Finale (Caraval #3)(47)

“I thought the count’s residence was fancier,” Tella said. “Scarlett described it as being much nicer.”

“I don’t think she saw it for what it really was the other day. I think she was too concerned about meeting the count. And it didn’t smell this bad.” Julian put a hand over his nose and mouth.

Tella did the same, fresh nerves clawing at her stomach. The stench was so putrid she dry-heaved as they reached the front door. It was cracked open, oozing more of the wretched odor.

The dog barked again, long and keening.

Tella halted as the door creaked all the way open and an awful incessant buzzing joined the unseen dog’s anguished cries.

She didn’t remember entering, but she would regret stepping inside for the rest of her life. No servants greeted them, or warned them away. There was only the endless howling of the dog, the buzzing of the flies, and Tella’s silent prayers.

Do not let my sister be dead.

Do not let my sister be dead.

Because someone was certainly dead. The morbid stench grew worse as she and Julian finally passed the entry and reached the open library.

Tella swayed on her feet as she saw the count’s body. Or she thought it was the count’s body. He was in the second-floor library, sitting in a great chair behind his desk, and he looked as if the skin had been burned off his body.

The dog beside him howled again and shook its sad face, trying to ward off the maggots and flies from feasting on the count’s remains.

Tella tried to look away from the charred corpse; she’d seen enough death that week. She didn’t need to look it in the eyes again. She’d never seen a body flayed with fire—and she wished she wasn’t seeing it now. But she couldn’t turn away from the macabre scene before her. It shouldn’t have been possible. If the count had been burned alive, then other parts of his library should have caught fire. But it was as if someone had instructed the flames to only burn his skin.

Tella staggered back a step as something Jacks had said returned to her.

“At least he stabbed her instead of burning her to death with his powers.… Fire’s the most painful way to die.”

“I think I know who did this,” Tella said. “I think the Fallen Star was here to find Scarlett.”

Julian turned entirely gray. “Why would he want Crimson?”

“Because of our mother. Before he killed her, the Fallen Star said that she’d forced him back inside the cursed Deck of Destiny; he must have been free once before, and our mother imprisoned him again. It probably wasn’t enough for him just to kill her—now he’s coming after her daughters.”

Which would also explain why their apartment had been ransacked.

Tella hoped she was wrong. She couldn’t lose her sister the same way she’d lost her mother. But she couldn’t imagine who else had done this, or why anyone else would do this. She’d never liked Nicolas, but the fact that he’d clearly been tortured to death made her think that he hadn’t given up her sister—or at least not easily.

Scarlett might have managed to get away. All the servants seemed to have escaped so maybe they’d taken her sister with them. Or maybe she’d managed to hide and they just needed to find her.

Julian tried to pull the dog from the room as they went to hunt for Scarlett. But the animal wouldn’t leave; it continued to howl and guard its dead master as Tella and Julian scoured every tainted inch of the estate for Scarlett.

“Crimson!” Julian shouted, and Tella would have sworn his eyes were glassy. He wasn’t crying, but he was close. “Crimson!”

“Scarlett!” Tella called at the same time, repeating the name until her throat went raw. Her vision dulled around the edges as she combed through closets and cellars and dusty rooms full of cloth-covered furniture. By the time she and Julian completed searching, Tella’s legs were shaking, she was covered in damp, and she’d found no signs that Scarlett had even been there.

Julian was a sweaty mess as well. Hair clung to his forehead and his shirt stuck to his chest as they stumbled away from the house and into the empty stables. It was the sole place on the estate that did not reek of dying.

But Tella didn’t want to rest there. She didn’t want to curl up in the hay and eat the food Julian had stolen from the kitchen. She didn’t want to rehash any horrors, or sit in silence while her worst fears came true. She’d already lost her mother and Legend. She couldn’t lose her sister.

Her chest went tight, and for a desperate moment Tella wished Jacks was there to take away the pain.





26





Scarlett


Scarlett waited for the world to rock, for the boat to sway and her stomach to roll. But only her stomach met her expectations. It bubbled with queasy unease as she sat up in a feather-soft bed and opened her eyes to find that everything was cream-and-gold columns and carpets and bedding, with delicate hints of pink.

Nothing was purple, her father’s signature color. She didn’t smell his wretched perfume, or see his hateful face. Yet Scarlett felt far from safe as she slid out of a bed shaped like a crescent moon and covered in gossamer-thin pink sheets.

On clumsy legs, still unsteady from whatever she’d been drugged with, Scarlett made her way between columns, all topped with disembodied heads of baby cherubs with animal eyes. Lovely and wrong. But they were not quite as disturbing as the frescoes of humans with animal parts painted on the ceiling.