“Too tight?” Zoé asked around the silver pins she had stuck between her lips. I realized I’d been frowning, and forced my face to relax and shook my head. She went back to work and I went back to my thoughts.
Marc was the most obvious person to ask, but he would want to know why, and I had no confidence that he wouldn’t tell Tristan. Same with the twins. As much as they might like me, they were his kin, his closest friends, and they were fervently loyal to him. I glanced down at Zoé and élise, their faces terse with concentration as they worked. They were my friends, but again, their loyalty was unquestionably to Tristan. There was no way they’d hand over something that might possibly be used against him, and besides, I had no way of knowing how their half-human blood would affect the spells. So that ruled out Tips and his gang as well.
All possible paths, it seemed, led back to Tristan. He was the only one I could ask, but I had a sinking feeling that that conversation wouldn’t go well. He liked being in control of circumstances, and I was already something of a loose cannon running amok with his plans. He would not like giving me more power than I already had. He didn’t trust me enough. He’d take the grimoire away from me, and with it, the only real leverage I had.
I sighed as deeply as I could in the tight dress. If only he would give me a chance to prove I was trustworthy and loyal, then maybe he would believe that I sought to harness Anushka’s spells to help him, not to hurt him. I needed him to understand that he was the last person in the world that I would hurt; that I would do whatever it took to help him. That I… I bit my lip and forced the thought away. He didn’t need to know that.
Clapping a hand over my mouth, I faked a yawn, then directed an apologetic look at my maids. “I think I’m about done for the night,” I said. “I’d like to get ready for bed.”
Once they had left me alone in my room, I crept out and retrieved the grimoire from the garderobe. The cover of the book felt vile and sinister in the darkness, and it was a relief to crawl back into bed and turn my light on. I made a tent of my blankets – in case anyone was watching – then I opened the book and flipped to the back. I slowly made my way through the pages, my mouth moving as I memorized the foreign words. It was easy enough for me – I was used to memorizing opera lyrics in other languages.
It was beginning to feel like fate that the librarian had found it for me; that after five hundred years, I’d been the one to open it. Maybe Tristan was right, and we shouldn’t break the curse. But that didn’t mean the knowledge that I could extract from Anushka’s writing was useless. There had to be a way I could use it against the King. But first I needed to convince Tristan to help me, and to do that, I needed to lure him in. I glanced across the room at the shadowy form of an altered dress hanging on the closet door.
Maybe, I thought, just maybe, that might work.
CHAPTER 21
CéCILE
“Well, you did a fine job of provoking him.”
The sound of Tristan’s voice pulled me out of deep sleep. Even after I’d hidden the grimoire away, I’d stayed up late trying to think of ways to get Tristan alone. And here he was. I rubbed the sleep from my eyes, blinking at the brilliance of his light, which hovered over the bed. I briefly wondered how long he’d been standing there watching me sleep. “Don’t blame me. He was angry before I even got there. Where have you been all night?”
“If anyone asks, tell them I was here sleeping,” he replied, turning away from me.
“I know the routine,” I said. “It’s just I don’t think there’s any point to it. He knows you’re avoiding me. I think he thinks you’re letting your dislike of humans interfere with finding a way to break the curse.”
“That’s better than the alternative.” He studiously avoided looking at me and rifled through papers on the desk, but there was no missing the embarrassment growing in the back of my mind.
“True,” I agreed, although I didn’t understand why the alternative – his father knowing he didn’t want to break the curse – had elicited his embarrassment. I frowned, mentally reviewing his words in my mind. He was acting strangely. I pulled the covers up around my chin and watched him unbuckle the sword at his waist, set it carefully on the desk, and then cross over to the closet. He took off his coat, hanging it carefully on a hanger, and brushed the fabric smooth. He untied his cravat with a quick jerk, but he folded it neatly and placed it on a shelf. There were dark circles under his eyes – all his sleepless nights were catching up with him.
“Do you ever sleep?”
“I try to, but I keep finding this girl in my bed.” He meant it as a joke, I knew, but I still felt guilty.