Page 124 of Summer of Sacrifice

“All of which would lead to emaciation. We need to learn his official cause of death.”

“That might be difficult.”

“Why is that? He’s the son of the duke.”

“Ah, but he’s been in Sager Asylum, a home for the insane, for the last two years. Likely, the duke doesn’t even know yet what’s happened to his son.”

Or he wouldn’t be strapped to an experimentation device beneath Société de Guerre.

Seleste’s earlier suspicions were niggling at the back of her head. If the heir to the dukedom had been declared mad, her fears might be entirely unfounded… “Cal, would Lord Nicolas still have become duke, even though he’d gone mad?”

Cal made to stroke his chin, his hand landing on a mask instead. “Yes. Peerage demands blood relation. The duke has no other sons, only three daughters. Lord Nicolas would have inherited and been aided in his seat by…” He paused, considering. “I believe in the case of madness or physical impairment, it is the duke’s physician who takes up the mantle to help him make decisions, et cetera.”

Seleste winced behind her mask. “To Sager Asylum, then.”

But she feared she already knew what they would discover there.

Halfway up the stairs, Cal paused. “Wait here. I’ll be right back.” And he rushed back down into the basement.

Seleste, Then

ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS AGO

Screams rent the night.

The Sager Asylum rose before them like a gargoyle come up from Hades. Its towers and spires a thing of Gothic legend. Seleste wished she could have summoned Aggie to see it.

“Remind me why we came here at night?” Cal said, suppressing a shiver as they stared up at the looming building.

“Time.” They hadn’t much of it. Ominous clouds were rolling in to conceal the moon, and Seleste adjusted her cloak against the chill that was slowly beckoning in Autumn. “And because it took us nearly all of the day to procure our forged identities.”

“What is it?” Cal caught her arm as she made to walk forward toward the spooky asylum. “Has the asylum unnerved you?” He stopped himself, studying her. “No. That’s not it. What has your eyes so clouded?”

Bitterness was beginning to coat her. It was a feeling she’d never experienced, never having seen any profit in what it lent the soul. The opposite was true for such a sordid emotion. Alas, she was discovering bitterness crept in like a thief regardless of her knowledge that it could only corrupt.

Being near Cal was simply becoming too much.

And she snapped.

Turning toward him and ripping her arm free of his grasp, she stared down this man she loved. This man who would never be hers. She watched as his face fell, confusion parting his lips at the coldness of her stare.

“Seleste?”

“Why is your name not on that list?”

Cal swallowed, genuine shock alighting on his features. “I— Maybe it is.” Fear crept into his eyes.

“No, it is not.”

“We haven’t decoded all of the names,” he defended, but there was little conviction in his tone. He was growing nervous, for two reasons she knew.

He thought she suspected he was guilty of the murders, and he was worried he was a target.

Both were invalid.

“Seleste.” He stepped forward to reach for her, and she backed away, but not for the reason he thought. He looked as if she’d struck him. “You can’t think I’m the murderer… Please tell me you don’t.”

She stood in silence, searching his face. Memorising it. And decided to divulge as little as possible of what she suspected. If they were successful—if they caught the fiends responsible—none of her concerns would hold ground. But they had only one more chance to stop the murderer, or they would have an entirely different case on their hands.

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