Penelope stood where she was told, answered what she was asked, and was dismissed almost as quickly as she’d come. Training followed.
Mingxi guided her through spell control drills, Jorren tested defensive reflexes, and Seraphine taught Penelope breathing techniques used by ancient bloodlines.
By midday, she was shaking. By evening, she could barely lift her hands. By nightfall, she collapsed into bed again, boots still on her feet.
The days blurred.
Council.
Training.
Evaluation.
Arms aching. Sigils burning in her sight long after she left the hall. Old fears resurfacing. New strength replacing them.
Every night, she dropped into bed without remembering crossing the room. Every morning, she woke with the creeping dread that this might be the day the creature struck first.
Through it all, Mingxi remained constant—not coddling, not gentle, but unwavering. A presence she could rely on, even if she didn’t understand why that mattered yet.
Chapter 22
On the seventh evening, after drills that made her fingers numb and a Council session that had lasted far too long, Penelope returned to her room ready to collapse again.
She pushed the door open and froze. Camille DuVallon stood in the center of Penelope’s chamber—a storm of pinned curls, layered silks, and exasperated genius—holding up an elaborate gown shimmering with emerald and gold enchantments.
“Late,” Camille snapped before Penelope even stepped inside. “You are late, and I refuse to dress a girl who is not present for her own transformation.”
Penelope blinked. “Madame DuVallon… you came yourself?”
Camille’s eyes narrowed. “Of course I did. Do you want your gown ruined by an apprentice? Do you want the wards on your cloak misaligned?”
She thrust the gown forward with the self-assured force of a general handing over a sacred relic and said, “Now stop staring and get behind the screen. We have a ball to prepare you for.”
Penelope swallowed. The training, the exhaustion, the political pressure, the creature hunting her, it had warped the days together. But the dress, the woman holding it, the presence of someone who believed she was meant to be seen…
Penelope straightened. “Very well,” she said. “Let’s begin.”
Two of Camille’s apprentices swept into Penelope’s chamber carrying boxes, fabric rolls, and something that looked disturbingly like a jeweler’s toolkit.
“Clothes off,” Camille announced, already snapping her fingers at the nearest apprentice. “We are catastrophically behind schedule.”
Penelope, still blinking from the morning’s training session and barely conscious enough to protest, stepped behind the folding screen. Camille muttered about “lunar symmetry” and “Council idiocy” and “men having opinions,” while the assistants prepared the gown’s inner pieces.
The underdress slid over Penelope’s skin like a cool breath. Then came the enchanted corseted bodice, tightening itself in perfect proportion, leaving her able to breathe but not slouch.
“Good,” Camille said, circling. “You have a spine worthy of expensive fabric.”
Penelope made a helpless sound. Camille ignored it.
The gown came last. Deep-emerald velvet, shimmering faintly with gold-thread enchantments that caught the ward-light like starlight caught in leaves. It flowed over Penelope’s frame in a single, elegant cascade. The skirt swirled like liquid shadow when she turned. The bodice framed her collarbones with soft strength.
Then came the weapons.
Camille’s eyes glinted. “A lady must never attend a ball unarmed.”
She clipped a gold filigree cuff around Penelope’s left wrist. When Camille pressed a hidden rune, a slender stiletto blade slid neatly along Penelope’s forearm, invisible once hidden under the sleeve.
Penelope stared. “Is that…?”
