CHAPTER 21
ISABELLE TOOK IN A ragged breath, trying to calm herself, though a flood of tears streamed down her cheeks, her chest heaving with panic.
The surge of fear that had been swelling since her conversation with Bellinor and Rul had begun to peak, and she was having difficulty breathing with the way her heart raced. No matter how she tried to talk herself out of it, she felt a sense of impending doom.
Was Celeste punishing them by withholding a sacrifice? Did the faux goddess even know she was here? All of those teachings about dancing with the devil, and the devil was no more than a man cursed by a witch.
The first of her many victims.
She had been an utter fool, believing every word the priestesses said, everylie.
Oh, she needed to get out of this room, needed time to think. Needed a moment alone, away from the demons who had brought her here.
Isabelle wiped the tears from her eyes and crept up to the door, pressing her ear to it and listening for any sign of life. Dead silence. She gathered her dress in her hands and turned the knob, opening it slowly to avoid any creaking.
She hurried down the hallway, her ears pricked for any sound, though an eerie silence permeated the emptiness.
No, not silence.
There was a faint pulsing, like le Voile had a heartbeat, and she supposed it might if it were truly a living thing. She ignored it, eyeing each door carefully as she strode past them until she found the one she was looking for.
Knotted wood, a worn knob. Familiar and yet unfamiliar at the same time.
She opened it to her cottage, the sunlight beaming in through the windows so different from the dim candlelight of le Jardin. It was her home, where she had been born, where she had grown up, where she’d come into womanhood.
It would be so easy to return, not to this faux cottage, but the real thing. She would never step foot in the temple again, of course, would be more of an outcast than she already was when she stopped worshipping Celeste. She could beg for her jobs back. She could marry Pierre or Henri—if either still wanted her—both so unremarkable that she couldn’t even remember what differentiated them anymore.
So contrary to the electric passion she felt with Bellinor and Rul.
Isabelle brushed her hand over the countertop, feeling the worn wood beneath her fingers. It felt real, but it wasn’t real. Nothing was in le Voile, was it?
But Rul’s affection wasn’t fabricated, this she knew. She could sense it in the way he gazed at her, the silly and sultry poems he recited for her, the way he spent every moment he could with her, always with that cheeky grin on his face.
And Bellinor? She had experienced his need,his desperation, through his own memories. He had said that she was unlike any other he had brought to le Voile, and perhaps that was praise, not criticism like she had first thought.
As Isabelle wandered through the door of the cottage, she felt the sunshine dancing across her skin, her light dress swaying in the cool breeze. It was a beautiful afternoon, like many of the days she had spent in Marilet, and she followed the well-worn path through the forest.
She walked in silence, taking in all the sights and sounds until she could see the town in the distance. How far did the illusion go? Could she enter the café? The temple? Meander through the city square?
Did she want to?
Isabelle stopped, her heart thumping in her chest at the proximity to the edge of town. She could go back. Bellinor would take her home, not to this fake Marilet, but the real thing. That was what she wanted, wasn’t it? She’d stabbed him in the shoulder, hoping he would let her return. She’d begged them both to let her go, but as she stood at the terminus of her forest, she realized that no part of her felt any urge to return.
Somehow, Marilet felt moredeadthan the Hell that had ensnared her, and not just this faux one, but the real one that lived in her memory. Sorrow and pain permeated the walls of her cottage—her father’s, her mother’s, her own—filling every space until she could barely breathe, though she had never admitted these feelings to herself.
In le Voile she felt alive. With Bellinor and Rul, she felt whole.
Without warning, the ground shook, like a quake was upon the sleepy town. Great trees swayed and creaked, the sunlight flickering as if it were a candle threatening to extinguish. The view of Marilet blinked in and out of existence, buildings slowly replaced by blackness.
Le Voile was eating away at le Jardin bit by bit.
When the temple was consumed, it felt like justice, though the trembling ceased a moment later. She had been deceived by her goddess, the revelation paining her greatly as tears dripped down her cheeks once again. But that wasn’t the reason she was crying. At the very least, if she returned to Marilet, it meant she would never see Bellinor and Rul again.
At worst, it meant they were gone forever.
Could she let herself live with the knowledge that she could have saved them?
There was only one answer, the solution making her breath come easier.
