The Unnaturalists

The crowd parts at one end of the hall, halfway between us and the dais, halfway between a waltz and the musicians tuning their instruments for the next. A young man in a sumptuous midnight velvet frock coat enters, wearing a horned Wyvern mask and trailing an entourage of admirers. The room seems to sigh in his presence. The Heir of Grimgorn. It must be him.

I grit my teeth when I think about what I must do. I have never, so far as I know, bewitched anyone, and the Guide didn’t make me feel very hopeful about performing a love spell as my first magical act. But a promise is a promise. And Lucy has me fair caught. I have no doubt that if I’d refused my new mistress, sweet as her smile is, she would not hesitate to send me to the Waste. And that would, in turn, ruin what little hope is left to us. Somehow I must get to the Manticore. The one thing I cannot risk above all others is failure. Especially with all I know now.

I pat Lucy gently on the shoulder. “Go on,” I whisper. “I’ll be watching.” And working the charm. Though I don’t say it aloud.

Somehow she must get his attention. I schooled her in the three levels of connections with people according to The Guide—eye, physical, and heart. Above all, one should strive to make connections of the heart, which are in turn the engines of affection. She threads her way toward him.

It is not difficult for Lucy to take a cup of punch and edge close to him as he looks on from behind his mask at those trying to court or entertain him. The Wyvern crest of Grimgorn glimmers in the intricate brocade of his waistcoat, and there’s a tiny Wyvern embroidered in the folds of his lace cuffs.

Closer and yet closer. She waits for a moment when everyone is laughing at some young gentleman’s expense. She glides close enough that he sees her out of the corner of his eye. The glance. It’s not hard when someone throws her head back, arms akimbo, to give her a gentle push and . . . her glass of punch spills down his arm, down his side, bleeding the blue velvet purple. The cup breaks like bells at Lucy’s feet.

A single shocked gasp ripples across the room; the sea of dancers grows still. All eyes are upon her as she apologizes, and the tremble in her voice is real.

“My lord, I am so very, very sorry.”

She reaches for his arm with her handkerchief, trying to soak up as much of the stain as she can. The touch.

If he reacts with anger, I won’t feel too badly about what I’m doing. But if he’s kind. . .

He crushes her hand under his. A servant rushes up with linen napkins from the buffet.

The magic is so potent I can hear him almost as if I’m standing right next to him. “I’ll forgive you,” he says to Lucy, his voice muffled by the mask, “if you’ll give me the next dance.”

His eyes are shadowed by his mask, but they’re oddly familiar, warm and fathomless as the sea as he looks upon her. Perhaps this will go better than either Lucy or I have imagined.

She bows her head and assents. The heart.

He removes his stained coat and hands it to a nearby servant. The edge of his cuff is stained, too, but he ignores it. He leads her out to the floor, and the musicians begin as if he is their cue. As he whirls her into the waltz, Lucy’s eyes glitter at me from her Phoenix mask. The young Princess with her stitched mouth stares emptily from her mother’s dais.

Then it all falls away, and it’s just Lucy, Master Grimgorn, and my spell.

He’s a very good dancer. It’s easy to be distracted by this, because I’ve never seen anyone dance the way the two of them do. I want so badly to forget the awfulness of what I’ve just seen, how shattered I am by Hal’s rejection. I lose myself in the magic, in making the two of them hopelessly attracted to each other. Lucy’s glove glows where the rose petal is hidden. I push the delicate, prickling magic from her hand to his heart. Their joined palms will surely catch fire soon so strong is the charm I weave.

At last, the waltz winds down and he bows. She curtsies.

Apparently inspired by their magical perfection, the dance master calls across the crowd, “Lord Bayne Grimgorn and Lady Lucy Virulen!”

I send this last arrow of thought into his heart as he leans to kiss her charmed glove to uproarious applause: If you are well and truly bewitched, you will send the marriage proposal tomorrow.

Master Grimgorn straightens and tears the mask off as Lucy turns toward me. Hal—no, Bayne—stares at me in shock, betrayal in every line of his face. He may have changed his wardrobe since I left him in the Cabinet, but there is no denying the look in his eyes.

The clocks all throughout the Tower begin to chime, but his thoughts are louder even than their tolling. What have you done? Oh, you foolish girl, what have you done?

CHAPTER 18

The fever had seized Syrus almost as soon as he’d gotten out of the City. Bayne had directed him to make his way to Virulen and offer his services at the kitchen; he’d even written a letter of reference. “Go there and watch over Vespa when she arrives,” he’d said. “Take her to the Manticore as soon as you can. We must keep her safe from Charles.”

But something was in Syrus’s blood—a terrible itching. When the strange and beloved Forest greeted him for the first time in weeks, he fell under its spell as one who has finally found his oasis after wandering in the desert. He very nearly forgot who he was when he heard a distant dryad singing a swaddlesong he remembered from his childhood. He burned to find her, to hear her sing those words to him again. He ambled through the mists and dells, wild as any Elemental. Sometimes, he dreamed that he walked on four feet instead of two.

When at last Truffler found him shivering inside a hollow log, it took days of gentle ministration before the hob could bring the boy back to himself.

Then came the morning that Syrus sat bolt upright in the pile of blankets Truffler had dragged in from Tinkerville, nearly knocking his head against the wooden roof of their makeshift infirmary.

Truffler turned from the makeshift brazier. “Quiet,” he said, making gestures of peace.

“But I have to . . . I need to . . .” Syrus remembered the rogue warlock’s threats and how only the cave sprites’ intervention had saved him and Bayne. He thought of the witch, barely come into her power and mostly defenseless—the perfect target. “I need to go to the Big House!” he said.

Truffler eyed him. “Not now. Quiet.”

Syrus remembered a time when he’d been small, not long after Truffler had first bonded with him. He’d tried to climb up a sheer cliff by himself when all the older boys had left him behind. Truffler had wrestled him to the ground with his hairy arms and held him there until he’d succumbed. Syrus had no doubt Truffler could still do the same if he wished.

“All right,” he said, lying back down. Rain drummed above his head. He wouldn’t admit it out loud, but it was the most comforting thing he could think of—outside of hearing his Granny tell her stories, of course—to be safe in the Forest with Truffler caring for him. He only wished it could last forever, instead of just a little while.

CHAPTER 19

As we approach Virulen Manor at last, I am still trying not to think of the horrendous Ball a few nights ago, still wishing I could erase the terrible betrayal in the eyes of the one who apparently betrayed me, as well. The Heir to the second most powerful House in the Empire masquerading as a Pedant! It felt as though the person I’d known—Hal Lumin—had died there on the Empress’s ballroom floor and Bayne, a man I’d never known, had risen to take his place. No wonder now that he resisted all my advances! Any self-respecting man of his station would have nothing to do with someone like me. His words of that night still echo in my head—What have you done, you foolish girl?

He was right. I had been a fool, and for more reasons than just him, though that was by far the most