My tail does its up-periscope move over my shoulder. “What? Why didn’t you tell me?”
Dad picks this moment to march into the passageway. He looks stunning in his gleaming armor. His great golden wings arch over his shoulders. “Myla-la.” He shakes his head. “How lovely you look.”
It’s my wedding day, and my father says I look lovely, so I should be all blushy and stuff. That’s not happening. My warrior sense won’t let the news from Cissy drop. “What happened with Lucifer’s coin?”
Dad gives me his thousand-watt smile. “Coin?”
“Don’t schmooze me. Cissy told me you couldn’t find it.”
“I couldn’t, but that’s nothing to worry about. I’ve been personally overseeing the Pulpitums all morning. Nothing magical is getting in or out. That coin is somewhere close by and I will find it…After the wedding.”
I stare between Cissy and Dad. “You didn’t tell Lincoln, either, did you?”
My father steps closer and lowers his voice. “You only have one wedding day. We thought we’d take some of the burdens from you both.”
My eyes narrow as my mind spins through this news. “You’ve been in the Pulpitums all morning.” A shiver runs down my limbs. “But the coin went missing yesterday. It was supposed to be in either my robes or the backpack.” I stare out over the crowd of supposed friends. Could one of them have taken it from me? It seems too horrible to be true.
Dad’s eyes glow angel-bright. “Everything’s going to be fine, Myla. Whatever you’re worried about, it can wait forty minutes for you to get married. You need to trust us.”
Cissy steps up as well. “We care about you and have taken tons of steps to ensure your day is perfect.”
I nod slowly. When she puts her mind to it, Cissy is a marvel at organization. For the first time, I notice how my friend looks in her black velvet gown. As my only bridesmaid, Cissy’s wearing the colors of the house of Rixa. “You look beautiful, by the way.”
“Does that mean you trust us?” she asks.
I straighten my spine and tamp down my worries. “You’re both right. Whatever happened to the coin, it’s nothing that can’t wait an hour.”
Somewhere across the Chapel floor, an orchestra starts playing Vivaldi. It’s human music, but sometimes mortals really know their stuff. This piece from the Four Seasons is one of my favorites.
I step closer to the edge of the archway and stare out over the crowd. Everyone’s gone silent while the orchestra plays. There are so many faces it’s hard to pick out any single one. Ghouls, angels, quasis, and thrax…Every seat seems filled with a dignitary. The only big difference is that if you’re thrax, you’re likely to be glaring at a nearby quasi and vice versa. How sucktastic.
The hate fest between Lincoln’s thrax and my quasis continues. Blech.
My gaze locks on one quasi in particular. Mrs. Pomplemousse. She got a choice aisle seat right not a dozen yards in front of me. Something inside my soul goes on alert. I motion Cissy closer. “This is assigned seating, right?”
“Oh, sure.” Cissy eyes her bouquet of white roses. “It took forever to arrange.”
“And only major dignitaries got aisle seats, right?”
“Everyone was fighting over them, so we had to come up with a system.” She gives me a conspiratorial grin. “I guess everyone wants a closer look at the demon who would be Queen of the Thrax.”
I nod toward Mrs. Pomplemousse. “So how did a low-level quasi get that seat?”
“Who?” Cissy squints at the old quasi. “Oh, her. Maybe someone switched spots. She looks pretty old and helpless.”
I stare at the back of Mrs. Pomplemousse’s head. She’s still wearing that outrageous pillbox hat and veil. Something about her feels wrong…Like a “demon cloaked in a fake skin” kind of wrong. And Mrs. Pomplemousse hugged me in the hallway yesterday. That old bat could have used that opportunity to steal Lucifer’s coin. My mind whirs through other suspicious things about the old dame. Desmond was right outside her house, waiting to steal the codex. Why didn’t I see it before? She could have tipped him off where we’d be, and with the codex, no less.
Desmond and Mrs. Pomplemousse could have been in cahoots.
My eyes widen. Prescott said that the Lady takes many forms. What if the Lady and Mrs. Pomplemousse are the same person? He also said the Lady can freeze a man on sight. That could just be lust powers, but it could also be the freezing abilities of a dyad demon. If she can freeze as well as shape shift, then the Lady has all the key powers of a pair of dyad demons.
A super-charged dyad demon.
And she’s sitting not ten yards away.