So I kick her into the stained-glass window. It doesn’t feel like a decision. It feels more like a necessity. I need her out of my sight.
It’s spectacular. The whole thing shatters in a spray of blue-and-white glass, and I have to shield my face. When I open my eyes, I can see the black veil and the street below. Tiny pieces at the edge of the window are still breaking loose and falling, like teardrops.
I hear distant screaming from the square. I see even more lantern light coming our way.
I can’t believe I stuck a knife in her. I can’t believe any of it just happened. It was all so quick.
I turn around. Ale is in the same spot, his face white. At the entrance to the dining room, Theo and Verene are frozen in their tracks. They were running at me. They were trying to stop me.
But they didn’t. They couldn’t.
I point the knife at Verene. I heard her scream earlier, but now, she looks strangely blank. I don’t like it at all. It makes me suddenly aware of the sick feeling of wrongness that’s filled up my throat. I want to say something—something pointed and decisive and unconcerned. But if I open my mouth, I’m going to vomit.
This is exactly what needed to happen, I remind myself. Verene needs to know how thoroughly I plan to defeat her.
She needs to know what I’m capable of.
I’m capable of killing someone. I can push them off a balcony, if I have to. But I can also put a knife between their ribs. I can feel their blood all over my hands.
All I want to do is wipe this blood off. It’s sticky, and the smell is in my nose and in my throat. But I can’t wipe it off. Then I’ll look like I’m sorry about this, and I refuse to feel sorry about it. The housekeeper wasn’t going to get out of my way. She was an obstacle.
I swallow hard.
“What?” I say to Verene. “If you’re going to make this difficult, then so am I.”
I’m amazed at how steady my voice is.
Verene and Theo don’t move. They look like they still haven’t quite figured out what’s happening. All at once, I imagine them as the little children in that portrait I saw, in the arms of the woman I just threw out a window. But surely they didn’t care that much about her. She was only a housekeeper.
“Well?” I say. “Are you just going to stand here? Because I thought you were—”
“I’ll kill you,” Verene says.
I can’t comprehend the words. Her face is still so blank, like she just said something matter-of-fact. Something that she says a hundred times a day.
“I’ll kill you.”
She says it again. Her voice is low but unmistakable.
“You’ll kill me?” My mouth dry, and I find myself tightening my grip on the knife. “Really?”
“She was innocent,” she says. “She never did anything to you.”
“Actually, she attacked me,” I say. “She said she wanted to protect you. So, really, this is your fault—”
Verene takes a step forward.
She doesn’t have a weapon, and I do. She doesn’t have any magic that I don’t know about. She can’t hurt me.
And yet, I feel suddenly outmatched. I’ve never seen this kind of cold, bone-deep determination in anyone’s eyes.
“I’m not going to pretend I know everything about the bizarre way your people worship you,” I say. I haven’t taken my eyes off her. I’m afraid to even blink. “But I’m pretty sure that if you killed someone, your city would no longer consider you a… good person.”
“Sometimes,” Verene says, “it’s good for people to die.”
I notice suddenly the way Theo is looking at his sister. His hand is outstretched, but he’s hesitating, like he’s not quite sure what’s going to happen if he touches her.
I know that the mob is coming for us. I know that if I want any chance of getting Verene under my control, I have to attack her now. But I’m suddenly certain that if I try to fight her, I’m going to lose.
I can’t face her like this. I need more. I need more magic.
So I run for the foyer. I push Ale ahead of me, through the short hall with the vase of white roses, and slam the front door.
I have to stop to catch my breath, because I feel like I’m going to faint. My hands are strangely tingly. I just want to get this blood off.
And I can hear footsteps behind the door. They’re following us, of course.
I’m about to keep running when my eyes catch on the small statues guarding either side of the door. They’re carved to look like Verene, naturally, with her billowing skirts and her graceful neck. They’re each holding a large glass lantern with a flame inside. They’re so pretty and so perfect.
I lunge at one of the statues and push it over.
The lantern shatters. The flame leaps onto the door and starts to spread, much quicker than I thought it would. Instantly, I feel the heat on my face.
I push over the other statue.
“Emanuela,” Ale says.
“What?” I say.
Verene and Theo can escape through their underground well. But they don’t deserve to stay in their grandiose hiding place. This is what happens to people who steal from my city and get in my way.
I start down the stairs. But Ale is lingering, wincing at the heat, like he thinks there’s anything he can do to stop it.
There’s not. There’s nothing I could do either, at this point, even if I wanted
