Page 32 of The Heartless One
“What is the spell?”
Elric just cast the damn thing himself, sending out a thin tendril of his power to guide them. It flickered in the light often, requiring rethreading every time the lights flickered as whale oil dripped through a complicated piping system. Weaving the spell over and over again took precious time and power that he needed, but eventually, they entered a bedroom in the central part of the home.
“Why was no one in the halls?” he spat the moment they closed the door behind them.
“I don’t know.”
“We should have seen at least one servant. It makes little sense.”
“No, I find there to be no sense here at all.” Jessamine’s brow wrinkled, but she turned to survey the room his spell had led them to. “Let’s just find out what we can and then get out of this house.”
It felt like a trick. There should have been guards inside as well as out. There should have been servants here to protect Fortuna. This felt like a trap.
But no one came out of the shadows. No blades parted through curtains, and no spells seared their flesh. This was just a bedroom. An ornate one, certainly, but a very quiet bedroom.
It was prettier than the hall. The entire ceiling was painted to look like a blush-colored sky with fluffy white clouds that a sunrise was just peeking through. The four-poster bed was bolted to the ceiling and the floor, with white marble pillars sanded smooth. The blankets were a lovely pale shade of blush on a bed so soft, it might have been the nicest he’d ever seen. A gold-edged vanity in the corner reflected the image of Jessamine and himself back at them—two dark stains in a house that had banished shadows.
Jessamine nudged the rug that was woven with strands of blush and gold. “This looks finer than a courtesan should have, don’t you think?”
“I don’t think she’s just a courtesan any longer,” he murmured, stepping into the room a little farther. “What are we looking for?”
“Clues. Notes. Anything that would give us an explanation for what Leon is planning, or how we can attack him without dying in the process.”
She seemed so confident. He tried not to grin at the sound of her voice. Clues. Like she was a little detective who had been given an impossible plot to solve. What a strange creature this woman was. When he failed in hiding his smile, Jessamine glared at him.
“What?” she asked.
He leaned against one of the bedposts and watched her open the golden chest at the base of the bed. “Nothing.”
“Would you look for something useful?”
“What do you consider useful?”
“I’ll know it when I see it.” She pawed through the fancy fabric contained inside the chest but then glared at him again as though that expression alone could light a fire beneath him.
He sighed and meandered throughout the room, taking in details as he went. This room was far too fine for a courtesan, that much was certain. He didn’t know many women who sold their flesh who had gold-dusted rooms. This wasn’t just gold foil, and it certainly wasn’t just painted. Even the hairbrush on her vanity was made out of solid gold.
She’d been gifted these by someone with a significant amount of money. Like a king who found her valuable. Or perhaps, gifts to keep her mouth shut.
What did this woman know? He could only imagine it was secrets of the state that Leon Bishop did not want getting out into society. The more he looked, the more certain he became. The extravagance of the room didn’t come from gifts that a man would give a woman he longed for. They weren’t gifts that made him think Leon had any kindness in his heart for her in the slightest. Nothing here was personal, but they were valuable.
He reached down to open a pot of makeup on the vanity. Pristine, priceless blush. Crushed pearls that would make her skin glimmer. Rouge that he remembered from the old days in a pot made of gold with glittering rubies on the top.
“She knows something,” he muttered.
“Like what?”
“Something Leon doesn’t want her to tell anyone else.”
So few people had items like this. Only the consorts of kings, at least. Opening a drawer, he noticed it was filled with letters signed with a royal-blue seal. But the moment he picked them up, they turned to ash.
Picking up another piece of paper that didn’t disintegrate, he flashed it for Jessamine to look at. “And she’s scared.”
“Of what?”
She grabbed the piece of paper, her eyes flying over the words he’d already seen. Fortuna Beaumont was holding a ball for all the eligible and rich men in the Pleasure District. Even men beyond. On the top of the page were the wordsFortuna Beaumont is looking for a new suitor.
“She’s running,” he murmured. The question was, from what?
