Hotel Magnifique(73)

It led to a small outpost somewhere in the south of Preet, the origin of the map room’s rug, but it was impossible to tell from my hasty scribbles.

“Where do you think it leads?” I said, coy, and brought the champagne to my mouth.

Alastair grabbed my free hand and squeezed until a bone popped. “Where does it lead?” he repeated through his teeth.

“To the ring.” My voice came out strangled.

His nostrils flared. “If we uncover the ring tomorrow, you can have your sister’s finger.” He tossed away my arm. “I’ll even fashion the porcelain into a pretty necklace.”

I dug my hands in my skirts and cursed when the map in my pocket rustled. The music was loud, but I heard it.

“Excuse me. I’m not feeling well,” I said, and turned to walk away, but Alastair caught my elbow.

“I’ll bring you to your room, Fabricant.” He pushed an arm around my waist, brushing my side an inch above the map. My breath froze.

“Ma?tre.” A short suminaire ran over, flapping her pink hands. “A guest is looking for you.”

“Tell them to wait.”

“It’s the emissary from the Lenore Islands. A Lord Allenbee. Yes!” The suminaire shook her head. “Or was it Bartonbee? No, Allenbee. Most certainly Allenbee . . . Esquire, I believe. He brought along the most wondrous little pickle sandwiches. We should give them to Chef, she—”

“Enough.” Alastair made an exasperated noise in his throat. He released me and said, “I’ll find you later.”

After he was gone, I gripped the top of a tufted chair, willing my heart to calm.

“He’s very handsome, isn’t he?” a guest in a tightly corseted dress said to her friend while fanning herself with an oversize sequined leaf. I assumed she was speaking about Alastair, but I turned in the direction both women were looking and spotted Bel.

His shirt was unbuttoned to past his collarbone. Wet from the rain, it clung to his lean torso while his trousers were stuck with brambles and muddy leaves up to his thighs. He looked like he’d been traipsing through the rain all day.

“Find your artéfact?” I asked, catching up to him.

“Of course.” He held up something gold. It flashed as he slid it into his pocket. “Don’t you have a map to draw?”

“We have to talk.”

He eyed my champagne warily. “Will you toss that at my face if I refuse?”

“Without a doubt.”

I looked around but didn’t see the ma?tre or any other suminaires nearby so I took Bel’s elbow and led him to the back of a mirrored partition. My chest tightened when he made sure to stand a distance away. I wanted to step closer, but decided against it; things were already too complicated.

“I drew a map,” I said.

All amusement drained from his face. “And?”

I tugged the map from my pocket. The charcoal was smudged, but the river Noir coiled like a snake through a city fettered by canals.

“This map doesn’t lead to the ring. It leads to Champilliers.” I brushed my fingers over a spot in the center and felt it—a bright signature of magic. Bel did the same, his eyes widening. “I drew it from the painting above the hearth in the map room. I believe this spot of magic is that woman, the former Fabricant.” I pushed the map back into my pocket. “When I touched her face in the painting, she spoke to me in the same voice from the itineraries.”

“Paintings don’t just speak.”

I threw up my hands. “Oh, really? Look around you. We’re surrounded by magic. Things speak! That woman is in Champilliers.”

“Alastair himself told me the old Fabricant was dead.”

“What if she isn’t? There has to be a good reason why you’re forbidden to take us there. I think she’s alive and she knows things. I can’t sense the ring, I don’t know where it is, but I touched that woman’s face and drew this map. You said yourself that sometimes the magical signatures are suminaires. I’m positive it’s her. Bel, she’s our answer.”

“I don’t see how.”

I groaned. “In that society handbook, she’s holding Alastair’s inkwell. It was her artéfact at one point. She was also the Fabricant; she could know where the ring is hidden, and tell us if it could work to nullify the contracts.”

“It would be suicide,” he said. “Regardless, you’d have to get to the contracts first and you don’t even know where they’re kept.”

“I do.” I pictured that third desk drawer, the infinite ledger. The ring might even remove whatever enchantment Alastair used to lock the drawer. It could solve everything. When I began pulling out the map a second time, Bel pushed my hand away.

“No.”

“Why not?”

He shook his head and stormed away.

I raced around a group of guests and grabbed his forearm. “You took me to Aligney. Why won’t you take me here? Alastair threatened Zosa. This is my last option.” My words were breathless. “Help me.”

“I can’t,” he said. At my furious expression, Bel added, “Look. If I move us there, Alastair will take away everything he’s given me.”

“Given you?”

“He doesn’t just threaten to punish me if I don’t do my job. He also rewards me.”