The Belles (The Belles #1)(116)

“Use the passages. I’ve left trunks for you that contain all you need.”

“I’ll lead them,” Arabella says, lifting a wall tapestry and pushing out a hidden panel.

“Thank you.” The queen kisses my cheek.

Rémy disappears with Amber into the dark passageway. I linger and hear Charlotte gasp for breath and mutter.

The bedroom doors shatter, wood flying in all directions.

“Go,” the queen shouts.

Hands find my shoulders. Arabella yanks me through. The door shuts us into darkness.





51


We follow behind Arabella. Her long veil sweeps along the cobblestone passage. “There will be guards here in a moment’s time. Sophia has her own tunnels beneath the palace. Hurry.”

She ducks and turns, seemingly at random, down a series of dark corridors. Pockets of gloom and dead air lurk about. Night-lanterns are hooked to the walls, creating quivering, infrequent splotches of light along the walls and floor.

My body quivers. Shadowy corners lie ahead. Spiderwebs spin a network of time gone by, stretching from lantern to lantern. I have no sense of where we are in the palace. Arabella knows every stair and turn and pathway through the darkness. The clomping of Rémy’s heavy boots matches the racing pattern of my heart.

Finally, Arabella slows down. The noise beyond the walls quiets. The scent of fresh bread creeps in, and the stone walls are warm to the touch.

Arabella drops to her knees and runs her fingers along the ground. She pulls on a latch, lifts a door, and exposes a Belle-trunk. Rémy sets a sleeping Amber on the floor and hoists it out.

Arabella flips it open and gazes up at me. “You are no longer a Belle.” She pulls a simple green dress from the trunk. “Out of those clothes.”

Rémy turns around while I change. I shiver with cold and fear. Dread fills every part of my body.

“Your name is Corinne Sauveterre, and you’re the daughter of a dragon merchant from the Gold Isles.” She ties the House of Rare Reptilians emblem around my neck, and shoves a parcel into my hands. Transport documents. A miniature portrait of me stares back. My new name and the names of my parents. “No one will ask for it unless you draw attention to yourself.” Arabella digs farther into the trunk.

“Why petit-dragons?”

“They’re lucky. And they’re worth a lot.” She holds up a pouch and flashes its contents at me. Five tiny eggs. They’re swaddled. “The queen gave them to me for safekeeping so that Sophia wouldn’t get to them. The shells are shatterproof. Just carry them on you. Keep them warm.” She laces the pouch around my waist, then covers it with a waist-sash embroidered with the house emblem. “Sell them when you have to. If you must. But they are also excellent and natural messengers.”

We lock eyes through her dark veil. She removes it. Her face is as smooth as mine. Her coiled russet hair is studded with jewels in her Belle-bun, and a Belle-emblem circles her neck. Her mouth curves into a smile. She has the same dimple in her cheek that I do. We could be a matching set. Mother and daughter.

I gasp.

“You haven’t figured it out yet,” she says.

“Figured what out?” I ask.

“I told Du Barry to keep you home,” she says, while packing a small toilette box.

“You did what?”

She glares at me. “I knew something terrible would happen if you came to court.”

“I don’t understand.”

“You and I are the same. You’re me. They tried to make another version of me in you. Your mother, Linnea, even gave you my mirror.” She points at the place where I’ve hidden it under my undergarments.

“What do you mean?”

“You know that we aren’t born. We’re grown like flowers.”

“I saw Sophia’s pods.” A thousand questions about who and what I am bubble up on my tongue, even though I know there isn’t the time to answer them.

“Yes, that’s why I’m kept at court. To watch over this process. They use my blood to ensure that enough Belles are born.”

I step back, and crash into the wall behind me. “You allowed them to do this?”

“Allow? I do what I’m told. Just like you. Up until today.”

“You could end it all.”

“I could have killed myself, but then they would’ve just brought you here and bled you every day. As long as there are strong Belles to use, it will never stop.”

“It has to,” I say.

“I know.”

Noise echoes on the other side of the wall. I suck in a huge breath and hold it until the sound drifts away.

“Help me change her clothes.” Arabella undresses Amber, who is sitting, spent, on the floor. I rush to help her. “And when you get to a safe place, you should both dye your hair. Especially Ambrosia.”

There’s a clatter overhead. The sound of rushing footsteps.

“We need to be on our way,” Rémy says.

“Yes. I will be in touch again. Send word when you’re safe.” Arabella lifts my chin and lets her fingers drift up the sides of my face, just like Maman did. “Open your eyes wide.”

She inserts two films to change my eye color. I squeeze my eyes shut after and reopen them. My eyes blur and water.