35
W e found Giselle stuffing her enchanted bag with the contents of her room. She glared as Maddox and I came through the door.
“What are you doing?” he asked, appalled, as Giselle crammed her box of sewing supplies into her satchel.
“I’m leaving.” She ran a hand through her disheveled hair, loose from its usual braid.
Maddox blocked her as she reached for an ornate candlestick that certainly wasn’t hers. “What? Why?”
Giselle glared, eyes flashing. “I am fed up with serving royalty,” she said. Her acorn pin was missing from her bodice. “Your sister is heartbroken and impossible to reason with and the royals left without me after claiming I was one of the best on the committee. Plus, they’re too idiotic to figure out who is behind all of this. And nobody appreciates my outfits! ”
The seamstress sidestepped Maddox and grabbed a candlestick, snapping it in half with the sheer force of the action, and stuffed the pieces into her bag. I had never seen her so incensed.
“You can’t just pack up and leave,” he sputtered. “You have a job!”
She threw her hands up. “I am a witch , Maddox, what do you expect? We’re used to going where we please, laws and authority be darned! By all means, keep guarding those uptight pricks if you want. I’m leaving and don’t think I’ll miss you just because you have a handsome face!”
Maddox choked. I stepped forward. “Giselle, we just wanted to—”
“I don’t know why you’re still here!” she said, whirling around to me. “If my betrothed asked someone to test me with love charms I’d have left ages ago!”
“Test me with...?” I parted my lips, remembering that she had offered me love charms the first time I met her. “Bennett asked you to do that?”
“They were never real, you know? Every witch knows love magic can only be bottled in a potion.” Giselle snorted. “That idiotic crown prince was already halfway in love with you when I told him you refused them. Then he got that stupid cat for you and I had to play along because he was too spineless to confess. He is dreadful at romance.” Giselle hauled a bolt of lilac silk from the floor with unnecessary violence. “And now look at him! Crawling back to the palace with his father like the spineless, duty-obsessed ninny he is.”
Maddox and I were both rendered speechless. I battled my sudden surge of feelings into submission. There was no use thinking about the past. It didn’t matter that Bennett asked Giselle to test me. It didn’t matter he was smitten with me for so long.
Horsefeathers. It didn’t matter.
A minute passed of Giselle shoveling knick-knacks into her satchel before Maddox regained his voice.
“How are we supposed to deal with Celeste without you?” he demanded, grabbing a porcelain vase of violas before she could get her hands on them.
Giselle’s frown deepened. “What do you need me for? I don’t want anything to do with that woman and I am leaving before she can get her grubby hands on me again.”
“You are the only one familiar with Celeste and her magic,” I said. “What she did to me, she’s going to do to the others who come to her show tomorrow night. We cannot let that happen.”
My words seemed to have the desired effect.
Giselle paused, a corner of an embroidered bedsheet in her hand. “What?”
“The audience will be witches , Giselle.” I tugged the bedsheet out of her grasp. “You said Celeste could return magic as well as take it. The others don’t deserve what you and I went through. And I...I just want to talk to Misty again. ”
“We need you,” Maddox said simply, setting down the vase. “You can show the royals how invaluable you are once you help us stop her.”
Giselle’s lower lip trembled as she straightened. She looked from me to Maddox.
“Fine,” she snapped, dropping her satchel. It landed with a heavy thud. “But only because we’re friends. I’m leaving after this.”
I exhaled and pulled her into a hug. “For the record,” I said, “I appreciate your outfits.”
THE NEXT HOUR WAS DEDICATED to getting rid of Lord Frederick. He had insisted on guarding me himself now that much of the Royal Guard had departed for Delibera, but after half an hour of having him trail behind us in the halls, I told him that Maddox alone was quite enough.
“Besides,” I said, “the rebels are taken care of. They’ll have no reason to come to the opera house again.”
“And you mustn't forget your back, sir,” Maddox piped up from behind him. “If you injure yourself you’ll become a liability if there is danger.”
Lord Frederick begrudgingly left for his room.
“About time,” Maddox grumbled as we descended the staircases. “So how exactly are we going to stop Celeste from taking everyone’s magic? And how do we get Narcissa’s back?”
“You’re lucky you’ve got me,” Giselle said. She had been scribbling notes while we were wandering about trying to lose Lord Frederick. “Celeste’s mother was an herbwitch who specialized in magic removal. Celeste is a charmwitch. Her natural talent is gathering substances, including magic, but I suspect she’s using sickleweed potion in conjunction with her charms and enchantments.”
I furrowed my brow, recalling something Father said. “The potion that removes witch magic?”
“Precisely,” Giselle said. “In the past Celeste kept the magic she had taken within herself. She was the sort of witch child who didn’t need an enchanted object to contain her magic—annoyingly talented. But I doubt she’d be able to handle an auditorium full of magic without one, or without sickleweed potion. Every witch has their limits.” She sighed. “All conjecture of course. We’ll need to scour every nook and cranny to find out what she’s up to.”
That was why the three of us were heading to Celeste’s backstage room. The singer was only in the theatre when there was rehearsal or a show. It was too early for rehearsal, so her room should be deserted.
Sneaking in was the riskiest part of our plan, but after talking in circles for half an hour, I concluded that theft and eavesdropping was our only solution.
That was yet another one of Mother’s lessons. Always be willing to resort to unsavory methods. This time, I couldn’t bring myself to care about what she would think of me using it.
We started the last flight of stairs.
“Maddox, I need you to keep watch when we search her room,” I said.
Maddox quickened his pace, boots squeaking on the marble. “Why does it have to be you two? I can do it. You’re the crown princess, for heaven's sake. And what if Celeste recognizes Giselle?”
“I need you as a guard,” I said. “And Giselle knows charmwitch magic. She’ll know what to look for.”
Maddox didn’t look convinced. “What if you don’t find anything? And what if Celeste barges in when you’re in there? Don’t tell me you’re going to engage in an epic battle of magic like you did last summer. Because you don’t have any.”
“Thank you for the reminder,” I said flatly. The thought of summoning that many animals again made my bones ache. How I managed that was still a mystery, but exploring untapped parts of my magic hadn’t appealed to me in ages .
Giselle blew a breath at Maddox’s paranoid ramblings. “It’ll be a quick search,” she said. “And I highly doubt we’ll need your guarding either.”
I swallowed as the steps ended. My fingers were frozen and shaking, but I steeled myself and marched to the auditorium with Giselle and Maddox.
All that mattered now was Misty. Our last conversation had been a disagreement. Now I knew there were things worse than her choosing Pippin over me. Losing the ability to talk to her was one of them. I had to set things right.
The auditorium was dimly lit, the space infinitely larger without the hustle-bustle of an audience. The velvet curtains were drawn. I would have assumed the space was empty if it weren’t for the occasional racket from the stagehands. Giselle, Maddox, and I slipped up the backstage steps.
Luckily, there were only a few people running errands. Several were repairing the giant painted moon from the beginning of the show. No one looked up at our entrance. I surveyed the space for any possible obstacle.
“There,” Maddox whispered, tilting his head to offstage left.
A dark-haired stagehand loitered before the short hallway we needed to pass. It led to the performers’ rooms. I sucked in a breath when I recognized him. Patrick. He had been at the rebel meetings. It seemed he had managed to escape arrest.
“You two go on. I’ll take care of him,” Maddox said.
I nodded and watched him saunter over to Patrick, leading him away from the hall. Giselle and I crept into the hallway.
“Rehearsal in ten minutes!” someone hollered from the stage .
I cursed. We must have lost track of time upstairs.
“Change of plans. You should hide,” I said to Giselle in a low voice. “If Celeste is here, she can’t recognize you.”
Giselle looked like she was about to protest, but sighed. “I would love to pummel her upside the head,” she grumbled, “but you’re right. Remember, look for sickleweed potion.”
I gritted my teeth, wishing I had been more prepared or more educated in witchcraft.
“What does it look like?” I asked. “Or smell like?”
Giselle pressed her mouth into a grim line. “It smells like the thing you desire most at the moment. Could be food or drink. Even atmosphere and ambiance. I suppose it makes it easier to get down, but it’s nasty magic nonetheless.”
The thing I desired most. What did defeating Celeste smell like?
Giselle wished me luck when we approached Celeste’s red door. “I’ll be here,” she said, disappearing behind a dusty tapestry on the opposite side. She poked her head out after a second, flashing a slip of patterned paper between her fingers. “If anything goes wrong, I’ve got you.”
I didn’t get to ask what the papers were before she disappeared again. Mustering up courage, I approached Celeste’s door and pressed my ear against the wood.
Silence.
But that didn’t mean she wasn’t inside. I took a deep breath and knocked. Talking to her hadn’t been a part of my plan, but I was sure I’d be able to manage if it came to it.
No response came, to my relief. The doorknob turned smoothly in my hand. I stepped inside.
Celeste’s room was a chaotic mess of pastel cushions and elegant furniture. A single lamp illuminated the space. Nothing changed since I had seen it last. Security didn’t seem to be a priority for her. Perhaps no one frequented the performers’ chambers save for Lady Ruan.
I started with the vanity. The tabletop was crowded with bottles of various shapes and sizes.
My eyes drew to a large, diamond-shaped container made of a multicolored crystal on the top shelf. Empty. I uncapped an oblong vial next to it instead and sniffed. Rosewater. A yellow orb encrusted with citrine crystals smelled of hair tonic. The clear cube beside it was a strong lilac perfume.
The back of my throat was burning by the time I went through a third of the containers. I coughed into my arm, eyes watering as I reached for a small lavender spray bottle. There was a row of them in the back, all identical. I inhaled. My fingers tingled with warmth when I recognized the scent.
Cedar and spices.
I peeked into the vial, as if the clear liquid would tell me something. There was barely enough to cover the bottom. I closed my eyes and gave it another whiff, inhaling deeper this time. Ghostly arms twined around my waist, holding me against a strong chest.
I opened my eyes. The sensation faded. What was Celeste doing with Bennett’s fragrance? I stilled as I watched the lamplight flicker off the lavender bottle. The narrow body. The amethyst studded cap. Celeste had brought it with her the night I lost my magic. It wasn’t fragrance.
It was her throat spray.
I capped it and stuffed it into my pocket, although a part of me longed to keep smelling it. Had Celeste somehow reformulated her mother’s sickleweed potion into something that expelled outward instead of taking her own magic? My mind raced. I wasn’t familiar with all the possibilities of witch magic, but it only made sense. I was halfway out of the room when I realized what it meant.
The thing I desired most at the moment was Bennett.
My heart jumped treacherously at the thought of him. I turned back into the room.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I muttered to myself. This wasn’t some romance novel where the female lead does little else but yearn endlessly for her lost love. Perhaps cedar was popular among throat spray formulators .
There had to be something else hiding in the rest of Celeste’s lotions and sprays. I would know what the scent of defeating Celeste smelled like once it presented itself.
I was about to uncap an aquamarine bottle when footsteps came from down the hall. I cursed, hastily putting it back. From the sliver of space between the door and doorframe, I spotted Celeste in deep conversation with someone.
The hallway was shadowy enough. Without a moment’s hesitation, I slipped outside and ducked beneath Giselle’s tapestry before Celeste could turn.
Giselle gave me a wide-eyed stare, which I returned. There was no chance of moving now. Hopefully, Celeste wouldn’t notice how lumpy the tapestry was.
The footsteps drew closer.
“You’ve made a very dangerous decision coming back here,” the singer said. She had dropped her sugary sweet act, opting for a lower, menacing tone.
“I’m dedicated to this cause as much as you are.”
I stiffened at the sound of Dominic’s voice. What was he doing here? He should be on his way to Delibera.
“Touching,” Celeste said airily. “Aren’t you afraid of the guards seeing you?”
“They have no reason to seek me out when they think I’m detained,” Dominic said.
“What do you want? Rehearsal is starting soon.”
“Nothing from you. I have unfinished business.”
“Not with Lady Narcissa, I hope.” Celeste scoffed after a moment of silence. “She is a witch, Dominic. I don’t understand why you can’t get that into your thick head.”
“She was a witch. Now she’s perfectly normal,” came his reply .
I trembled. Giselle squeezed my hand.
“Thanks to me.” The door opened, then shut. I strained to hear, but their voices were muffled by the thick tapestry, and now a wall. This was too good of an opportunity to pass up. I stepped out.
“Narcissa, what are you doing?” Giselle hissed.
“Eavesdropping,” I mouthed back. “Stay.”
She frowned and made a series of hand motions and faces I barely understood before ducking back into her hiding place.
I pressed my ear to the door, my muscles tense.
“...have made some minor adjustments to the enchantment. The way she reacted was far too violent. We can’t have all the witches in the audience keel over in pain tomorrow night, now can we?”
The clinking of glass ensued. Celeste was rifling through her vanity. The spray bottle I had taken weighed heavily in my pocket despite being nearly empty. Would she notice its absence?
“And you’re sure no one will suspect you?” Dominic demanded.
“I’ve perfected this enchantment. It’ll be nearly undetectable to even the most skilled of witches,” Celeste said smugly. “Besides, even if someone does find out, there’s nothing they can do about it. With sickleweed potion alone, a witch’s magic disperses, never to be seen again. But with my reformulation and enchantment, I alone will be able to contain it. And I never intend to give it back.”
“Then what? Are you going to take all that magic for yourself?”
The clinking stopped as Celeste laughed. “Of course not. That’s impossible. ”
“I don’t understand,” Dominic said. “Why are you doing this unless you want power?”
Light footsteps sounded. “Such a handsome face,” Celeste crooned. “Too bad you don’t have any brains to go with it.”
Dominic made a strangled noise. “Answer the question. The rioters are loyal to you, despite knowing what you are. You spent months building their trust, yet you have no qualms with the royals and no desire for power. What is your purpose, Celeste? You’ve shared everything with me except this.”
I held my breath. Celeste was the mysterious witch mistress.
“Is it not enough to know I have no intention of harming your plans?”
“No.”
Celeste scoffed. “Very well. It’s a personal matter,” she said. “I want all those lowlifes in Witch Village to pay. They treated my mother’s magic as a curse and mine as a menace. I want to drive them out of Olderea like they drove me out of the village, to take their magic and hold it in my hands. I have no intention of giving it back, of course. Witches are nothing without their magic. This is for justice, Dominic. For me. For my mother. Are you satisfied?”
“What are you going to do after you strip the witches of their magic? You’re not going to stay, are you?” The disgust in his voice was evident, though I doubted it was a reaction to her unscrupulous actions.
She scoffed. “Are you so prejudiced as to exterminate every witch from the kingdom? Even me?”
“Our partnership is temporary,” Dominic said stiffly. “If you are convicted, my father will give you safe passage out of Olderea. That is all. I owe you nothing. ”
“Of course not.” I thought I detected a hint of disappointment in her voice. The clinking of bottles resumed. “Go then, to your unfinished business.”
Footsteps grew close. I turned to hide, but the door swung open.