Chapter 7
The next morning, my closet presented me with a dilemma.
My family wears black to funerals, like most. But a blooded Morton adds a stroke of red: a scarlet tie, a sprig of azaleas, the cardinal feather in Uncle Orrin’s hat.
It seemed disrespectful to wear all black today—as if Peter didn’t count. I’d had a necklace picked out since I was twelve years old.
But Grandmother’s order of secrecy stood. If rubies flashed at my throat, everyone would know in an instant what I’d done.
It felt strange lying to them, even by omission.
I needed clarification.
Before Faraday woke up, I walked through the morning mist to the Great House, let myself in the back door, and climbed the servants’ stairs behind the kitchen. I skipped the squeaky steps and took care not to disturb the spiderwebs.
Outside the door was a tray of dirty dishes and a covered bedpan. I knocked and went in.
Mother was awake. Mother was always awake. She was propped on a stack of pillows, holding a book and a pencil for scribbling in the margins.
She didn’t look up, just said, “There you are,” as if she’d found me hiding behind the settee.
“Good morning, Mother.” Hunched by the slanted attic ceiling, I couldn’t really bow.
“It’s warmer today,” she said, and twirled her pencil at the window.
I went to crank it open, stepping my way across piles of papers and books. Mother had always been messy for a Morton. As her sickness had settled in, so had her bad habits.
A cold breeze coiled through the attic window, stirring the papers, the dust, the spiderwebs. It was not warmer today.
“Cyrus told me about your misstep,” she said. “You’re lucky it was Helshire. The FBI wouldn’t have missed that. Even a half-decent local detective might’ve noticed.”
“Peter sometimes carried loose chalk in his pockets.”
“Which would leave residue in those pockets, would it not?”
I didn’t respond. I’d already spent last night going over all the ways the police—or the always curious Lindqvists—might still catch my error.
My silence seemed to placate Mother. She finally looked up from her book and smiled. “Aunt Jessica.”
Pleasure rolled through me: I was blooded, though no one else would call me that yet.
“Cyrus told me there was a vote,” I said. “How does that work?”
“Grandmother chooses her counselors. Four of us.”
That was all I was getting: a logic game. Mother, Cyrus—I’d have to figure out the other two.
“Why cull him in secret?”
She looked out the window. “This is a delicate time. You’re aware of the Belmonts’ recent troubles?”
I nodded—a warehouse fire, a car accident, missing money. My classmate Caroline Belmont had taken emergency leave from Helshire.
“When bad luck comes in threes…” my mother began.
“Look for a deeper reason,” I said. “Still, stochastic flukes happen.”
She scoffed. The Belmonts were an old shipping family we’d incorporated four generations ago. If they were being attacked, my family was the ultimate target.
“The Lindqvists?” I asked.
“Our old enemies.”
I didn’t argue. Mother’s views on the Lindqvists were antiquated. The last open feud between our families had ended more than a hundred years ago. “What does that have to do with Peter?”
“Take a guess.”
A silence stretched out. Lying in bed for twelve years had taught my mother infinite patience.
Her sickness doesn’t have a name. Other Mortons had fallen ill the same way—a great-granduncle in the 1990s, three sisters during the Great Depression. One day, we’re spinning power from blood, the next morning we can’t get up.
Mother’s illness struck when I was eight, two weeks after my mors curae, as if she’d been waiting until I was on the right path. There were so few Mortons in my generation, which was why Peter had been given so many chances.
“He played with matches,” I said.
“Go on.”
“If you’re worried about a conflict with the Lindqvists, Peter was a source of instability.”
“Ever since Uncle Max,” she said, almost too soft to hear. My mother hadn’t mentioned Cyrus’s brother in years. None of us ever said his name. “We need to steady the ship.”
“But why in secret? Culling weakness shows strength. Especially because it was me—Peter was my little shadow.”
“And you are loyal without care.” My mother’s smile spread to her eyes. “My little girl who never screamed at night. Who had to learn how to cry. Who is proud of being blooded on her own cousin.”
Most first assignments are strangers, not close family. Even homegrown killers know to begin with insects, wild animals, pets. Start small, then escalate.
I had not started small.
“A prodigy,” my mother said. “But a hidden one, for now. If we face another conflict with the Lindqvists, it’s important that the other families come together, keeping to the old traditions.”
That’s when I saw it. “You needed a funeral.”
She nodded. Culling was normally a quiet affair, but after this tragic accident, a contingent of Seths had flown here from London, Wolvaardts all the way from South Africa. Three of the four families in a show of solidarity.
This was why, after Peter’s many years of failure, they’d chosen to cull him now.
“You’ll wear red soon enough, Aunt Jessica.”
“Thank you, Mother,” I said.
She sank back into the pillows, her smile fading by degrees, as if controlled by a dial. “On the dresser.”
By the attic door was an old oak dresser, full of the clothes my mother no longer wore. On top lay a folded silk jacket, very black, very formal.
I picked it up. The lining was deep blood red.
When I slipped the jacket on, it fit perfectly.
“Yes,” I said. “This will do very well.”