The Dagger and the Flame (The City of Fantome #1)

Chapter 30 Seraphine

Chapter 30 Seraphine

The following morning, Pippin went walkabout. Sera looked for him in his usual spots but he wasn’t snoozing by the ovens in the kitchen or growling at squirrels through the windows of the rec room. She asked around until Blanche said she had seen him snoozing in the library after breakfast.

It was there Sera found him curled up under an armchair by the window. Madame Fontaine was sitting in the opposite chair, poring over a spread of tarot cards. Sera was about to turn around and come back later when the old lady looked up.

‘I don’t bite, Seraphine,’ she said, beckoning at her. ‘Your mutt likes me well enough.’

Sera edged inside. ‘I didn’t want to disturb you.’

Fontaine snorted. ‘You were afraid I’d smell my brandy on your breath.’

Sera’s cheeks flamed. She’d thought the three cups of coffee at breakfast had done enough to battle her hangover.

‘I was saving the Laramie for a special occasion,’ Madame Fontaine went on, gathering her cards back into the deck. For an old woman with gnarled hands, she shuffled them with surprising deftness. ‘Not that those two urchins you run around with seemed to care.’

‘It was a stressful night,’ said Sera, vaguely wondering if the rumours were true, and Saint Oriel did in fact sometimes whisper to Fontaine. ‘We had a run-in with a monster in the Scholars’ Quarter.’

A card sprang from the deck and Fontaine caught it in mid-air, laying it face up on the table. It was an image of a woman in a gold mask, holding a silver one in her hand.

‘The Deceiver,’ said Madame Fontaine.

Sera stared at the card. Well, shit.

Fontaine continued shuffling. ‘I knew your mother, you know. We had dealings many years ago when I was the head of this Order and she was a woman not much older than you.’

Sera didn’t tear her gaze from the card. Was it meant to be her, or Mama?

The old woman wheezed a dusty laugh. ‘Sylvie never could sit still, even back then. She refused to settle for the lot she was given in life. Was always reaching for something greater. Darker.’ She looked up at Sera. ‘When you go looking for trouble, trouble will find you first.’

‘Funny thing for a Cloak to say,’ remarked Sera. ‘Isn’t all trouble the same?’

‘No.’ The word was flat.

Sera avoided Fontaine’s milky gaze, but she could feel it prickling the side of her cheek. It stirred unease inside her, and she got the sense that the longer she lingered here in the library, the more the old woman would pry, and Sera didn’t want to tell her about her search for Lightfire. About Mama’s note, or what she knew of the monsters of Fantome. She didn’t trust the old crone. And it was clear the old crone didn’t trust her.

‘I need to take Pip for a walk,’ she said, crouching to fish him out from under the chair. ‘He ate way too much bacon at breakfast.’

Madame Fontaine kept shuffling. ‘I knew your father too.’

Sera stilled. Then stood up, very slowly. She should have left then, run from those words the way she and Mama had tried to run from the man, but curiosity turned her feet to lead.

Fontaine hummed, her hands still working through the cards.

‘He came to me some years before you were born. A street urchin with quick fingers, who wanted a better life. A richer life. He begged to be a Cloak.’ Her lips twisted, the memory sour in her mouth. ‘I turned him away.’

Sera was surprised by her flash of anger. It reminded her of the night she had come here begging for sanctuary, only to have the same door slammed in her face. ‘Why?’

‘For the same reason I turned you away.’ Fontaine smiled, but there was no warmth in it. Just suspicion, laced with wariness. ‘Only this time it wasn’t up to me. You are no Cloak, Seraphine Marchant. Not in your heart.’

‘You don’t know me,’ protested Sara.

Fontaine cocked her head. ‘Do you know yourself yet?’ Her fingers moved, quicker and quicker. ‘You have an air of destiny about you.’

‘You say that like it’s a bad thing,’ said Sera, at the scowl in her voice.

Fontaine didn’t answer. She closed her eyes, frowning. Another card jumped. She let it flutter to the floor, where it landed face up. It was an old man in a reaping cloak, carrying a scythe.

‘The Grim,’ she said, with a grunt. ‘Death lurks around the corner.’

‘Whose death?’ said Sera before she could help herself.

Madame Fontaine set the cards down. Perhaps it was Sera’s imagination but she thought the old crone looked afraid. ‘We will find out.’

Sera hugged Pippin closer, making for the door before another card jumped out bearing Mama’s face or Dufort’s scowl.

Fontaine’s parting words followed her out into the corridor. ‘You’d better replace that brandy, girl.’