Three days later, there were no more tears left to cry.
Tired of her thoughts about Latimer, which wound around in the same circle over and over, Selena decided further isolation was not only maddening, but pointless.
No one from the Assembly had come to the castle to retrieve her, and she needed to face the possibility no one would. So much of her life had been spent waiting for something to happen—her engagement to the nobleman of her mother’s choosing, Lucas Thorne’s proposal, a visit from another spell-caster. Well, she thought, it is time I start making things happen myself.
If the Assembly would not come to her, she would go to it.
Saying goodbye to her grandmother would be the most difficult part of leaving Castle Nelesti. Celeste was her only reason to stay, but even if Selena cherished her trips into her grandmother’s mind and the close connection she found there, she could admit to herself that the mind-scrying spell was in no way helping Celeste.
Sitting beside the unresponsive woman, she started to envy her.
Celeste had married Selena’s grandfather because she loved him. Before marrying Graham Nelesti, Celeste had seen a lot of her native Torred and had traveled throughout Continae.
“When I find the Seminary, I will speak to every single white-robe I find until I have found someone who can help,” she whispered to her grandmother. “And if they cannot, I shall scour Altaerra for a cleric who can.”
Although the memory of the black-clad wizardess and her cohorts was all too fresh in her mind, Selena summoned the courage to see Celeste—as she was—one last time before leaving home.
Restrictions be damned.
* * *
Maybe it was Selena’s own fear that sent her to this particular memory—one of Celeste’s most troubled moments.
Possibly, she had unconsciously sought out an unhappy experience, as though looking for evidence that her grandmother’s life had not been entirely wonderful. Or perhaps Quess—Lady Red herself—had intervened.
Selena found herself in one of the castle’s many corridors. Celeste was moving slowly in the direction of her parents’ room. As she—they—drew nearer, Selena heard a voice that was at once strange but also familiar.
“Quite a lass you got there, Sis,” came the heavily accented voice of a man. “Selena sure can toss ’em back.”
The voice that replied was undeniably Charlotte’s. “What are you doing here, Willard? If you have come for more money—”
Uncle Will went on as though uninterrupted. “She’s not like your other brats, is she, Char?”
A heavy moment of silence followed in which Selena held her breath. Apparently, Celeste also wanted to hear the rest of the conversation because she remained still, lurking outside the not-quite-shut door. Grandmother and granddaughter listened, transfixed, as the dialogue resumed.
“What do you mean by that?” Charlotte demanded, though her tone had lost much of its bluster.
“She reminds me o’ somebody,” Willard O’Camber answered. “An old chum of mine in fact. Maybe it’s the red hair…she’s the only whelp o’ yours that’s got it, right? Or maybe it’s her height. She’ll be taller than Godfrey one day. Ah, I’ve just recalled of who Selena reminds me of.”
“Do not say it.” Her mother’s words were so soft Selena nearly did not hear them.
“Say what, sister o’ mine?” Willard teased. “That Selena looks more like Finbar Kemyss than Godfrey Nelesti?”
Another pause followed. Were she not reliving an old woman’s memory, Selena might have barged into the room and confronted her mother and uncle. But at this point in time, Selena would have been back in her bedroom, suffering through her first hangover. Uncle Will had already stopped by.
Now, thanks to magic, Selena was privy to what had transpired after Charlotte fetched her brother.
“It is true then,” Willard said from the other side of the door. “Selena is Finbar’s. The timing is right I suppose. Me an’ Fin did come ’round about nine months before the girl was born. I guess you two didn’t waste any time in getting reacquainted, eh?”
“How—” Charlotte’s voice faltered. She cleared her throat and said more firmly, “How much will your silence cost?”
Uncle Will chuckled. “So much for reminiscing, eh? Ah, well, right to the point then. One thousand suns ought to do the trick. Superian gold’s worth quite a bit at home, Char…not that you’ve been back to Param since you left it, not even to put flowers on Mum’s grave.”
Her mother made a noise that might have been an exasperated laugh. “One thousand suns? You are either mad or—”
“Drunk?” Willard supplied. “I’m neither, Sis. An’ don’t try to tell me you don’t have the money. Your husband’s one of the wealthiest men in Continae.”
“Not so wealthy he won’t notice one thousand suns missing from the treasury!” Charlotte argued, a hint of a lower-class accent creeping into her voice. “How do you expect me to explain this to Godfrey?”
“Not my problem,” said Willard dismissively.
“How can you do this, Will? We’re…we are your family. How do you live with yourself?”
Willard must have turned to face the door because his voice came louder, “Live with myself? I do this so I can live. Not all of us can weasel our way into an aristocrat’s bed. A man’s got to eat. An’ we all must use the talents the gods’ve given us to survive.”
“I never want to see you again.” Selena could barely hear her mother. “No more handouts. If I give you this money, you are never to return to Castle Nelesti.”
“Agreed,” Willard said. “I’ll be gone as soon as you fork over the coins. I’ll even wait here if you’d like. Heavens forbid I spend any more quality time with my nieces or nephews…my family.”
The sound of approaching footsteps caused Celeste—and, therefore, Selena—to draw back from the door. Selena’s grandmother retreated farther down the hallway but paused when Charlotte spoke again.
“There is one more condition,” her mother said.
“I’m listening,” Uncle Will said.
“You cannot tell anyone, especially not Finbar.”
Willard made a low humming sound. “You want me to conceal the good news from my best and oldest friend in all o’ the world? He doesn’t have any other children, least not that I know of. Who’m I to deny him the joys of fatherhood?”
“Willard!” Charlotte’s tone was identical to the one she assumed when reprimanding Barclay and Lucian.
“A’right, a’right,” Willard replied, “Your secret is safe with me.”
“You swear on your soul you will not tell Finbar or anyone else?”
Selena did not hear her uncle’s response. The castle’s stone walls began to shimmer like curtains in the wind. Darkness seeped up from the floor. She did not bother to fight against the spell’s expiration. She knew what came next. Her mother would pay off her twin brother and then, once he was gone, claim Willard had stolen it.
Back in Celeste’s stuffy room, Selena braced herself against the dizziness that always followed the mind-scrying spell. The beating of her heart reverberated painfully inside her skull, and her body felt heavier than the thick stew the twins always wolfed down before a hunt.
There was a chance Celeste’s feeble mind had manufactured the memory. For all Selena knew every memory her grandmother possessed could be laced with lies, a symptom of whatever ailment robbed her of awareness. Maybe Riley really had hit her first and not the other way around.
Maybe Willard had pilfered the thousand suns, not blackmailed her mother into giving it to him.
Selena suddenly remembered the conversation she had had with her grandmother a few days after her coming-of-age ball. Celeste had been distracted, distant. They had argued about something, and Selena had thought her grandmother was angry about how she had made a fool of herself at the party.
What if she had been upset about something else?
Anger gnawed at her gut. She wanted to rise up and throw the chair across the room. Not that that would have roused her grandmother. How could she not have told Selena the truth?
“Did you at least confront her?” Selena asked the shell of Celeste Nelesti.
But she knew Celeste had not. Her grandmother would have kept the terrible secret to the grave and beyond to protect her granddaughter—and her son.
“You blind fool,” Selena whispered, though she could not have said, just then, whom she was insulting.
Only two people could fill in the gaps in the story, and Selena doubted her uncle would show his face at Castle Nelesti anytime soon. Which left her mother.