit as eager to get this done as you are, but two million solas is worth a little risk.
” It was difficult to say that number out loud without feeling a thrill race through her, and she could tell Rafe and Leif weren’t unaffected either.
She cleared her throat. “I’ve been thinking about that, about what I might do with my cut when all is said and done. ”
Before she finished speaking, Rafe was already shaking his head. “Let’s not count our money before the check clears, Magpie.”
He had a point, but since she first thought about using the money to pay off the contracts for the other urchins, she hadn’t been able to let go of the idea. Her cut would cover a few of the urchins, but there were so many. If Rafe and Leif joined her . . .
“I’m going to buy out as many of the urchins’ contracts as I can,” she told them. “And I’d like help freeing more of them.”
A surprised silence followed the proclamation.
Rafe grimaced. “Minstead won’t like that.”
“Who cares? By then we’ll be free of him.”
“All the more reason not to put a target on your back,” Leif said. “Or the backs of any urchins you try to help.”
“I’ve seen how he handles anyone who crosses him, Mavis,” Rafe added. “Besides, for every urchin you might help, he’ll enlist three more to his collection.”
“And what about the urchins you do free? It’ll only be a matter of time before they’re desperate enough to sign another contract with him. You’d be wasting your money,” Leif warned.
Mavis’s stomach soured, and she pushed the dregs of her coffee away.
“It’s only an idea.” She’d hoped they would help her shape it rather than crush it, but all their points were valid ones.
“All I know is that buying our freedom won’t be enough.
Not for me, and I don’t think it will be enough for the two of you either. ”
The Hartweiller brothers exchanged another of those loaded looks before Rafe cleared his throat. “I don’t see the point in discussing imaginary money when there is a very real twenty thousand at stake. I’d rather focus on that.”