This was embarrassing enough. “Turn me back.”
“To follow him in there? You’re better off dead. Stay in your glamor, Lilac. Trust me.” The witch glared warningly.
No, she would not follow Garin anywhere dressed this way.
Lilac stamped back to the carriage door; she refused to join Garin for his glass of scotch or whatever it was at five in the fucking morning when they had Kestrel’s quest to complete. Adelaide placed her hand on the frame, which scattered with violet sparks for a second. Lilac tugged at the handle, but it was no use.
“Adelaide, let me in.”
“No. I need to reset the spell, and having you hanging around will just be an irritating distraction, if not a reason for townsfolk to come interrogate us. Go away.”
A glance at the firefly showed that it was still circling the door, traveling from a pair of men who’d stepped out to share a drink on the stoop, and the torch that lit the peeling pub sign.
The Jaunty Hog. She knew it well without ever having been.
Lilac turned back to Adelaide with a frown. “What does this mean?”
“It usually does this around a roadblock, something preventing me from accessing the destination.”
“But this is no roadblock. It’s a pub.”
“Right.” Adelaide stood, leaning over the front railing, sneering. “It is a door, which you must go through in order to discover justwhatis causing the error in my spell, before I leave you all stranded and put your driver’s organs in my ingredients cabinet.”
“Dressed like this?” Lilac hissed. “I thought your spell would help me blend in.”
The witch shook her head, her onyx hair falling around her face. “Illusory tonics and their glamors are only designed to help the wearer looknotthemselves. And you certainly,” she said with a sharp cackle, “are most unrecognizable.”
The moment Lilac entered,she deeply regretted not bringing her cloak. She recognized the owner right away. Bog Abgrall, a stout fellow with beady eyes and a half circle of thinning brown hair framing the sheen of his otherwise bald head, stood behind the bar, cleaning tankards and chucking them into a wide bucket. He was often at the castle during her father’s Court of Common Appeals, reporting the infractions of neighboring shops or requesting repair loans, by which Henri had been generous; one might wonder what needed repairing if not for the ancient cracked bar, sticky pocked floor, or the rickety tables and chairs that befell her nervous gaze now.
Bog didn’t look up as she entered. “Be right with you.”
Lilac muttered her thanks and approached Garin. He was seated upon a barstool with his back to her, another stool pulled closely to him. He didn’t turn to look her way, seemingly distracted.
She followed his gaze to the right corner at the back of the room, where a group of men lounged in one of the booths to the left of the blazing hearth carved into the wall. Three of them were half asleep and the other four were actually snoring, their heads resting against their seats or slumped onto the table. Upon the two tables they’d pulled together were acouple tattered journals, a thin stack of parchment, a quill, and a large piece of paper that appeared to be some sort of illustration. One older couple sat at the other end of the bar. The pub was otherwise empty.
“Two cups of cider, please,” Garin said, not taking his eyes off the table. He finally turned as she approached the bar beside him—and blinked. Garin’s pupils widened, even as his brows rose. He glanced around, watching the elderly woman nudge her partner in the side as Lilac climbed upon the stool next to Garin. “She’ll take a metal tankard, if you’ve got any of those.”
Bog muttered something about special accommodations, then looked up at her. He double-took, and a wide grin spread over his face. He fished in one of the presumably clean tankard buckets, turned to the barrels behind him, finished with their drinks and brought it over, beaming. “On the house for the lovely couple. Congratulations. I’ll bring some food.”
Lilac pulled her drink the rest of the way across the counter, planning on bringing it to her mouth to pretend to swig from it. When she lifted it, she gasped, hiding her shock in the cup. She swallowed air and could see Garin in the corner of her eye, one foot up on his stool beam, one bouncing on the floor, watching her. He hooked a finger into the handle and then pulled his cup toward himself, expressionless.
She fumbled with the cup, holding it again in front of her to see her reflection. All the remnants of blood she’d probably missed under her nails and in the creases of her face were gone. Her hands went to her hair, which was no longer chestnut but a deeper shade of mahogany—the edges auburn, as if backlit by the sun—and gathered into a pretty, thick bun at the base of her scalp, loose curls daintily framing her face. Her full cheeks were primed in a vibrant wash of color as if bitten by winter wind, lips and eyelids painted in the same lovely shade of berry. Her chest was adorned in a lace filigree of branches and leaves with glittering crystal dewdrops upon a plunging dress that framed her chest, her arms covered in fitted cream sleeves lined in the same sheer material.
She’d seen the dress in the carriage, which was devastating enough, butthis…
She’d witnessed this vision before, in her reflection at the Lake of Mirrors, where Kestrel had deposited them. This was some kind of mistake; ithadto be. This disguise was supposed to hide her. The oldcouple across the bar and the men at the table were staring, but it seemed to be because of her dress and not her identity. Adelaide had been right; her features were so enhanced by the cosmetic trickery she stared at now that she wouldn’t be recognized.
Was this a joke? No one else knew about the threat of France—and what her parents believed the solution to be.
Or did they?
There were no shadows under her eyes, which were clearer, sharper in the candlelight of the tavern. A stranger stared back. In her reflection, she looked sure of herself, sure of her decision. She looked beautiful, even in her devastation.
Eleanor Trécesson was radiant.
She was a bride.
7
