Page 93 of Down Comes the Night

“That’s what I like to hear!” Barrett leaned across the table to fill Lowry’s glass with the last of the wine.

Wren watched Lowry absentmindedly twirl his glass. Wine rolled down the sides like tears. This was her opportunity. All she had to do was distract him long enough to pour the drug in. The vial in her hands was as hot as a lit coal.

But all around her were hungry eyes hidden behind whitewood masks. They raked down her spine. If she hesitated, she would miss her chance. But if she was discovered, it was all too easy to imagine how everything would crash down around her. There would be no justice for her or Hannah or Hal. There would be no peace for Danu.

And she would hang for sabotage.

Wren opened her mouth to get Lowry’s attention, but when Barrett’s booming voice interrupted her, her jaw clacked shut. “Ms. Southerland, I’m so glad you came by tonight. We still haven’t properly met.”

He was too loud for how close they were, and his breath was ripe with alcohol. As friendly as he was, she didn’t have time to engagein idle conversation. “Oh, Your Grace, you’re too kind. I’m afraid I lead a boring life compared to the rest of our sparkling company.”

“On the contrary, I’ve been dying to speak with you since I arrived. I consider myself something of a military scholar.” He puffed out his chest proudly. “I hope you won’t find this prying, but I must ask. You served in the Danu-Vesrian War, correct?”

“In the medical unit, yes.”

“What an honor you’ve done your country.” Barrett spoke with grim admiration. “I’ve done much reading, but I’ve never heard a firsthand account. You must tell me what it was like to serve under General Flynn. She demonstrated some of the finest displays of military tactics in history.”

Wren had only seen General Flynn once in her life. “Uh… thanks?”

“Fitzy, please.” Lowry groaned. “And you callmemacabre. Don’t subject my guest of honor to your raving.”

“To the devil with you,” Barrett said. “This, Alistair, is why the alliance is crucial. The leadership in the Queen’s Guard is unparalleled. Why, in the famous Battle of Donn—”

Never had Wren known someone to discuss flanking maneuvers and scorched-earth tactics with the same soaring fervor of a besotted schoolboy. Wren did not believe Barrett had ever seen combat, but she doubted even General Flynn herself could muster such gusto.

Lowry let out a long-suffering sigh and whispered something to a fair-haired woman whose lips were toxin-bright beneath her mask. Whatever he said must have been funny, for she tossed back her head and burst into a peal of laughter. Her glittering necklace highlighted the elegant arches of her collarbones. Lowry’s eyes traced them as he slung an arm over the back of her chair. Although every eye in the room was on him, he was the image of perfect ease.

Tonight, she realized,wasa celebration for him.

He thought he’d bested her. Ensnared her.

And now his guard was down. He’d left his glass unattended.

Suddenly, Wren felt as if she’d been plunged underwater. Every sound in the room—even Barrett’s incessant prattling—was muffled and faraway. She uncapped the vial in her sleeve. Would anyone else be able to smell that telltale aroma, like biting into a pear? Lowry was still shamelessly flirting, his hand scandalously high on his companion’s leg. Barrett was regaling the woman beside him with tales of Danu’s military victories.

With her heart pounding too loudly in her ears, Wren tipped the vial into Lowry’s glass. It struck the surface with aplopas loud and startling as a gunshot.

“What is that?”

Wren snatched her hand away before she could finish measuring out the full dose—but not soon enough. The woman beside Lowry was staring balefully in her direction.

She saw.

Wren was so cold. She swore all her blood had evaporated. “I—”

Lowry turned around, but his gaze landed past Wren’s shoulder. Amusement danced in his eyes. Her breath fled her lungs, leaving her wrung out in her seat. Behind her was a man promenading across the floor with the skirts of his iridescent tailcoat trailing nearly ten feet behind him.

“Can you believe it?” The woman sneered. When she tossed her hair, the crystals studding her braids glimmered in the candlelight. “How gauche.”

Lowry laughed and picked up his glass. It cast a shimmering red aura on the white tablecloth, as dark as a bloodstain. “A toast,” he said to the table. “To us, the most gauche and macabre of them all.”

“To new friendships,” Barrett interjected.

To Danu. To Vesria. To everyone we couldn’t save and everyone we will.

Their glasses clinked. Drunk on his own hubris, Lowry swilled his wine in one audible gulp. Wren hoped it burned all the way down.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN