Bone Crier's Moon (Bone Grace #1)(69)

As they walk past, Odiva moves off the path and wraps her arms around herself. Pernelle shoots me an inquisitive look. Maurille squeezes my hand. I shrug at them like I don’t know why Odiva wants to talk privately with me. Like I didn’t just confront her with the crime of owning another grace bone. She already has five. A sixth is an offense to the gods and the sanctity of an animal’s life. Still, my limbs shake when Odiva returns to me after the Ferriers are gone. Her expression is eerily calm and resigned.

“This is not a grace bone.” Odiva withdraws the hidden necklace, and the ruby in the mouth of the bird skull glints in the sunlight. “It was a gift from my beloved.”

My lips part. I take a closer look at the skull. The bill is black and a little smaller than a raven’s but stouter than a rook’s. “Why would your amouré give you a crow skull?”

She grins at me, and my scalp prickles with uneasiness. “I see nothing escapes your notice, Sabine.” Her feather epaulettes rustle as she lifts a shoulder. “I suppose my love knew I had an affinity for bones.”

“You didn’t hide them from him?” A Leurress is supposed to put away her grace bones when she spends a year with her amouré.

“He was exceptional. He accepted me for what I was. He loved me without fear.”

I eye the ruby again. He was also wealthy and clearly powerful if he could be that kind of match to Odiva. “Then why do you keep his gift a secret? Ailesse would want to know that her father—”

“Enough about Ailesse,” Odiva snaps. I stagger back a step at her burst of frustration. She shoves the crow skull back under the neckline of her dress. “Not everything must be divulged, Sabine. Love is sacred. Private.”

I stare incredulously at her. She was the first to mention Ailesse a moment ago. But all Odiva’s warmth is gone now. I suddenly recall what she confessed after I killed the nighthawk. I was too distraught to give her words much weight, but now they tear through my mind: That does not mean I loved him. She was speaking of her amouré.

But then who gave her the necklace?

A small movement draws my keen eye to where the forest meets the plateau. There, perched on a lowlying branch of an ash tree, almost as if she’s heard my thoughts, is the silver owl.

A breath of hope fills my chest. The owl is a reminder of Ailesse. Odiva may have turned her back on her daughter, but Elara hasn’t forgotten.

The owl will lead me to her, just like she led me to the catacombs.

Odiva turns to follow my gaze. Once she sees the owl, she stifles a gasp.

I dash away toward the forest.

“Sabine,” Odiva calls after me. “Where are you going? I have told all the Ferriers to return to Chateau Creux.”

“I’m not a Ferrier,” I shout back. “But if you want me to be, you’ll let me hunt.”

“You need your rest.”

“I need a third grace bone. I’ll come home once I have it.” And once I’ve saved Ailesse.

I cast a fleeting glance over my shoulder, but my matrone isn’t racing after me. She stands frozen on the path, one pale hand on the claw marks the owl gave her.

When I reach the tree line, the owl flutters away. I pursue her deeper into the forest. Just like before, she lands within sight, and once I catch up, she flies off again. I grin, running faster.

We play this game, mile after mile. I pay little attention to my surroundings; I focus all my attention on keeping the owl’s gilded feathers in sight. But once I cross a thoroughfare to Dovré and spy a bridge twenty feet ahead, I stumble to a sudden stop. This bridge is made of stone and has a high arch and a dry riverbed beneath. It’s within view of Beau Palais, which looks down on the bridge from the highest hill in Dovré.

I’m at Castelpont.

And the silver owl is gone.

My breath scatters on a swirl of morning mist. Why did the owl bring me here? Would Bastien really take Ailesse back to the place where she tried to kill him?

Tentatively, I walk toward the bridge. Maybe the owl knows something I don’t. Maybe there’s another entrance to the catacombs nearby. But a dark sense of foreboding tells me something more dangerous is at play.

I slip my bow off my shoulder. I draw an arrow from my quiver. My muscles string taut as I step onto the bridge. I glance to my left, to my right, and to the riverbed below. I see nothing.

I take another step and freeze. My graced sense of smell catches a musty and sharp scent, like damp leaves and wet fur. I’ve almost placed what it belongs to, when a creature comes bounding for me. Fangs bared. Hackles raised. Incredibly fast.

Time slows my pounding pulse to a sluggish beat as I meet the jackal’s golden eyes. The silver owl swoops in behind him. She shrieks and goads him forward with her claws.

She brought him to me.

The jackal is halfway over the bridge. A fleeting thought crosses my mind. I’m meant to injure the jackal. Capture him, not kill him. Odiva’s command.

The jackal pounces at me. Leaps into the air. Opens his jaws.

The owl didn’t want Odiva to kill him. The owl wants the jackal’s graces to be mine.

I nock an arrow.

Blow out a shuddering breath.

And shoot straight for the golden jackal’s heart.





31


Bastien


AILESSE’S GRIP TIGHTENS ON MY hand as we walk by the arranged bones and skulls along the tunnel walls. “We’ll be past them soon,” I tell her. After a few branching corridors, the catacombs open into one of the old limestone quarries under Dovré. My lantern only shines a little way into the wide pit before us.