Page 97 of A Treachery of Swans

“Papa! Come, please. I know you’re angry, but you’ll die if you stay here. Please, we can—”

I break off when I see the dagger in Regnault’s hand.

He gets to his feet slowly, raising the weapon, and advances on me. His mask is gone. For the first time in my life, I see Regnault without the ornate, feathered accessory that he has always worn. I had once wondered if he was hiding a scar behind it, some mark of his mysterious past. But behind it there are only signs of age: a wrinkled brow and crow’s feet and bruised shadows under his eyes oozing desolate, irrational fury.

I stumble back, nearly falling when another tremor shakes the temple; another column falls and shatters against the ground. The water is nearly to my knees now—it sloshes as I back away, Regnault coming ever nearer, one hand reaching for me, the other holding aloft the knife.

Suddenly my heel strikes a piece of detritus, and I lose my balance. Regnault leaps at me, the dagger arcing downward, just as a strong pair of arms seizes me from behind, lifting me from the water and out of the dagger’s reach.

“Get away from her!” Marie d’Odette commands.

“No!” shrieks Regnault, but Marie grips me to her chest, one hand under my knees, the other clutching at my shoulders. She grunts with effort, her wings pumping wildly. Behind us, one final tremor runs through the temple. Water cascades in around us with violent, triumphant force as the lake reclaims the structure that has so long lain dormant in its depths. I know Regnault cannot escape in time, and perhaps I should turn back, take one last look at him, but I can’t bring myself to do it. I simply bury my face in Marie’s collarbone and let her bring me back to safety.

Marie alights on the shore of Lac des Cygnes with difficulty, panting as she places me back on the muddy shore. I try to stand, but my knees crumple beneath me. Before I can hit the sand, another pair of hands catches me, this time thick and calloused.

“You’re safe,” Damien whispers, and grips me tightly. I lean against him, grateful—mainly for the warmth, because I am soaked and freezing—then pat him awkwardly on the back.

“I am,” I say disbelievingly before pulling away. “Mothers, we did it.” My chest burns—I’m somewhere halfway between laughing and crying. “The Couronne is destroyed. Morgane… Morgane is free. Magic should be back.”

“Magicisback.” Aimé walks up beside Damien, and I notice he’s wearing the circlet I gave him. His hand is pressed to the shallow wound near his shoulder where Regnault had stabbed him, and he pulls it away briefly, showing me his palm. “Look.”

His hand is smeared in blood. Red blood. A mundane, undeniable crimson, as bright as ripe cherries or mid-autumn leaves or rubies polished to a shine.

“The curse is broken,” I breathe, and Aimé nods, grinning with tired relief.

I move my attention to the lakeside, where the guardsmen are busy gathering their dead and hacking at the dented corpses of the golden tarasques. Aimé follows my gaze to the lifeless monsters. “Apparently they stopped moving right before we arrived.”

I make a contemplative noise. “Must have lost their magic when the Couronne was broken.”

“And what of Regnault?” Aimé asks carefully. “Did you leave him behind?”

“I did not want to,” I admit, swallowing tightly. “I tried to save him. But he… preferred to drown.” I rub my face, then chuckle wryly. “He even tried to stab me as a parting gift. Marie, ever my gallant defender, pulled me away before I could accept.” I turn back to Marie, grinning. “Frankly, princess, I’m surprised you’re not yet tired of rescuing m—”

I break off.

The Swan Princess is kneeling in the sand, her eyes unfocused, her smile not a smile at all but a wavering, pained grimace.

My stomach drops. “Marie?”

“It’s nothing,” she whispers hoarsely.

Then she crumples to the ground.

From between her shoulder blades, just to the left of her spine, protrudes Regnault’s dagger.

SCENE XXXVIIIThe Lake

No.”Panic surges through me, brittle and horrified and desperate. I run to Marie, falling to my knees at her side. Lake water laps at my ankles—the sun shines with vicious, mocking brightness.

“Marie?” I whisper, hovering my hands over her spine, over her wings, over the dagger sunk hilt-deep into her back. And I know, Iknow,this is not the sort of injury anyone survives. But I still wrack my brain for a solution. I have so many skills, yet in the face of this, I come up empty-handed, useless.

I’museless.

“Oh, Marie, no, please—” Numbly I reach for her face, wanting to lift her away from the wet earth that now sullies her clothes, her cheek. Marie’s eyes flutter open, then closed again. Blood trickles from the corner of her mouth, from the dagger wound; it sinks into the beautiful white feathers of her wings, and I try, ineffectively, to wipe it away.

“What happened?” Aimé kneels beside me, and unfairly, I want to shove him away, to tell him to leave. “How did this happen?”

“Regnault,” I spit between chattering teeth. “He must have thrown it at her as she was carrying me away.”

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