To Vanquish Darkness (Le Sombre #1)

Chapter 46

46

1836 COUNTRYSIDE BEYOND MORDELLES, FRANCE

H ow was Ren outside her uncle's gate?

Beads of sweat formed on her forehead. She’d done everything she could to get here without him following, but she’d failed. But what had taken him so long?

Amalie turned to find the girls huddling together on her bed. She closed the shutters. "Wait here."

"Uncle Oren said—" Bethany started, but Amalie held up a hand.

"I'll be right back." She set her clothes on the writing desk and descended the stairs. Maurielle sat in the parlor, but she didn't give her aunt a chance to stop her. She rushed outside, stopping only when her uncle turned and flashed a look of pure murderous intent.

Theo blocked her view of Ren through the open gate, and she shifted to the side to get a clear view. "What are you doing here?"

Ren held out his hands. "There's no time to talk. The Pourfendeurs are coming. We need to get out now."

Amalie’s brow pinched. The Pourfendeurs? She’d left Marcel and Olivie in Servon only a day prior, and they hadn’t said a thing about coming to Mordelles.

She took a step closer, emboldened by Theo's presence even though her uncle hissed through his teeth. “The Pourfendeurs are my friends.” She wouldn't listen to any more of his lies. He'd insinuated it was her uncle who had been attacked, then insisted Theo had asked him to protect her. Neither of those had proven true.

Ren gave her an apologetic look, then turned his attention back to Theo. “I tried to keep her safe, but she refused to stay put."

"I didn't ask you to keep her safe," Theo snapped.

"Well, it's a good thing I took it upon myself. She could've been killed on her way to Servon. She had no money—I had to pay for her to spend the night at a reputable inn."

"I would've made do." Amalie took another step.

Ren ignored her. "I followed her here and heard the rumors in Mordelles. They know you’re here, Theo. They know what you are.” He looked innocently between the two of them. “Is this where the attack happened?”

Amalie watched him for any hint of betrayal, but couldn’t find it. Ren looked glad to see Theo and honest in his desperation for them to act. Theo's hands fisted at his sides.

Ren's eyes flickered. "I mean what I say. Whatever dealings you have here, they can wait. This family doesn’t need their house to be burned to the ground.”

“They wouldn’t do that without proof,” Amalie said. “I know them. They aren’t witch hunters, as much as people make them out to be.”

None of what Ren was saying made sense. Unless . . . had Marcel and Olivie followed her, too? Had they been watching her home since that night she showed up with a mark on her skin? She thought of Marcel's accusations in the town square. How he'd changed his tune the next morning after she'd stepped into the sunlight. Had it been a bit too easy to convince him?

“I think this might be yours.” Theo pulled his hand from his pocket, and Amalie snapped back to the present. Theo stood in front of Ren, holding out the ring.

Ren's eyes widened. His jaw went slack as he stared at the silver band in Theo's palm.

Theo's eyes darkened, his jaw set. "Answer me."

Amalie’s hands began to shake. If Theo thought the ring was his, then Ren must’ve known about her mother. Could it have been Ren that she loved? The entirety of her childhood replayed in a split second. Her mother leaving late at night to meet Ren in the woods. Ren’s hands on her mother’s waist. Ren’s lips dripping with her mother’s blood.

Amalie thought she might be sick.

Ren's eyes narrowed. He took one last look at the ring and tilted his head. "It’s not mine."

Theo slammed his hand against the stone wall, directly next to Ren’s head. “You’re a liar.”

Theo said he’d watched over guardians, but from the way he’d acted at the castle, it didn’t seem like any of his coven knew about it. But they’d known each other for thousands of years. Was it so hard to believe that they knew each other well enough to parse out each other’s secrets?

So why hadn't Theo seen Ren's? How had he not known that Ren was hunting for her mother near the river?

The shard in her middle pulled so intently, she thought she might collapse to her knees. The river. The sword.

“I swear to you, I know nothing of which you speak.” Ren tugged at the collar of his shirt, fishing for something. Finally he pulled it out. Strung on a gold chain. His signet ring. Safe and sound against his chest.

Theo took a step back. He stared at the ring in Ren’s hand, then at the one he held in his palm.

Ren clapped a hand on Theo’s shoulder. “Now, I’m assuming you’ll tell me the details later, but it’s obvious these humans are colluding with our kind. You, specifically, so can we please get them out of here?”

None of this was right.

The sensation of someone watching her prickled her skin. What was she missing? Ren hadn’t told her the truth, but then he’d shown up as if it was the most normal thing in the world to be warning a man and his family who was supposed to be cursed.

Was it possible he didn’t know of whom he spoke? Had he gotten information from someone else and never connected the two? But what Theo had said in the bedroom . . .

Either Ren’s version of events was true or Theo’s was. She knew what she wanted to believe, but hadn’t her mother fallen prey to such thinking?

"I'll go to the Pourfendeurs. I'll show myself. Distract them while you get them out." Theo nodded, then closed the gate and turned to Amalie and Oren. He’d let Ren go, just like that. But what proof did they have to accuse him further?

"We should go with him. Marcel and Olivie will listen to me." Amalie’s fingers felt numb at the ends. They would listen to her. She would tell them every last shred of information if she had to.

Oren shook his head. "No. We're leaving this house anyway. Let them burn it if they wish."

Amalie's heart sank as she glanced back at the house. The roses that bloomed along the foundation. The pear tree that always flowered pale pink in the spring.

Maurielle walked outside with Bethany and her two younger girls. All of them looked wide-eyed and flushed. They must have been watching from the window, and now all three of them stared at Theo. If Oren had hoped to wait until they were eighteen, she doubted very much that he'd be able to reach that mark. It was for the better.

"I left my clothes upstairs." She started for the house, and Oren herded Maurielle and the girls to the second gate along the side of the house.

Theo had drawn up a plan. Her curiosity clawed at her as she ran into the study and pulled her satchel from the chair, then took the stairs two at a time to her bedroom. She stuffed her clothes from the bed into the bag, then glanced at the armoire. She could fit the dress, couldn't she?

Amalie crossed the room and pulled the door open, then released the dress from the wooden hanger. She pulled it out and closed the door, then jumped as a figure moved in her peripheral vision.

"You forgot something at the castle." Marx waved his fingers through the flame still burning on her writing desk, then straightened and pulled a strip of pale blue fabric from his pocket. "Sentimental, yes?"