Page 33 of The Muse (Beautiful Magic 1)
“A curse?” I echo. What the hell? My skin prickles with this new intel. Is Clio trapped because the painting is cursed?
“That’s why we had to keep it away from Renoir’s family all these years. To protect the woman in the painting.”
Some women can just be trouble.
Yes, Clio needs protecting.
And now it’s my job, too, to look out for her. Because of everything I feel for her.
“What is the curse? This is the first I’m hearing of it,” I press.
My head spins. Hell, it swims with facts and suppositions. With magic and mystery.
“I don’t entirely understand all of it. But there’s clearly some sort of curse on it to keep the woman trapped in it. I suspect it’s because Renoir and Valadon didn’t see eye to eye on something. Renoir believed art and inspiration were only for great artists,” she explains. “Valadon didn’t, and the Muses don’t either.”
Just when I think I’ve found the pattern, some random new piece drops in. “So . . . they talk to you too, the Muses?”
“Duh. How else would I know these things? The Muses believe that one day there will be an age of great artistic creation and expression.” Sophie spreads her arms wide like she’s embracing the invisible masses before her as she orates. “An artistic revolution that’s for everyone.” She points at me. “That’s where inspiration comes in. Where you come in.”
“Me?” Pointing must be contagious, because I tap my chest with my finger. “How so?”
She sighs loudly, impatiently. “The Muses have always been eternal, not mortal like we are. But they believe a human muse will come along, and that will mark the start of this new age.” She taps me now, right on the sternum. “That’s you, doofus.”
Human muse? What now? “Sophie, what are you talking about?”
She throws up her hands and looks at the ceiling. “Didn’t my brother tell you all this?”
Frustration gets the better of me, and I snap, “No one has given me a complete answer about anything!”
She cuts her eyes my way. “Then I will. The Muses have been expecting a human muse, and when they saw you hanging out with the Degas dancers one night, they figured out that you were the one. The one they’ve been waiting for. But since you’re the first, you’ll have to figure out for yourself what that means. Now, let’s get into that room.”
She says all of this as if she’s giving me directions to Notre Dame from here. Turn down this road, cross this bridge, and there you are—a human muse.
I look from the locked door to Sophie and back again. I picture Max taking the papers out of the black leather portfolio earlier. The ink must have barely been dry, and he was trying to steal the painting.
Sophie says quietly, “I’m not putting you on, I swear. If you won’t believe you’re a human muse, then at least believe that you’re the only one with the power to keep that painting safe. Perhaps the power to break the curse.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose, wondering if this is any stranger than seeing Degas’ ballerinas performing in the gallery or entertaining the idea that the ghost of Renoir is inhabiting Max.
I picture Clio looking up at me, picture her face as she edges around the subject of being trapped in the painting. She’s as alive as I am, and if buying into this human muse business lets me save her, how can I reject the idea completely?
If I’m the only one who can keep her safe, then dammit, I’ll have to do it.
Break the curse and set her free.
Looking over Sophie’s shoulder to the door, I focus on the immediate and concrete problem. “The door is locked. We’ll have to find another way in.”
Her eyes are intense as she stares at me. “You’re the other way. You brought the calf, right? With the Muses’ dust in it?”
Just go with it and remember it’s for Clio.
I take the pink polka-dotted calf I won at the party from my messenger bag and hand it over. Sophie takes off the cap from the calf’s fifth leg and taps some of the silvery dust into her palm. “Now, draw a key and touch it with the silver dust.”
“Right, sure. No problem,” I say with an eye roll.
But her expression is dead serious. “Please.”
The sound of her voice does me in.
There is no joking, only earnest gravity. As I take out my sketch pad and a pencil, I remember how I’d rubbed my silver-coated hand across the page where I’d drawn Olympia’s cat and found a black cat’s hair. I’d dismissed the oddity and forgotten about it, but maybe . . .
The lock on the door is the kind that takes an old-fashioned skeleton key. I put my pencil to the paper and draw a precise, pristine skeleton key.
