Which she had apparently misunderstood on a deep level, based on everything he’d said last night.
What else had she misunderstood that night?Washe unhappy that she hadn’t accepted his offer? Didhethink, as Leonie seemed to, that the fact she hadn’t taken him up on it yet meant she wasn’t fully committed to their marriage—or to him?
At that thought, all of the painfully confused emotions from earlier instantly surged within her, trying to seize control once more. Margaret battened them down with a deep, controlled breath as she met Leonie’s furious red glare. “I won’t discuss my marriage with anyone but my own husband,” she said firmly. “Thatis a private matter. But I will tell you—and give you my word—that I meant everything I said yesterday. I still do.
“Also...” Her voice softened as she saw the telltale shift of muscles in Leonie’s pale cheeks and realized the girl was fighting back real tears. “I know you’ve lived only a short time in both of your forms, but please remember: the future can be a true adventure when we’re fortunate, full of unexpected twists and turns.” Margaret herself, so passionately immersed in her college library thirteen months ago, could never have predicted that she would be standing here in the middle of the Black Forest now, debating with a nachzehrer from her studies—much less feeling so many intense, nameless emotions for a man she’d been tricked into marrying in the first place.
“We don’t have to make every choice straightaway,” she said, both to Leonie and to herself. “We’re allowed to take our time to think and learn before we come to lifechanging decisions.”
The nachzehrer answered only in a rapid series of blinks and the clenching and unclenching of her pale fists.
Margaret gave what she hoped was a reassuring nod. “Now, if we could please resume our journey while we talk? I believe we have some way still to go.”
“Oh, averylong and treacherous way, indeed.” A woman’s voice spoke unexpectedly behind her and to the left, and Margaret spun around, nearly tripping as her boot heel snagged in thick moss.
The woman who emerged from between the trees was wearing a deeply hooded cloak even more all-enveloping than Leonie’s robes. Made of fine, if weathered, dark purple satin embroidered in silver thread, it swept around her figure in a swirling circle, obscuring her tall figure within it. Not even her eyes were visible as she tilted her hooded head, but Margaret couldn’t escape the feeling of being studied with uncomfortably keen calculation even before the woman spoke again. “I wouldn’t advise you keep going in that direction. You wouldn’t care to meet the monsters who live in the Diamantensee. They’re even more vicious and violent thanthisone.” A meaningful tilt of her headaccompanied the turn of her tone from saccharine to contemptuous.
Leonie flinched backward, pulling up her own hood—and Margaret stepped forward to block the stranger’s view. “I don’t believe we’ve been introduced.” She did her best to infuse her words with icy hauteur.
“Oh, but I know all about you,Lady Riven.”
A sudden eruption of rattling sounded against a nearby spruce tree as if in panicked answer.
Leonie’s pale, clawed hands shaped the sign of the cross as she took another hasty step back. “Are you a witch?” she whispered.
“There are no such things as witches.” Margaret included the importunate woodpecker on that nearby tree in her unimpressed glower.
The hooded woman let out a low, mocking laugh. “So says the supernatural expert. But then, whatisa witch, really, apart from a woman who knows things?”
At that, Margaret’s jaw actually dropped open. “That—of all the absurd and inaccurate—that is the mostoutrageouslyoffensive definition!” she finally sputtered. “How could you, yourself a woman?—?!”
Gathering herself together, she forced her thoughts back into order and bit out her next words with deliberation. “Old-fashioned people and institutions may not approve of those of us who devote our lives to study instead of to child-rearing, but that doesn’t make any of us who take the time to learn things intowitchesany more than a man whoexpands his own knowledge becomes awizard. They’re both meaningless terms, anyway! Despite all those ignorant witch trials of the past, modern studies have conclusively proven that humans cannot work what once might have been termedmagicthemselves. At best, they can only use supernatural relics?—”
“Oh, yes, you most certainlyarethe infamous Lady Riven, aren’t you?” The amused condescension in the woman’s voice made hot prickles of irritation rise on Margaret’s skin. “Your notoriety has spread even to this godforsaken corner of the world—but you needn’t waste your fiery lectures here with only the trees andthissoulless shell of a creature to hear you. I’ve come bearing an invitation to a far more elevating association.”
“My companion is hardly soulless,” said Margaret tightly, “and when it comes to ‘elevating associations,’ I believe our definitions may once again differ. Thank you, but I’m not interested in any more invitations. Farewell.”
She turned back in the direction—she hoped—of the Diamantensee, but the woman spoke, loud and sharp, before she could take her first step forward.
“Is that why you so rudely ignored my last one?”
Margaret stilled, remembering shreds of cream-colored paper floating in the breeze. “Areyouthe Baro?—?”
“Do not speak any further in these woods!” The woman wrapped her satin cloak even more tightlyaround herself, head whipping back and forth within its concealing hood as if in search of hidden eavesdroppers lurking in the dim light between the pines and firs. “There’s no need to bandy about my name or title, whatever they may be. Merely believe me when I assure you?—”
“You’ve shown no fear of bandying aboutmyname and title here, no matter who may be listening.” Margaret’s eyes narrowed as she took a step closer. “Is there a reason you’re hiding your own identity so closely? It hardly inspires me to trust anything you say.”
The woman drew herself up within her cloak with aristocratic hauteur. “I swear to you on my family name that I am human. More than that, you mustbe able to tell from both my accent and my attire that I, like you, am atruelady, regardless of my exact title. Unlike you, I was born into high society rather than marrying into it. What more should anyone need to know in order to trust my word against the worthless monster slinking after you now? This area may be infested with supernatural pests, but I am here to inform you that we have an historic chance to improve it now together and restore it to what it should have been all along, for both of our sakes.”
Leonie let out a choked huff of breath—was that a cut-off sob?—and Margaret lost the final shreds of her embattled patience. “That is quite enough. I’m here to work, not to listen to bigoted rubbish,and I’ve no more time to waste.” She beckoned to the nachzehrer. “Leonie, there’s no need to linger for her sake.”
The woman’s outraged gasp cut through the green-tinted air, but Leonie hurried forward, head lowered, past that cloaked figure to take shelter by Margaret’s side. Driven by instinct that overpowered reason, Margaret reached out to take the girl’s closest bony arm in a reassuring grip as they began to walk together, and—even more uncharacteristically—Leonie did not shake her off.
“Wait!” the possible baroness called urgently after them as they started back up the mossy, sloping ground. “You don’t understand. I’m here tohelpyou in your own quest. You’re searching for Reflection’s Heart, aren’t you? I can tell you exactly where it is, in exchange for one small favor. A mere nothing! Only leave behind that monster and come with me, and I’ll tell youeverythingyou need in order to further all of your ambitions!”
As they continued to walk, her voice rose even higher. “You can’t possibly succeed in this without my help!”
Leonie hesitated, looking back between the trees—but Margaret only shook her head and continued onward, tugging the nachzehrer with her through the next break in the trees. “Don’t pay her any attention,” Margaret murmured softly. “It isneverworth making any bargain for help from a person who can’t be trusted to deliver it.” She’d learned that lesson years ago, well before the endof her first term at university.
