Havenfall (Havenfall #1)(59)

“I found some papers in your room.” There doesn’t seem to be any point in talking around that bit now. “I know you’re trading magical artifacts. Enchanted things.”

“I wouldn’t have thought a modern girl like you believed in such things,” the Heiress says, witheringly. “Everyone knows the magic of the Adjacent Realms is bound to its bearers. Only people carry magic.”

I feel my hackles go up. “It doesn’t matter if the magic is real. You’re telling people it is.” My anger, held at bay while I hid in the trees, is rising rapidly now. “You told that creepy-ass dude from earlier that magic is real, and it can be found at Havenfall.”

The Heiress’s eye twitches when I swear. She might not understand the slang, but she understands my tone just fine.

“I’ve told him nothing he didn’t already know,” she said. “There are many who know the true nature of Havenfall. Humans all over this world of yours. There always have been.”

My face must betray my shock, because she tilts her head at me.

“Come, Madeline, did you really think a place such as this could truly be a secret? This is the nature of magic. The green children of Woolpit. Canneto di Caronia. The Fairy Flag. I could go on. There are always leaks, but the world doesn’t end.”

I wait for her to say more, but she doesn’t. My mind races. If I take her at her word—that magic really can be bound to objects … what does that mean? I think of her room, glittering with dusty trinkets, and I skim over Havenfall’s grounds and perimeter and everyone who walks through its doors every day. Marcus trusted his people, and I trusted him. How could he not have known about this? Or worse, how could he have known and done nothing about it?

“It predates Marcus’s term as the Innkeeper,” the Heiress says, reading my face. “It predates even my time there. Secrets—and magic—always find their way free.”

My head feels like it’s spinning as I try to wrap my mind around this new information. “How many people are involved?” I whisper. “How many have had their hands in this?”

“It’s hard to say,” the Heiress says calmly. “Hundreds. Maybe more than a thousand.”

“That’s—” Anger and fear twine together inside me. “A thousand? How are you so relaxed right now?”

“We’re still here, aren’t we?” she retorts. “The inn is still standing. And I’m on your side of this. I am trying to right the wrongs.”

“You don’t understand! There’s no such thing as an open secret in this world!”

I clench my hands hard under the table, nails digging in. How can I make the Heiress understand a world full of cell phones with cameras and microphones? The Internet? “Everyone talks about everything online now. If you don’t keep something a total secret, everyone will know soon enough.”

“Ah, but you forget that humans are selfish creatures,” the Heiress says evenly. “If there’s something to be gained by it, they will hold their tongues.”

I bite my own tongue as the waitress approaches with our food: a chicken sandwich for me and coffee and scones for the Heiress.

She breaks off a corner of the scone and eats it delicately, then makes a face. “Too sugary.”

That’s a joke between us ever since I was a little kid. I’d bring her some Haven food to try, and she’d pretend not to like it. But I’m in no mood for games right now, nostalgic or not.

“How long has this been going on?” I demand.

The Heiress’s face stays placid. The unshakable calmness in her voice somehow angers me even more. “I don’t know. Before either of us was born. As long as people have been crossing through the doorways, I expect.”

“And you’re trying to put a stop to it. By buying the objects back up …”

“And returning them to the Adjacent Realms where they belong,” she finishes for me. “Yes, that’s the idea. I’ve used their magic to get past the barrier on the grounds.”

“Then why didn’t you tell Marcus a long time ago?”

For the first time in our exchange, a flicker of emotion shows. The Heiress’s face falls, only slightly, and only for a second. But I don’t miss it.

“Madeline,” she says slowly. “I’m going to tell you something, and you’re not going to want to believe it, but you must. It’s true.”

Dread fills my insides, heavy, cold. “What is it?”

She looks me straight in the eyes. “Your uncle knows about the trade,” she says. “He is the seller.”



I don’t believe it. I can’t believe it. Even after we return to the inn, when the Heiress brings me back to her room and shows me papers with Marcus’s handwriting on them, I can’t believe it.

And yet … there’s no other explanation. No other reason I can think of that would explain the existence of letters in my uncle’s distinctive slanted handwriting, promising buyers riches beyond imagining, Havenfall silver infused with magic. Long lists of names and mailing addresses, each one noted next to what they purchased, when, and for how much. The records go back decades, since before I was born, since Marcus took over Havenfall from my great-great-grandmother. There are copies of receipts for silver objects passing hand to hand. This time I can’t deny the Heiress’s claim. She was buying. And my uncle—my uncle who I trust more than anyone else in the world—was, is, selling.