Bone Crier's Moon (Bone Grace, #1)(35)

I hate him.

I throw the shard at his face. He dodges it with ease.

Tyrus and Elara, why did you give me this boy?

Marcel pulls something from his pack, and Bastien groans. “It would have been useful to know you had more rope in there all this time.”

“Spare rope wasn’t foremost on my mind.” Marcel tosses it to Bastien. He tends to his bleeding lip while Bastien and Jules drag me onto the stone slab to bind me up again. I don’t resist them; Elara’s Light is already dwindling inside me. Curse Bastien for being right about me needing to reserve my strength.

“Aren’t you going to join me?” I ask with a smile I hope is sultrier than Jules’s. If I can’t fight my amouré, I’ll goad him. “There’s room for two on here.” I pat the slab. “You certainly took advantage of that last night.”

Jules freezes. “What is she talking about?”

Bastien shrugs. “I had to hold her still, didn’t I?”

“Is that what you call that full-body embrace?” I arch my brow.

Even by the light of one lamp, I see his ears flush red. He scoffs and looks between me and Jules, then abruptly strides away. “Help me with these lamps, Marcel,” he grumbles. He grabs his dry shirt, yanks it back on, and steals an uncomfortable glance at me. I grin and wink at him.

Jules’s teeth set on edge. “I’m going to make a run for food.”

“Not on your bad leg,” Bastien tells her.

“I’m fine,” she snaps. “I need the fresh air.”

“A supply run? Excellent.” Marcel slowly nods, which I’ve come to understand is a sign of excitement. “Get the rest of my books, will you?”

Jules pulls a face. “I’m not carting a library down here.”

“I only need my Bone Crier collection.”

He has more than one book about the Leurress? I didn’t realize any existed. We have a few books in Chateau Creux, thanks to Rosalinde, who learned to read from her amouré and taught all the novices. But none of the books are about us.

Marcel rights a tipped-over lamp and pours more oil into it. “I came across a passage once about ritual soulmates, but I can’t remember the exact phrasing. If I can find a way to break the bond between Bastien and her”—he waves an idle hand at me—“then we can kill her. Problem solved.”

Jules smiles. “In that case, I’ll happily be your pack mule.”

I bite my tongue. Their efforts will be pointless. The gods forged the bond I share with Bastien; no mortal can break it. But the longer these three are preoccupied by trying, the better my chances will be to outsmart them.

“One book is in the loft above Troupe de Lions,” Marcel says, stifling a yawn like he’s had the most uneventful night of his life. “Two are in the threadmaker’s cellar, and the fourth is in the abandoned stables behind Maison de Chalon.”

Why are Marcel’s books scattered throughout the city instead of in one place? Doesn’t he have a home? Do any of them? Or are they always on the run?

“Got it.” Jules heads for the door. I fidget on the slab. I hope I won’t have to relieve myself while she’s gone. I’m not asking one of the boys to take me to wherever it is that passes as a privy chamber down here.

Bastien lights another wick. “Pinch some more lamp oil if you can.” Pinch? As in steal? Why am I not surprised? “And be back before nightfall. The queen will come tonight, and we need to be ready.”

Jules nods. “Be careful while I’m gone. That Bone Crier is shiftier than the three of us combined.”

“I won’t take my eyes off her.”

Jules frowns like that’s exactly what she’s afraid of. She ducks out through the low door and pushes it closed. The air is a little lighter now. Until Bastien spins around to face me with folded arms. His biceps flex beneath his sleeves. I sit up straighter and square my shoulders, showing him I have plenty of my own strength left. “Do you intend to stare at me until my mother comes?” I ask, offering him a honeyed smile. “What a brilliant strategy.”

His eyes narrow. He rolls his tongue in his cheek. “Marcel, open your book again.” He turns away and scrubs a hand over his face. “We have work to do.”

“Good luck.” I settle back against the slab wall. “You’re going to need that and a miracle.”





14

Sabine

I TREMBLE AS I REACH the bend in the forest path, intersecting the road to Castelpont.

Please, Elara, let Ailesse be alive.

I take a steeling breath and step onto the road. Twenty feet ahead, the ancient stone bridge and dry riverbed beneath it look stark and desolate in the morning sun, no longer mysterious under the full moon or foreboding in surrounding fog. Now they’re only a painful reminder of Ailesse’s overconfidence and my own inadequacy.

My feet pad the ground as I force my quaking legs closer. No sign of Ailesse yet, but her amouré could have stashed her body in the shadow of a parapet.

I set foot on the bridge. I don’t see Ailesse lying on the stones. I glance at the riverbed below.

She’s not dashed to pieces down there either. Swallowing, I tentatively press forward to the high arch of the bridge, craning my neck so I can see down its other side. No sign of her. My legs give way with relief, and I lean against a parapet.