Page 27 of The Deadliest Candidate

“Oh?” Lautric pushed back the overly long sleeve of his sweater and glanced at his watch. He sighed. “Ah, right.”

Fern watched him with interest. Where had he been? Several hours had passed since they’d been told about the assignment—what could he possibly be prioritising over that?

Lautric looked up from his watch, and Fern’s curiosity was reflected in his gaze.

“Are you not taking lunch?” he asked.

“I’m not hungry.”

“No… neither am I.” He drew closer to her desk. “Is your research going well?”

Fern said, “Probably about as well as yours is.”

He shook his head. “Ah, I’ve not even started my research.”

“You have more important business to attend to?” Fern had tried to ask this in a light tone, to soften the suspicion in her voice, but the question came out a little tart.

Lautric let out a quiet half-laugh. “I suppose you could say that, Miss Sullivan.” He glanced down at her desk, hislimpid brown eyes skating across her books and papers. “You work fast. I thought your field of expertise was Sumbra?”

Fern could not help the sense that he was trying to get something out of her. She thought ofSymbols of In-Between Doors, which both herself and the Lautric House had coveted. Fern—for her research, and the Lautrics—well, that was the more interesting question, of course.

Fern said, “If you have an interest in my work, Mr Lautric, I am happy to recommend you some of my publications.”

He smiled, an artless, unguarded thing. It brightened up his features as if a sudden ray of sunlight had made its way out of a tangle of clouds and fallen directly upon his face.

“No need, Miss Sullivan. I’ve read all your work already.”

He might have been lying, or he might have been telling the truth. The Lautrics probably worked hard to keep themselves informed on all their enemies. Their house words, after all, wereSavoir et Souveraineté—knowledge and sovereignty. They probably lived by the adage regarding how close one’s enemies ought to be kept.

Fern had no intention of letting herself be kept close to anyone, let alone her enemies.

If she should rewrite the adage according to her own philosophy, it would sound something like:Keep your friends at a distance and your enemies as far away as possible.

“Was it Mr Boussard who recommended you my work?”

She asked this question as she folded her papers away so he could no longer see them, but she did look back up to catch his reaction.

For a second, his expression was blank, his lips forming the pout of the questionwho?But no word came, only the shape of it. And then he blinked, a slow scrunch of his eyes, a gesture of—what? Amusement, or realisation, or annoyance? She could not tell. But he stepped back, and he said, “I wish you luck on your assignment, Miss Sullivan.” He hesitated, then added, “Should you need any assistance, you need only ask.”

He turned and left without awaiting Fern’s reply, leaving a heavy silence in his wake. Fern stared after him, and her eyes remained on the dark arch of the doorway long after he had disappeared through it.

Lautric wanted something from her. Why else this odd conversation, this unsettling friendliness?

Unlike her fellow candidates, Fern did not come with the affiliation of any great institution behind her. She had no connection to the Reformed Vatican or the Poison Tower or the Jathvi Empire. She was nothing more than the orphaned daughter of a groundskeeper and a caretaker, and she had no notable association aside from the libraries she had worked at over the course of her career.

So it must be something else Lautric wanted. But what?

As the days passed,Fern began to establish and perfect a routine for herself.

Her three years at the St Jerome Orphanage had inculcated in her the importance of keeping to one’s schedule; it kept the body busy and the mind tidy. Fern had hated every last day she spent at St Jerome, but she’d never shaken away its lessons.

Every morning, she would wake at eight, feed Inkwell and dress. She would take her breakfast in the dining room, a quick coffee and two slices of toast, reading as she ate. Then she would make her way to the Alchemy Wing, working until and through lunch. She sometimes took a break after the other candidates returned from lunch, to stretch her legs and explore the library.

After lunch, she would leave the Alchemy Wing, which was a little louder in the afternoons since most of the candidates congregated there, spread out amongst the desks in their new-formed alliances. Dominating the desks in the centre of the hall was the golden alliance the twins had so skilfully assembled: themselves, the aristocratic Lautric and Orsini, and Baudet, the Reformed Vatican archivist.

General Srivastav and Dr Essouadi, though they seemed to be working independently, sat together and would often fetch one another cups of tea. Vasili Drei and Josefa Novak, like Fern, kept themselves to themselves.

Cooperating on this task, Fern thought every time she observed the golden alliance, was both an advantage and a risk. On one hand, Fern could see how the group had rapidly compiled their list before portioning out the research amongst themselves.

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