“It was dead. Right in my hands. I picked it up and it was all—all broken and bloody.” Tess shudders.
Vi’s plummy eyes are filled with tears, but she blinks them back valiantly. “It’s dead, but—” Her hands search its spotless white fur. There is no blood, no wound save the obvious. Its little head droops at a strange angle.
“She dropped it.” Lucy wipes away tears with the backs of both hands, and draws in a deep breath. “Tess picked it up, and then she just—dropped it.”
“It was already dead!” Tess stands, hanging on to the wooden railing. “I thought—it looked dead. There was blood all over my hands.”
She holds up both palms, as if to prove her point—but they’re spotless, too.
I turn to Lucy. “Did you see the illusion?”
Lucy shakes her head, caramel braids swinging. “No.”
“Nothing at all?” I press. “Was anyone else in the hallway?”
“I don’t think so.” Lucy twists her pudgy hands together. “I looked up when Tess cried out, but then she dropped it and—it was too late. It tumbled right down the steps.”
“I saw it!” Tess’s voice is anguished as she makes her shaky way down to us. “I swear I did. I’m not making it up, and I’m not going mad!”
“Course you aren’t!” Bekah sounds indignant. “You’d never.”
“Vi, I’m—I’m so sorry,” Tess says.
“I know.” Vi is staring at the kitten cradled in her hands; she doesn’t meet Tess’s eyes.
Bekah links her arm through Tess’s. “Come on, let’s go back to the parlor,” she suggests, leading her away.
“Why don’t you give him to me?” Sachi holds out her hands, and Vi brushes her fingers over the kitten’s furry head one more time before she relinquishes it. Tears spill over her cheeks. “It’s all right. Get Noelle and take her upstairs. I’ll take care of this.”
She and Vi go their separate ways, but Lucy lingers on the bottom step. “Is there something else?” I ask.
Lucy toys with one of her braids. “I don’t want to be a tattletale.”
“If it’s about Tess, I need to know so I can look after her,” I say.
“I’m worried about her.” Lucy’s gaze is still trained on the floor. “On Tuesday, we were going up to my room so she could help me with my Latin, and she swore she heard music.”
I lean against the wooden banister as dread blooms through me. “What kind of music?”
“A funeral dirge. Only I didn’t hear a thing. I even ran down to check if Livvy was playing the piano, but no one was there. And then yesterday morning, Tess asked me to come in and help her do up the back of her dress. She was looking in the mirror and she started screaming. She said—” Lucy gulps. “She said the front of her dress was all covered in blood. She tore it off and threw it in the fireplace. I tried to stop her, but—”
My hand flies to my mouth. “No one was there but you? No one else saw?”
“No. But all of these—episodes—they’ve got one thing in common, haven’t they?” Lucy whispers, her brown eyes enormous. “It’s like she’s preoccupied with—”
“Death,” I finish. Fear shivers up my back. Is this how madness begins? Is this how it started for the oracles before Tess?
“You mustn’t tell anyone else. Let me handle this,” I insist. “Promise me.”
Lucy nods. “I promise.”
Chapter 15
I KNOCK LIGHTLY ON MAURA’S DOOR JUST after dawn.
She opens it a few inches. “What is it? Parvati’s still sleeping.”
I crook a finger, beckoning her out. “I need to talk to you.”
She tiptoes out in stocking feet, closing the door softly behind her. Her hair falls in bright curls to her waist. She’s already dressed in a black wool frock with rabbit fur at the wide belled sleeves. “I thought you and Tess washed your hands of me.”
I don’t know what to say. We’re sisters, and no matter how angry I am, that still means something. I’ve been awake half the night, worried sick about Tess. What if her worst fears are being realized, and she is beginning the slow descent into madness? Brenna’s brokenness was due in part to Alice’s mind-magic gone wrong, but Brenna wasn’t the first oracle to go mad. And Tess—brilliant, capable, curious Tess—how could she bear it?
Tess saw something that Brenna feared would break her. Something Tess confessed she couldn’t keep from me forever. Did she foresee her own madness?
“It’s Tess,” I say finally. “Are you absolutely certain Inez isn’t terrorizing her?”
Maura sighs, propping one hand on her hip. “I told you, it’s not her. What’s happened now? It must be something awful for you to come to me.”
“You asked me to come to you.” I purse my lips. “But you’ve got to promise—before I tell you, Maura, I want you to swear you won’t tell Inez. That you won’t tell anyone. Swear it on Mother’s grave.”
“Good Lord,” Maura breathes. She knows that for me to invoke Mother, it must be serious. “What—very well, I swear on Mother’s grave that whatever it is, I won’t breathe a word of it to anyone. Will that do?”
“Thank you.” I twist Mother’s pearl ring round and round on my finger, avoiding Maura’s eyes. “There have been other episodes. Several of them now. And I’m—well, I’m afraid it may all be in her head.”
“That she’s going mad.” Maura steps closer as she utters the words I can’t bring myself to say aloud.
“I don’t know what to do,” I whisper, sinking back against the green flowered wallpaper. “She must be so scared.”
Maura’s shoulders slump. “I would be terrified.”
“Me too.” Not being able to trust my own senses—I can’t even imagine it. “We’ve got to look out for her, without letting her know. She needs us.”
“We?” Maura squints up at me. “You want us to work together? Does that mean you’re willing to put the past behind us?”
I set my jaw. “I’m willing to try and work with you. For Tess’s sake.”
Maura laughs her new, brittle laugh. “How gracious of you. Cate, do you even hear yourself? How condescending you are?”
“What do you expect? You erased me!” My hands vibrate as magic hums through me, and I clasp them tightly behind my back. “Perhaps if you apologized . . .”
Her blue eyes meet mine as she shakes her head. “No.”
I gape at her. No? I offer her an olive branch, and she throws it to the ground and stomps on it.
I try. I try and try and even when I swear I’ve turned my back on her, I wind up trying again.
She won’t tell me she’s sorry because she’s not. Maura’s never been one for a polite lie. She’s never had my compunctions about mind-magic, never thought it wicked or wrong. She didn’t hesitate to use it on Father or the O’Hares. Her friends, Finn, the Head Council: They’ve all been recipients of her ruthlessness. Maura wouldn’t hesitate to—