Grim Lovelies (Grim Lovelies 1)

“You don’t know what we can do,” he answered. “Nobody does. Until two days ago, even I would have laughed if you’d told me we could cast whispers.” He cocked the rifle. “Do you want to risk it?”

Petra’s expression turned very serious as she faced Anouk. “Listen—?you’re going to get yourselves killed unless you give this up. There are other ways to stay human.” Her voice wasn’t unkind.

“By siding with Rennar?” Anouk shook her head. “We’re no one’s pawns.”

Luc and Beau leaned against the heavy wine-cellar door until it slammed shut, and they locked Petra and the countess in. Petra didn’t resist, but Countess Quine hurled herself against the door, though the lock mechanism had long ago been secured with Mada Zola’s own magic, and no amount of whispering could open it.

Anouk tossed one last look to Petra behind the bars. The witch’s girl sat against the wall, legs folded under her, a nasty look on her face—?but it was aimed at the countess, as if Quine was the last person she wanted to be imprisoned with. Her eyes shifted to Anouk and softened.

“Good luck, then.”

Returning to the kitchen required more than a little skillful shimmying to scale a staircase with no stairs. Once they had made it, Anouk hurried to the kitchen window and stood on tiptoe. Outside, remnants of smoke hung over the gardens. The battle was still raging. Sparks of magic, wielded by the lesser Royals stationed at various windows, sizzled across the gardens. Despite the awful sight of slain Goblins in the grass, it looked like the Goblins might be getting the upper hand. The remaining ones had formed a stronghold near the potting shed and magicked a swarm of termites to go after the wooden soldiers.

Anouk and the others started for the rear hallway, but they hadn’t gone three steps before a shadow crossed their path. Lady Metham materialized by the kitchen door. Her fingers sparked with magic; her lips were stained with powder. Anouk and the others scrambled backward.

“My eucalyptus supply is down to dust,” Cricket whispered in a rush. “Hunter Black? Your borage?”

“Lost with my coat.”

Viggo’s blood throbbed in Anouk’s body, but she didn’t dare use it up on anyone other than Zola or Rennar. “Right. Then run!” she commanded.

The five of them bolted down the central hall. Lady Metham followed. She didn’t deign to run; she simply swallowed powder and then projected herself twenty feet ahead, cutting off the beasties. Anouk skittered to a stop just as Lady Metham swiped a silver dagger at her throat, missing by only a hair. Luc grabbed Anouk and they ran down a side hall, but Lady Metham projected herself there too, blocking the exit.

“Don’t you know when you’ve lost, beasties?” Lady Metham taunted.

“Tell the blade in your shoulder that we’ve lost,” Cricket spat.

Lady Metham looked down at her pristine dress with a frown. “What blade—”

Even before she’d finished speaking, Cricket had drawn and thrown a blade. It sank into Lady Metham’s left shoulder with perfect precision, and she released a strained cry. Blood poured down the side of her dress, staining the gossamer fabric. She reached for her powder. Anouk got a dark premonition.

“Changa, changa,” Lady Metham spat in Cricket’s direction with eyes that were blazing with fury, “a forma verum.”

Anouk recognized the spell with a gasp.

“No—?Cricket, run!”

But it was too late. Cricket had nowhere to go. They were penned in by walls on three sides and Lady Metham on the fourth. With a whisper and a twist of her hands, Lady Metham cast out an aura of sparking magic, which floated to surround Cricket. Cricket swatted at the magic glimmers as if they were gnats, clawing at the places where they hit her. But the magic clung to her. Wherever the sparks touched her skin, it rippled and puckered. Her left arm contorted, and she screamed and clutched at it. Long white hairs sprang up from the scratch marks she carved into her own skin. More white hairs sprouted around her neck and spread down her chest. Her curly brown hair was now threaded with white, and her chest contorted too, folding in on itself. Her screams changed to yowls.

Anouk couldn’t watch. Clammy sweat poured over her brow, and her mouth was suddenly dry. Her greatest fears—?the things she’d not even dared to think about in midnight hours—?were happening before her eyes. And she couldn’t stop it. With every yowl, she felt an equal pain in her own chest, as though it were her changing too.

And then the crackling magic stopped. Anouk dared to open her eyes, and her stomach plummeted. There it was—?the white cat from the painting. Long pearl-white hair, a fluffy tail with a crook at the tip. Her knees buckled. The cat . . . it wasn’t Cricket. Not anymore. There was nothing of Cricket’s wit or love of Pretty candy. Nothing of her twinkling eyes. At least death was final: This felt somehow worse, a body that continued existing in this awful, twisted form.

Beau caught Anouk in his arms, tried to turn her face away, but her gaze was fixed on the cat. It started to lick one paw. Back in the oubliette, one of the five pelts would be gone now, dissipated into the ether, magically returned to the flesh and bones of its original owner.

Anouk turned on Lady Metham sharply. “You putain!”

The lady was slumped against the wall. Her face was pale; there was a light sheen of sweat across her forehead. It had taken much for her to perform such a complex spell—?Anouk suspected that somewhere beneath that dress a kidney or her liver had turned to stone—?but she wore a grimly satisfied smile.

“That’s one little kitty. Soon to be four more animals once Rennar gets hold of you.”

Anouk felt a sort of madness come over her as she stared at the cat. In her entire life, short as it had been, she had never experienced such rage, this crackling heat that flushed up her chest and made her whole body shake . . .

“I hope you have some other trick up your sleeve,” Luc whispered to Hunter Black.

“He doesn’t have to,” Anouk answered in a deathly low voice. “I do.”

Her anger drew together, concentrating itself somewhere deep within her unbeating heart. She murmured under her breath.