The Everlasting Rose (The Belles, #2)(11)
He opens a door and ushers us inside. Night-lanterns float through a pleasant bedroom. Two beds are pushed against opposite walls. A gold-striped couch and matching armchair sit beside the solitary window. Mirrors hang above a modest vanity.
“I’m going to go buy the most recent papers and get a sense of where the guards are,” Rémy says as he leaves the room.
I let the teacup dragons out of my pouch. They stretch their tiny wings, then hiss and tiptoe through the room, sniffing every object in their path. I call out the names Amber gave them—Feuille for the green, Poivre for the red, Or for the gold, Eau for the blue, and Fant?me for the white.
Edel flits them away as they circle her, begging for attention. “We were tracked. Had to have been,” she mumbles angrily.
“I think it’s my fault,” I say with a shrug. “I’ve been sneaking out.”
“What? Where have you been going?” Edel demands.
I drop my hand in my dress pocket, the raised glass grooves of the poison bottle finding my fingers. I almost show it to her, but a twinge in my stomach makes me bury the secret.
“I couldn’t take being stuck in that tiny room all the time. I needed air—some space to think,” I lie. “Maybe I was followed?”
“That’s too easy.” Edel brushes her hand along one of the bed frames, then sits. “They would’ve just arrested you on the spot. Why follow you to the boardinghouse? Why interrogate all the boarders and do a search?”
The green teacup dragon, Feuille, climbs into my lap and curls into a tiny ball. “Maybe one of us was spotted while running errands, but they didn’t know which boardinghouse we’d returned to.”
“Someone like Amber?” Edel asks, arching an eyebrow.
I take a deep breath. “What do you think she did, exactly?”
Edel snaps upright. “Look! I know you’ve always loved her more than you love the rest of us.”
“I have not. You’re all my sisters.” I set Feuille on the floor and rush to sit at Edel’s side. I touch her, and she yanks away.
“We all felt it. Hana, Valerie, Padma, and me. It was always the two of you....” She purses her lips. “You can’t see it. Or maybe you don’t want to see it. But she’s hiding something... I know it.”
The door snaps open. Rémy returns with an armful of newspapers and the latest newsreel.
Edel stands and turns to Rémy. “What are the papers saying?”
“Find the room’s télétrope,” Rémy says.
Edel riffles through the nearest bureau and retrieves a dusty télétrope. She opens the machine’s bottom compartment, fishes out a wobbly matchstick, and lights the tea candle in its base.
I take one of the papers from Rémy’s stack. Poivre tries to nibble its edges, but I wrestle it from the teacup’s tiny fangs, his mouth warm with the promise of fire.
I think of Amber. Edel’s words linger, sinking into my skin. A whisper echoes inside me: What does my and Amber’s closeness have to do with her not trusting Amber?
A knot squeezes in my throat, thickening with regret and threatening to choke me.
Edel takes the film from Rémy and inserts it into the télétrope. “Close the curtains, and blow out the night-lanterns.”
Rémy extinguishes them. I bunch the curtains closed. The teacup dragons squeak and flutter about, protesting the dark until the newsreel projects on the wall. An image of Sophia appears. She’s seated on her throne surrounded by her teacup animals—her monkey, Singe, at her shoulder, her elephant, Zo, in her lap, and a small bunny on her scepter. Her grating voice drifts through the télétrope’s tiny voice-box. “The time of the Belles is over. Orléans has been at the mercy of their powers for too long. They’ve been able to lord it over us. But never again, now that I am queen.”
Edel paces.
My cheeks warm as if the arcana are waking up. “We’ve lorded it over them? No! They beg for our help. They work us until we’re sick. Du Barry was the one who profited—not us!”
Sophia continues: “We will take back control. I will regulate the entire beauty system—it will cater to all our needs when we’re at the very heart of it. Those who don’t cooperate will meet a deadly fate. The Fugitive Belle Act has just passed without a single protest vote in my new cabinet. I’m going to round up all the runaway Belles. They will live in my prison, the Everlasting Rose. They will be raised and trained there, and prepared for their duties to our great country. They’re dangerous and aggressive, and need to be watched and controlled for their own benefit. My loyal subjects, the reward for bringing me Edel Beauregard has risen from eight hundred fifty thousand leas to one million leas.”
Edel gasps.
“And anyone who brings me Camille Beauregard, my disgraced favorite, the Belle who killed two of my most beloveds: Lady Claudine, Duchesse de Bissay, and”—her voice breaks in mock-upset—“and my best friend, my sister, Princess Charlotte...”
“What?” I cry.
Tears fall down her cheeks as the people in the crowd before her shout in agreement. My pulse is a throbbing drum, counting down the moments of this newsreel like racing sand in an hourglass.
“Yes, it has been confirmed that she experimented on my sister’s weak body and stopped her heart,” Sophia says. “And she will be punished. Two million leas for anyone who brings her to me. And if she is delivered by the time of Princess Charlotte’s viewing and the coronation, I’ll give you your own small palace. My mother’s favorite summer one on the Isle of Minnate. You have seven days. An auspicious number revered by the Goddess of Love.” She smiles, showing the perfect sliver of teeth. “My dearly beloved mother was a passive queen. I will not be.”