69

Torden and the crew followed me into the hallway, all but Yu. I shut the door behind me.

I had helped protect the innocents living in Baba Yaga’s shadow. It was time to protect my own home.

I planted myself in front of the door and faced Alessandra. “You didn’t have to do any of this,” I said, staring her down. “Hurt him. Banish me. I would have been content to work in my fields and stay out of your way. But you wanted me gone, and you sacrificed my father to do it.”

Alessandra smirked, eyes wide, thick lashes fluttering. “Sir Perrault, did you give her elocution lessons? She’s grown so bold.” Pugh sniggered. Perrault didn’t respond. “You’re a child,” my stepmother said more evenly. “I arranged your courtship because your prospects at home were doomed.”

I paused, considering her.

This would have wilted me once.

Alessandra had always professed to be powerful, just as the tsarytsya had. But so much of her power rested upon expectations and bluffs. Truth be told, she was much closer kin to Midnight than to Baba Yaga.

Something about my silence seemed to dampen her. “Selah?” Alessandra demanded, irritable. “Perrault? Have you forgotten our arrangement?”

I didn’t even flinch. I knew Perrault better, this time.

“No.” Perrault shook his head. “That debt’s long paid. And it was never, ever Selah’s to bear.” He squeezed my shoulder, bracing me.

Perrault was different. Stronger. And so was I.

My stepmother glanced again at my ring and at Torden.

Once upon a time, I would have anxiously assured her that I’d gotten engaged, as she’d ordered, or explained with fear and trembling why I was not. I would have, at least, enjoyed her shock at seeing Torden. I would have played her game, terrified of what she could do to me if I did not.

Today, I just thought of Midnight flipping the Tooth and Claw board over in her tantrum, and smiled a little.

I crossed my arms. “You know, Alessandra, I met a lot of people on my trip. You remind me of a general I met. She was petty, and greedy, and in the end, everything she grasped at slipped through her fingers.

“I’ve been dragged in chains across Europe,” I said slowly. “I have ventured out into Stupka-Zamok on Wolf Night and lived to tell the story. I have sat opposite Baba Yaga herself and played Tooth and Claw and won.” I stepped closer to her. “You don’t frighten me, or impress me, anymore.”

Alessandra winced—just a little. Just enough. As the haughtiness on her face slipped, I saw there was nothing solider or stronger beneath it than selfishness.

“Tell me the truth,” I said. “Now.”

Alessandra drew farther back. But she ran into Cobie before she could get down the hallway. Skop and Vishnu backed her. The rest kept close to me.

“The builders of this place made room for the trees that grew beneath Arbor Hall’s floors. They carved spaces out for tree trunks they should have just pulled up by the roots.” Alessandra’s voice wobbled. “Those builders made room for the trees as this house would never make room for me.”

“That’s not true.” My voice was flat.

“I was never, ever allowed to forget who Violet Savannah Potomac was to this country,” she breathed. “To you, or to Jeremiah.”

I raised my eyebrows. “You wanted me to forget my mother?”

“There was nothing left for me!” Alessandra brayed. “I did my best to carve out a space of my own, to give Potomac’s commoners something to aspire to.” I gasped a weary, incredulous laugh; my stepmother ignored me.

“But you and your perfect dead mother took up all the air in the house. I realized eventually that I had to pull out by the roots those things that threatened to choke me.” Alessandra’s thin face grew hard and ugly. “How else would there ever be any room for my daughter?”

“Your—” I stopped short, startled. “Your daughter?”

Alessandra had had a child. Of course, I knew this. But to hear her speak of a girl, living in this house, my own flesh and blood—I reeled.

I needed a long moment to get my bearings.

Alessandra wiped her nose on her sleeve. “From the moment I knew I carried my Victoria, I vowed she would not live in anyone’s shadow. She would not be an afterthought to a story already told.”

“There is always breath for more than one story to be told,” I said in a low voice. “My heart was never closed to you as yours was to me.”

She had never loved me, had never wanted to make room for me. And it had never been my fault. The lack had never been mine.

“I would have been no trouble. Your mistake was sending me away. If my claws are sharper than yours now, it’s your own fault.”

Alessandra looked away from me, petulant. That night in the Roots, she had seemed so elegant, so grand and powerful; I had run from her crying, off-balance, terrified of everything that was about to change.

Here and now, I felt large. I felt broad and strong and grounded, flanked by my friends. I wasn’t crazy or imagining things; she had hurt my father.

Backed against the corridor wall, Alessandra, queen of falsehoods and facades, was too small to scare me anymore.

“Skop, Vishnu, Cobie,” I said, not looking away from her. “Restrain them, please. Anya and Perrault, please go get help.”

They were not gone long. To my surprise, Captain Janesley—Peter’s father—was one of several guards who answered my friends’ summons.

“Selah?” He looked uncertain.

“You’re not misunderstanding the situation, Captain,” I said swiftly. “Please arrest my stepmother and the doctor. They’ve nearly killed my father—poison. Everyone here will attest to that, including Dr. Gold and my own doctor, who are tending to him now.”

“It’s a baseless charge. You have no proof,” Dr. Pugh said. His eyes were darting wildly between the guards.

“Not yet.” I kept my voice even. “But I’ve become a great believer in process, Dr. Pugh. In letting people speak, and letting the truth come out. I believe the same will happen here.” I paused and glanced back at Peter’s father. “Captain?”

Captain Janesley hesitated only a moment. Then he nodded efficiently at me. “Yes, Seneschal-elect.”

Alessandra and Dr. Pugh were both speaking to me as they were borne away. Threats, apologies, protests. I wasn’t quite sure what they said.

Words were powerful. In stories, in songs, in prayers, in promises.

But theirs had no power here anymore.