“It’s very…” Lux trailed as she caught sight of the same vines growing over the manor clinging to the rafters here. The blooms were many, more vibrant, and they hung nearly low enough to brush Shaw’s head.
Half the ceiling above them was clear. Lux could see straight through to the moon and stars, and the cool light mixing with the assortment of candlesticks granted the room an eerie ambiance. The vast majority of the candles burned atop Riselda’s workspace.
“…exposed,” she finished.
Riselda’s head lifted to gaze out the wide windows beyond her. The sea was especially wild tonight; the cresting waves glistened like ice. She said, largely wistful, “This was my favorite room of the house. It hurt to leave it.”
Riselda whirled with the decanter in hand, and in the other, she held a short glass. She poured a small amount and held it to her nose. “For energy.” Then she downed its contents.
She poured another and held it out. Not to Lux, but to Shaw. “Cheers, Cock—”
“Enough,Riselda.”
Riselda bit back a grin. “To our resourceful Mr. Roser. A pretty face and a talent: quite an unheard-of combination. For a man.”
Lux thought he would refuse it even as his eyes were begging for rest, but he surprised her. He accepted the glass and tossed the elixir back in a single swallow. He held it out to Riselda.
Who accepted it with a smile. The woman knew what she was doing, Lux must admit. If she’d offered it first to Lux, Shaw would have surely protested her drinking it. He didn’t have the same sense of preservation for himself—she’d known this since discovering why he’d died.
“And lastly.” A splash of liquid met the glass and extended toward her. Lux took it, but she didn’t drink. She sniffed it instead.
“What do you smell?”
Lux stiffened at the question, as it was one Riselda had asked repeatedly when she had been considered family and tutor both. When they’d thought Lux’s fascination with the body was a healer’s mark rather than a necromancer’s.
And same as then, Lux was not a discerning sort. “It smells sweet. Some sort of berry.”
“Dried mulberries, yes.”
In her periphery, she noted Riselda appeared to be her normal self, and Shaw too. He stood a little straighter, some of the tiredness leaving his posture. Lux swallowed the elixir. It was thin and light. She rid herself of the glass.
By the time she did, a fog she hadn’t realized dulled her head had evaporated. Her eyes widened at the feel of it.
“Good. Now that we are all alert for the coming long hours, I have a key. Let’s see if it still fits, shall we?”
Chapter forty-two
Luxhadatfirstassumed the vault to be somewhere in the manor’s dark underground corridors. She’d guessed later it was housed in the tower.
She was correct the second time around.
Behind Riselda’s childhood portrait, the hidden passage to the tower was cold with stone on either side and nothing at all to heat the air. Lux held her hand to a torch as they passed it by just for the fleeting feel of its fire. Shaw kept pace behind her, Riselda in front, and every time she looked back her nightmare followed, silent to everyone but her.
She gritted her teeth against its relentless voice, ready to scream.
And she waited. She waited until they’d climbed to the very top and stood before the arched, wooden door, Riselda’s heirloom key in its lock. She waited until the lock clicked open. Only then did she push the black-handled dagger into Riselda’s back.
It didn’t pierce the skin, she didn’t think, and aside from stiffening, Riselda neither flinched nor made a sound. Her long-fingered hand held onto the key where it rested, and she said, “So it has come to this again.”
Lux’s nostrils flared, every muscle tensed. The nightmare barraged her, but she wouldn’t be swayed.
“So it has. Self-preservation has always driven you, Riselda, and I know if it comes down to who should emerge from this unscathed, you’ll choose yourself. So tell me—what’s really in the vault? What do you want so badly?”
Riselda laughed, low and lovely. “My darling, you do not understand me so well as you think.” She paused briefly. “But you do understand me better than anyone else alive, I will admit. You waited until I could get you in before you betrayed me. Dare I say I’m impressed?”
“I don’t want to impress you,” seethed Lux.
“Push the dagger. Take back our power. She has siphoned from us long enough!”
