Hotel Magnifique(52)

Relax? This was the closest I’d come to finding out how to get my sister back. I forced myself to take a deep breath. Bel was probably right. Zosa was still under contract. Besides, even if I found this Frigga, there was no way I could ask her about the aviary without revealing myself.

I picked at a snagged nail and thought of the aviary’s thick glass, the woman’s voice as I touched it. Closed indefinitely.

“I don’t understand why the aviary is always locked.” There had to be an explanation why Alastair closed it to guests, something driving him. “That day in the map room, you told me Alastair was greedy. What did you mean exactly?”

Bel shrugged. “I see his face every time I bring him an artéfact. Alastair’s fanatical about hoarding them. More so, I think, than he is about safety. Once I caught him lining up artéfacts across his office floor, counting them over and over, like a dragon counting its hoard of gold.”

“What about that signet ring you’re looking for?”

“You’re not going let it go, are you?”

“Did you honestly expect me to?”

He huffed a laugh. “Actually, I thought I’d have to explain it sooner. The truth is, I’ve searched for that miserable ring for years.”

Alastair must want it badly. “What does it do?”

“I don’t know,” Bel said. “I’ve been looking for it for so long that I can barely stand to think about it. And yet Alastair still expects me to find it.”

It must do something spectacular—but none of this explained the strictness around the aviary.

Bel swirled his thumb in a puddle of gold paste. “Now would you care to tell me how you came by the Sacred Salve?”

Here we go.

Bel listened, grim-faced, as I recounted the tale of the library bird. There was one more thing I wanted to ask, but I didn’t know how. The thought alone made me sweat.

“Are you all right?”

I must have looked anxious because he took my hand and began idly scraping paste from my palm with the hilt of his switchblade. I prayed he didn’t notice my full-body blush. But he definitely did. I wished to god my face wasn’t so damned readable, especially by him.

“Hellas knows we meet,” I said.

Bel’s switchblade stilled.

I wasn’t bothered by what Hellas said, but how he had said it. “Is he . . . jealous we meet?” As soon as the words came out, I wanted to take them back, melt into the floor. “Not that we’re anything . . .” I added. Oh god. Boil me. “Forget it, forget it. Forget I even asked.” I sat down on his sheet and cringed when gold paste squished under me.

Bel was quiet.

The silence was unbearable. My insides twisted. I forced my eyes down between my boots, as if the floor held all the world’s secrets.

After a long while, Bel exhaled. “Hellas and I . . . We were together once. Long ago.”

“I had no idea.”

“Not many do. There was a time when I was closer to him than anyone, back when we were both trying to prove ourselves to Alastair.” He frowned. “But then, slowly, we started to notice what was happening around us. I wanted to investigate, but Hellas was nervous to do anything that might get him in trouble. I would get so mad.” A terrible expression crept over Bel’s face. “But Hellas had a good reason for being nervous—a reason that I refused to acknowledge at the time.”

I titled my chin, curious. “What reason?”

“It’s . . . not important anymore,” he said. “I don’t like who Hellas has become, but I could never hate him for it. Looking back, the fact that our relationship ended as badly as it did probably nudged him to be the person he is now. And how it ended was all my fault. The things I said . . .”

He shut his eyes. I could tell it was hard for him to talk about, and my heart cracked open a bit. This made me see the Botaniste in a whole new light, and I couldn’t help but feel sorry for him, and for Bel.

“Hellas is allowed to still be angry with me. Regardless, he reports to both Yrsa and Alastair, so promise me you’ll be careful around him.”

When I nodded, he exhaled and sat down beside me. His thigh brushed my skirts and my skin tightened at the contact. The silence in the room felt tense. I turned toward him, searching for something to say, but my attention shifted to his clean shirt that hung unbuttoned. A swath of his smooth, muscled chest peeked through.

Last night, I’d dragged my fingers over that same chest hoping his bleeding would stop, but this felt different. My cheeks warmed. He caught my eyes. His were dilated. My lips parted to tell him I should go, but nothing came out because his eyes moved to my throat. When my breath hitched, they moved to my mouth as if he might . . . as if he might kiss me.

I shot up and started toward the door.

“Wait.” He took my arm. “Your cut.”

The cut from the vendor’s cart was now a puckered slash crusted with blue dust. I’d forgotten it.

Bel swiped some paste from my hair and smeared gold over the cut, erasing it before I could pull away. His fingers lingered against my skin. “Thanks,” he said. “For the paste.”

“Right. The paste,” I repeated.

He then added, “Even though it was a horrendous idea to retrieve it in the first place.”

I scowled while he fished a towel from a shelf and held it out.