His head fell upon my shoulder. “Like a dream.” When I deposited him carefully beside Beau—his entire leg spilling free from the mattress—his hand caught my own and lingered there, even after his eyes had fluttered shut. “You smell like a dream.”

The Hangover

Reid

I felt as if I’d been hit by a runaway horse.

Our own horses shifted nervously in the alley behind the inn, snorting and stamping their feet. I gripped their reins tighter. Dull pain throbbed behind my eyes. When my stomach rose suddenly, I turned away from them, clenching my eyes against the weak morning light. “Never again,” I promised them bitterly.

I would never imbibe another ounce of liquor for as long as I lived.

The horse nearest me lifted his tail and defecated in response.

The smell nearly undid me. Pressing a fist to my mouth, I struggled to tether their reins to the post and fled to our rooms once more. Inside, the others packed the last of their belongings with slow, sluggish movements. Except for Coco and Célie. Smirking, Coco watched from the bed, while Célie flitted to and fro in an effort to help. But she didn’t help. Instead, she talked. Loudly.

“Why didn’t you wake me?” She swatted Jean Luc’s arm before bending to search under the bed for his missing boot. “You know I have always wanted to try whiskey, and you all drank an entire bottle without me! And played truth or dare too! How could you leave me to sleep in the next room while you had all the fun?”

“It wasn’t fun,” Beau muttered, accepting his shirt from Lou. Sometime in the course of the night, it’d ended up in the washbowl. He wrung it out now with a miserable expression. “Fun is the last word I’d use to describe it, actually. Can you stop talking now, darling?”

“Oh, nonsense!” Abandoning her search beneath the bed, Célie rose and planted her hands on her hips. “I want to know every single detail. What questions did you ask? What dares did you undertake? Is that”—her eyes fell to a dark smear on the corner of the dressing table—“is that blood?”

I strode to wipe it away, cheeks hot, mumbling, “Fell doing a cartwheel.”

“Oh my goodness! Are you all right? Actually—never mind. Forget I asked. Clearly, you all had a grand time without me, so a little blood can be your penance. You do have to tell me everything that transpired, however, since you couldn’t be bothered to invite me. Fortunately, we have plenty of time to recount every detail on our way to L’Eau Mélancolique—”

Jean Luc seized her shoulders then, his eyes bloodshot and pleading. “I love you, Célie, but please—shut up.”

“Hear, hear,” Beau said, lifting his shoe.

Though she narrowed her eyes at each of them, it was Coco who interrupted, her voice rising to a shout. “What’s that?” She grinned wider at our collective wince. Each word was a spike through my eyes. “You can’t hear us? Célie, darling, we must speak up for them.”

Célie grinned now too. “Of course, Cosette. How abominably rude of us! Shall I repeat everything I’ve just said?”

“I think that would be the courteous thing to do.”

“You’re right. It would be. What I said was—”

“Please—” Beau turned helplessly to Lou, who sat on the floor at the foot of the bed, folding her soiled clothes and replacing them in her pack. My stomach twisted anew at the sight of her. Fresh bile rose in my throat. She hadn’t acknowledged anyone this morning. Including me. I could’ve been sick from shame alone—from the memory of her skin, soft and sweet. Its scent haunted me still.

I’d dared her to kiss me.

Stalking to the washbowl to splash my face, I swallowed acid.

When she didn’t answer, Beau tapped her shoulder, and she looked up with a vacant expression. Her face wan. Her freckles stark. “Can you force them to shut up somehow?” he asked her. “Perhaps solder their vocal cords?”

Lou lifted a hand to her ears, pulling a small piece of fabric from each of them. “What’s that?”

We all stared at her.

Earplugs. She’d made earplugs from a piece of the innkeeper’s quilt. Beau snatched them from her with an air of reverence, stuffing them into his own ears. “You’re an evil genius.”

But Lou didn’t laugh. She only blinked. Her eyes focused on the room slowly, as if she’d been lost in thought. She still held an undergarment in one hand when she asked, “Should we send word to Claud somehow? About Morgane?” The hateful woman’s words echoed between us: The time is now. The trees have mobilized, and we shall follow, striking hard and true while the conclave deliberates. “We should really warn Blaise too, and both should know about Isla. We can coordinate some sort of defense—”

I couldn’t prevent a scoff. “You think mermaids and werewolves can coordinate anything?”

Her gaze sharpened abruptly. “I think every plan we’ve ever coordinated has been complete and utter shit and ended in total disaster.”

“We need them,” Coco agreed firmly, cinching her bag and standing. “I’ll send word to them from the beach.” She paused. “After Isla agrees to help us.”

As one, we all looked to the ring on Lou’s finger. She twisted it nervously. “Do you think we can trust her?” Her eyes met Coco’s across the room. “Can we trust your mother?”

“We held up our end of the agreement.” Coco shrugged. “And the waters prevent falsehood.”

“Right.” Lou continued twisting the ring. Twisting and twisting and twisting. “And—what’s the conclave? What are they deliberating?”

It was Jean Luc who answered. “Religious leaders from throughout the kingdom have gathered in Cesarine to elect a new Archbishop. They’re also”—he cleared his throat, abruptly busy with his satchel—“they’re eliciting information from Madame Labelle.”

The word fell heavy with meaning.

“Eliciting,” Lou repeated.

Jean Luc still wouldn’t look at her. “Hellfire continues to ravage the city.”

“What does eliciting mean?” Coco asked him, undeterred.

“You know what it means.”

They all stared at me in the ensuing silence. Heat prickled my neck. My face. “I don’t care.”