From her knitting bag, she pulled a small wooden jewelry box. I stood and crossed the room, took it from her.
She watched my face as I opened it.
It was a mottled brown, with a shiny purple showing through, like a ripe, unpeeled beet. The fingernail was missing, and a tiny spur of bone stuck out from the otherwise clean incision.
“Her pinkie,” I said.
“A light sentence, for a second offense. But it was you who failed to guide her. You should apologize, when you see her again.”
I studied the severed finger in its velvet bed. “This might take more than an apology.”
“You’ll pull the Wilbert-Lees into shape, don’t worry.” Grandmother was still watching me. “Do you care about her?”
I tried to imagine Faraday waking up in a cutting wrack. Eight handsto immobilize her. A weighted blanket to collect her screams and vomit. The cool of metal snippers around her pinkie, the suddenclickof flesh, tendons, bone.
Would she blame me? Would she regret signing with us?
Houses. Horses. Paris.
“I’m not sure how I feel about her,” I said, truthfully.
Grandmother was pleased. “She has potential, for an ordinary.”
I closed the box, handed it back. “You must be very worried, to do all this to me.”
“Hardly. The elders of every family know what’s happening. Your new friends have no chance of success. But they betrayed us, and must be punished. It’s the principle of the thing.”
I almost believed her. But as she reached up to put the pinkie box on my bookshelf, her fingers trembled.
She was furious.
This wasn’t about principles. Bianca was wrong about us Mortons. Underneath our accountancy, we were still feasting on our enemy’s hearts.
When we broke, we soaked the woodshed with blood.
The moment passed, and she smiled. “Faraday sends her love, by the way. She understands that you had to rest, but is excited for your return.”
I stared into those lightless eyes, feeling a sliver of hope.
“What do you want from me?”
“The name of the Morton who appointed you. It had to be someone of Arabella’s generation. Hector? Clara?”
After nine days, I was ready for this. “Sebastian picked me.”
“And who picked him? We know how it works.”
“Do you?” I wasn’t going to tell them anything. “How do you know any of this?”
“Because your new friends are sentimental.” She reached into the jar and took a cookie, nibbled. “Some time ago, they tried to recruit a loyal Morton—who rejected them, but promised never to tell. They made the mistake of not killing that person.”
A failure of triage, like mine. Protecting Faraday had put me in this room.
“We decided to be patient,” Elizabeth said. “We waited for Uncle Max’s bottleneck to narrow their options. We waited for you.”
Me, the time bomb.
“Who recruited Sebastian?” she asked again.
