“Or perhaps,” said another voice, causing everyone to turn, “Rune has been out rescuing witches all night. They say the Crimson Moth only works beneath the cover of darkness.”
The words chilled Rune, who looked directly into the piercing eyes of Laila Creed. Laila was several inches taller—which always made it seem like she was looking down her nose at Rune—and a member of the Blood Guard.
She was also beautiful, with prominent cheekbones and raven-black hair crowned high on her head. Rune recognized the design of the high-waisted peacock blue dress. It was the work of Sebastian Khan, a popular dressmaker from the mainland whose wait list was almost a year long and whose dresses were the envy of the season. It was impossible to acquire one unless you had considerable wealth and connections.
Rune had two in her closet.
That fact that Laila wore the rare dress and not her uniform meant she was off duty tonight. She likely hadn’t been one of the witch hunters who’d brought Seraphine in.
Rune’s blood ran cold at the memory of Seraphine’s empty house. Of how the Blood Guard soldiers found the witch right before Rune showed up. If she was being spied on, that spy could very well be Laila, who had never liked Rune, for reasons she could only guess at.
Donning her mask—the one she hid the true Rune Winters behind—Rune threw back her head and laughed.
“Ha! Can you imagine it? Me, spending my nights gallivanting across this damned island, with its ghastly weather and endless mud and rain? Think of what it would do to my Minews!”
She pulled up the hem of her skirt to show off the silk shoes, custom made by Evelyn Minew, a couture artist halfway across the world whose designs were one of a kind and never replicated. It had taken half a year for Rune to get in touch with her, and another year for the shoes to arrive.
Take that, Laila Creed.
At the looks of astonishment and envy, Rune dropped her hem and, smiling, entered the circle forming around her, stepping a little in front of Laila to edge her out. Lowering her voice, a little conspiratorially, she said, “Did you hear? The vigilante smuggled her last batch of witches out through the sewers. The sewers! Just think!”
Their noses wrinkled with disgust.
Rune didn’t need to fake her reaction. Her stomach twisted at the memory of it: the putrid odor of raw sewage filling the dark tunnel, sloshing around her knees as she and the twin sisters she’d rescued—they were barely thirteen—walked through the stench for miles beneath the city. A servant had found their bedsheets hidden beneath the floorboards and informed on the girls. The bloodstains weren’t red, but black—the telltale sign of a witch who’d come into her powers at the onset of her first bleeding.
That night, Alexander Sharpe—the same friend who had tipped Rune off to the Blood Guard closing in on Nan—had been waiting on the other end with fresh clothes and a horse that would take the girls directly to the docks, where one of Rune’s loaded cargo ships was ready to set sail. Alex was always waiting on the other end. Sometimes with horses or a carriage; other times with boats. He was the getaway man in their heists, and he never let Rune down.
The cargo ship arrived in port two days ago, and the twins had sent a coded message saying they were safe on the mainland.
“Anyone who prefers wading through poo to sleeping soundly in a soft, clean bed is, well, revolting.” Growing warm beneath her cloak, Rune untied the tassels at her throat.
The surrounding party murmured their agreement. Except for one person—Laila.
“But isn’t that precisely what the Crimson Moth would say?”
Rune’s fingers stiffened as the tassels of the cloak came undone. The garment slipped from her bare shoulders, and before she could grab it, someone stepped behind her, catching the fine wool and folding it over his arm.
“Come now,” said a comforting voice near her ear. “If Rune was the Moth, would she have delivered her grandmother to be purged?”
As the owner of the voice stepped beside Rune, she glanced up. Alex Sharpe. In the presence of her oldest friend—a genuine friend, like Verity—every muscle in her body relaxed.
He looked like a lion tonight, with his golden hair shining beneath the light of the chandeliers. His gaze was warm and steady on her face, but his forehead creased ever so slightly, saying he knew where she’d been, and he’d worried about her.
Noah Creed—Laila’s brother and a young man who’d made Verity’s short list of Suitors Rune Needs to Consider—cut in.
“The Crimson Moth hasn’t struck in weeks,” Noah said, also defending Rune. To support this theory, he added: “I heard they brought in another witch tonight, completely unhindered. The Moth didn’t even try to rescue her.”
Rune’s attention homed in on Noah.
Where did you hear that, I wonder?
Noah shared his sister’s deep brown eyes, high cheekbones, and ocher skin tone. Not only was he handsome in his black overcoat with sloping shoulders and silk lapel, but he was also the son of the Good Commander. That position put him very close to a firsthand source of the most classified intel, making him a fine option indeed.
But will he notice his wife slipping out of bed in the night? Or coming home exhausted after dawn … sometimes with bruises?
Rune turned her smile on Noah. “A witch? Brought in tonight? Don’t tease us, Noah. Tell us more.”
Noah’s eyes widened at finding himself the subject of her attention. But he lifted his hands in protest. “Gideon Sharpe brought her in. That’s all I know.”
Gideon Sharpe.
Rune’s lip nearly curled at the name of Alex’s older brother. Devoutly loyal to the New Republic, Gideon was a ruthless, bloodthirsty witch hunter who’d sent more of Rune’s kind to the purge than any other member of the Guard.
He’d also famously helped assassinate the Sister Queens, sparking the revolution into a blaze.
Rune hated him.
The two Sharpe brothers couldn’t be more different.
Catching Rune’s gaze, Verity raised a dark eyebrow, asking a silent question. In answer, Rune tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, showing off her grandmother’s ruby earrings. She’d put them on earlier tonight, and they dripped from her ears like beads of blood. The earrings were her answer—failure—telling her partner in crime everything she needed to know about how tonight went. Seraphine is in enemy hands. Either Verity would figure out the rest herself or Rune would fill her in before the after-party she was hosting later tonight.
At the sight of the rubies, Verity’s mouth pinched. Turning away from Rune, she quickly cleared her throat.
“Well, I’ve always thought Missus Blackwater is the Moth,” she said, commanding the group’s attention as she glanced across the loud, brightly lit hall toward an old woman with frizzy hair and a neck strung with too many pearls. Missus Blackwater sat alone on the opera café’s terrace, murmuring to herself. “Can you imagine the old biddy leading the Blood Guard on a wild goose chase? What a perfect disguise!”
At that, everyone burst out laughing.
As more guesses were made, Rune took the chance Verity gave her and slipped silently into the crowd, armed with a new purpose: tracking down Gideon Sharpe.
THREE
GIDEON
ANOTHER NIGHT, ANOTHER WITCH.
Gideon Sharpe pressed his fists against the shower tiles. Letting the hot water scald his back, he stared blankly at the blood running like ink down his skin and swirling around the drain.
He couldn’t tell if the blood was real or imagined. The nightmares were no longer confined to his sleeping hours; they often struck in the middle of his waking ones now.
But this was no nightmare. He knew whose blood this was. It was as real as he was.
You shouldn’t have left them alone with her.
The Tasker brothers had a lust for disobeying orders. And though Gideon himself had no love for witches, he didn’t tolerate unnecessary cruelty. He’d wanted to discharge the brothers the last time they’d bludgeoned a witch half to death, but had been told by his betters that beating a witch senseless was no different from beating a disease-ridden rat.