Page 65 of The Dagger and the Flame
When Sera returned to House Armand, most of the Cloaks were in the dining hall, enjoying a dinner of roast turkey with herb stuffing, spiced cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes. She ducked her head in to wave at Bibi and Val before continuing upstairs with Pippin, leaving him to tackle the giant turkey leg Rupert and Bianca had set aside for him. She didn’t return to the dining room, instead heading to the basement to find Theo.
After several insistent knocks, the door opened to reveal the Shadowsmith in all his rumpled glory. His silver hair was ruffled and he was wearing loose-fitting trousers, a black vest, and his feet were bare. He blinked, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.
‘Sorry to interrupt your nap,’ said Sera, brushing past him. ‘You missed dinner, by the way.’
Theo frowned. ‘Not again.’
‘If you ask nicely, Pip might share his turkey leg with you.’ That earned her a sluggish smile. ‘What are you working on down here anyway?’
‘A hideous failure.’ He sighed, gesturing to the mess of tools on the island. ‘A compass that can detect unusually high concentrations of Shade. Spikes of magic.’
‘You mean monsters.’
He nodded. ‘It is not going well.’
Sera almost felt bad about adding another task to his workload. ‘I went back to the plains today, to see if I could find out anything about Mama’s necklace.’
His eyebrows shot up. ‘That was reckless.’
‘Everything I do these days is reckless.’ She shrugged off her satchel, then crouched to rifle through it. She was glad not to have to look him in the eyes when she said, ‘Today was… illuminating.’ A colossal understatement. She had found answers in the plains, but they were not the kind she had been hoping for. At least, not the kind she could be proud of. To think that Mama decided to make monsters out of ordinary people… and all so she could punish Gaspard Dufort for his own depravity.
What good was an antidote now that the monsters were already scattered across Fantome, stalking and killing at will? How could they make the antidote if Mama had taken its secret to the grave?
Mama had gone too far. She had taken everything too far and made a mess she was no longer here to fix.
Lorenzo might have been a coward but he had been rightabout one thing: Sylvie Marchant had had it coming. But this awful mess was not entirely Mama’s fault. Dufort had murdered her, unwittingly setting her unfinished plan into motion. And Maria had fled instead of destroying that damn shipment of wine. She should have poured it into the river and been done with it all.
‘Seraphine?’ Theo was on his knees before her. ‘You’re a million miles away.’
She rolled back on her heels and buried her head in her hands. ‘I’m spiralling.’
‘I see that.’ He gently removed her hands from her face. ‘Can you be more specific? What did you find, out in the plains?’
Sera raked her hands through her hair, wishing she could forget everything Lorenzo had told her. But the truth was a storm in her heart, and it had grown wilder with every step towards home.
‘Whatever it is, you can tell me,’ said Theo. ‘I promise I won’t judge.’
Sera blew out a breath. ‘I wouldn’t be so sure about that.’
‘You’d be surprised at the secrets people have spilled down here. Even Madame Mercure.’ He winked. ‘Try me.’
Despite her burgeoning shame and anger over what Mama had done, the burden was too great for Sera to shoulder alone. She found she did want to try with Theo. What else did she possibly have to lose?
‘I’ll be right here,’ he said, kicking his legs out and leaning back against the glass island. ‘Whenever you get done wrestling with your indecision.’
Sera sat beside him. In the falling quiet of the cloakroom, asnight yawned across the city of Fantome and the distant sound of howls hitchhiked on the wind, she confessed everything that Lorenzo had told her about the monsters of Fantome, about Mama’s role in their creation and how her plan had been set in motion too soon.
Theo listened in contemplative silence, his face a careful mask of impassivity.
When it was done, Sera didn’t feel any better. She felt sick. As though she had stuck a knife in Mama’s memory and drained all the goodness out. ‘She wasn’t a bad person,’ she added, desperately. ‘She just…’ she trailed off.
‘Wanted to destroy Dufort and his Daggers by any means necessary,’ said Theo, with the kind of casual acceptance that made Sera want to hug him.
She nodded. ‘I guess so.’
‘Why?’
Sera chewed on her lip, unsure of how to answer him. There was so much uncomfortable truth between them that already the air felt heavier. She couldn’t bring herself to add to it, to fully illuminate the long shadow Dufort had cast over their lives. But then Theo spoke again, muddling out his own answer. ‘It’s not like she was alone in that desire. Back where I come from, the villagers speak of Dufort like he’s the devil himself. Most are too terrified to speak of him at all, to venture as far as Fantome in case they come face to face with a Dagger. To be a Cloak is one thing, but….’
