“I was just pointing it out,” I said, giving Lady Morano a hug. “Although it does make you look more intimidating.”
“Ah, perfect,” Blanche murmured into my shoulder. “Just what my suitors are looking for, I’m sure.”
I pulled back and looked her over. “You’d still be the belle of the ball.”
Blanche slapped my chest playfully. “Stop flirting or I’ll tell my brother.”
I bowed to her in reply. “Let’s fetch him and leave this accursed place forever, shall we?”
“Please.”
Annette led us to the laboratory and stopped short after stepping inside.
“Annette?” Blanche asked.
Suddenly, Annette was yanked from the doorway, and I heard her cry out as I pushed my way into the lab. I blinked in surprise to find Father Schedoni standing over the lady’s maid. He sneered at me. There was something in his hand that I couldn’t quite make out.
“You,” Blanche snarled behind me. “You’re the one who’s been feeding me leech food and killing men. You’re as bad as my uncle.”
“As bad as your uncle?” Schedoni chuckled. His eyes watched as Annette braced herself against the wall to help herself up, before kicking her in the stomach, forcing her back to the ground with a sharp gasp. “I am much worse than your uncle.”
Blanche held up a hand, and I watched with fascination as her hand began to lengthen, talons jutting from her nails. Even with the antidote running through her veins, if she wasn’t actively holding the monster back, she could let it out and, hopefully, control it.
Schedoni tossed two small bags at our feet, and we suddenly found ourselves blinded by dust. I coughed as it invaded my nose and mouth, tickling my lungs. It had a terrible smell to it, like burning metal.
Silver,I realized, as I wheeled to find Blanche on the floor, curled into a ball, her skin sizzling as if she was being boiled alive, foam pouring from her mouth.
I acted quickly, undoing my cloak and tossing it over Blanche in one fluid motion, then shoving her back into the dungeon and closing the door on her to keep any more of the silver dust from harming her.
“That will be your last mistake,” Schedoni promised, pulling a dagger from his robes and advancing on me.
Annette threw a leg out and tripped the monk, sending him sprawling.
Cursing, Schedoni climbed to his feet, and I searched the room for something to use against him. I had no idea what was in any of the beakers and tubes on the table, but I grabbed them at random and began to throw them at the monk.
Schedoni grunted under each blow as glass shattered against his habit. He held his arms up to protect his face, but even that didn’t protect him when something began to eat away at the cloth covering his arms, like an acid, making it smoke.
“Enough!” Schedoni bellowed, rushing me, knife raised overhead, as if he meant to deliver a death blow upon reaching me.
I spun out of the way, and the monk sliced the dagger into the table, whereupon it became embedded in the wood. He took a moment to try to free it, but I swung at him with a fist, and he danced out of my way before he could resecure his weapon.
Schedoni hissed but drew something else from the folds of his robe. It looked like a tape measure, but when he opened it, I saw that it was outfitted with a metal wire. A garrote. I wondered what else Schedoni had in his arsenal. These were tools of an assassin, not some simple monk. That explained a lot, actually.
I moved in for another punch, but Schedoni sidestepped me and sent me spinning as he rushed at my side. I grunted as the edge of the lab table knocked the wind out of me, but I still had the presence of mind to reach for a weapon. My fingers wrapped around a glass beaker, but it slipped out of my hand when Schedoni grabbed the back of my shirt and yanked me back toward him. If he pulled me any closer, he would slip that wire around my neck and that would be the end of me. My hands scrambled for purchase, grazing the beaker. I fought against Schedoni’s grip on my shirt and the fabric gave a little. It was just enough to allow me to reach forward and grab ahold of the beaker, but as I was pulled back with renewed force, I smashed the beaker against the top of the counter, shattering most of it into useless shards.
I felt Schedoni slip the garrote wire over my neck and draw it taut against my throat. It dug into my skin and my eyes bulged as I took what was left in my hand and thrust it back into Schedoni’s face, hoping it would be enough to get him to release me.
It was.
I gasped as the garrote slackened, and I pushed myself away from Schedoni, leaning back against the counter to assess my adversary and plan my next move. But there was no need.
I had shoved a large shard of glass into his right eye. As I watched in horror, Schedoni ran his fingers over the shard, as if to pry it loose, slicing the flesh of his fingers to ribbons in the process before he stumbled back into a wall and slid to the floor.
I swallowed hard as I watched him tumble onto his side and lay still. He faced the wall, so I didn’t have to gaze upon that terrible glass in his eye, the blow that I had dealt him, sealing his fate.
I peered down at my hands. I was a murderer now. And I had blood on my hands. Actual blood, from where the glass shard had also sliced my hand. Now that I noticed it, it stung terribly, and I pulled a kerchief from my coat pocket and wrapped it carefully.
“Are you alright?” Annette asked as she shuffled into the room with Blanche, who had recovered, but bore bloodshot eyes and raw-looking skin from her exposure to the silver.
