Star's Crossing

24: A Pitied Creature

Have you ever been kissed?

"What on earth are you doing, Mare Atwood?" Lilith had appeared, quite spontaneously it seemed, at Mare's side. She too crouched, snatching the drapes from Mare's fingers and drawing them from the window. "Ah. Well. He does not look so terrible in the heat of fun and exercise, does he?"

Mare's cheeks warmed, as did the place just beneath her ribs, and she absently touched her lips. Have you ever been kissed? "He does."

"Well, he's never contested with an absence of good looks," scoffed Lilith. "That dark hair. Those raven eyes. The girls spoke of nothing else come holidays these last years."

Mare looked to Lilith, shaking herself back to the molten summer sunlight and the dusty shafts between the shelves. Lilith spoke of Camden, not Geoffrey. Of course. Heat sprang to Mare's cheeks and she recalled that Lilith had no inkling of Mare's feelings for the young Bridge.

The notion halted Mare. Feelings. What feelings?

"Mare?"

"Sorry. Yes." Mare shook her head once more, stooping further to peer out at the grass. Mare hadn't noticed a carriage when the girls arrived, but there was an apparent lack of servants in the greeting hall. Were Alison's aunts taking tea with her mother? That'd explain the presence of the boys. "Lilith. May I ask something?"

"Mare, if we're to be friends, you must know I absolutely loath that question." Lilith shot Mare a cross look, and Mare thought the pair of them looked quite curious, bent at the knee on the twisted staircase, each a hand tangled in the drapes, speaking in low conspiratorial tones. It'd be a sure sight to walk in on. "Simply ask. No use dithering."

"Sure." Mare wanted to snipe at the glass of Lilith's voice, but the truth was she appreciated Lilith's straight-shooting. Such candor was woefully absent in most corridors of Mare's life. It was refreshing to be addressed as an adult, an equal. Even if the delivery was a bit chilly. "You and Mr. Bridge. Have you entered courtship?"

The flare in Lilith's eyes frosted quickly, and the tinge of color in her cheeks vanished as though upon command. She glanced back to the window, and she looked porcelain as she had that first eve in the parlor, before any of the letter madness had begun.

"Not in any official sense," she said coldly. And she dropped the drapes and stood quickly, straightening her gown and ascending what remained of the curved staircase.

"And," Mare followed slowly, reluctant to surrender her vantage, but more driven by curiosity—and, she supposed, fear—pertaining to Theodore Bridge. "In the unofficial sense?"

Lilith had halted on the landing, where she was illuminated by a single piercing arrow of sunlight, broad enough to paint all of her in deified strokes. Immediately at her back stood a row of carefully curated, tightly packed books. There were hundreds, perhaps thousands, in the whole of the library. Usually Mare would find this sight and opportunity invigorating, if not a bit mysterious. But with Lilith angelic before those dark shelves, the library lent only a sense of foreboding.

Lilith's mouth twisted grimly, and she turned from the light and into the dim-swathed furrows beyond.

Mare hesitated, craning her neck for one last look at her three boys, facing one another on the verdant pasture. The drapes caught a draft and billowed between her and the glass, and when it settled, they'd gone.

Mare worried her lip, fingers gliding along the banister as she trailed after Lilith. "You seem unenthused. I thought the match very smart."

"Ha." Lilith's voice fell dull against the varnished hardwood, and was quickly buried with dust. Mare could not see her as she wound through the shelves, and was chilled by how deep the darkness stretched; it gave the illusion the library had no end or beginning. "That's because it is very smart, Mare Atwood."

Mare crept deeper into the library, fingers outstretched, ghostly before her. She felt as though she tread across the floor of a murky, dangerous lake. But her curiosity called her to Lilith's voice. Teddy had sworn he'd protect Mare's secret. Truth be told, she had no reason at all not to believe him.

But she had just as little reason to believe him. After all, what did Theodore Bridge, wealthy, clever, handsome and elite, owe Mare Atwood? The prowling, wealth-seeking courter of his own cousin?

Found all but kissing his own brother?

Mare's cheeks flared at the memory, too real, too recent, too close in the gloom. She closed her eyes in the dark, nothing but a swell of morning light poised at the distant end of her aisle to remind her of her place. She leaned against the nearest shelf, tracing spines with her fingertips.

"You know," called Lilith, and she sounded a thousand miles away, "some have commented on your own match."

Mare laughed, a cold, soft little thing, and did not open her eyes. "I hope you do not say this with the intention of surprising me."

"Surprise? You? With your talent for telling a tale, I don't have a prayer." Lilith's voice was close now, and Mare opened her eyes, somehow unsurprised to find her silhouetted against that distant blot of light. "You know, you would out-marry all four of your sisters with the bank and esteem of Camden Doores. His father has invested in the railways of the west. The Doores will be one of the wealthiest tycoons in New England."

Mare squinted, but could not make out even the amethyst of Lilith's eyes. "You think he will not agree to it." Mare realized how true her assessment was as soon as she spoke it, and straightened further. "That's why you insist I admit my position to Alison. To—"

"Protect you." Lilith spoke firmly, and she took a step deeper between the shelves. "Alison can protect your name. She is Camden's cousin. Mrs. Doores niece. If all else fails, she can claim the letters as her own."

Mare laughed, this time hard and sharp as a blade. She followed with a step toward Lilith. "If you think I will let Alison Watt impale her own reputation for mine—"

"She is a woman of birth and education," said Lilith, "just like me. Trust me, Mare. She would survive. You, on the other hand, will not." Lilith closed the distance between them, and now Mare could see the sheer brilliance of her eyes, and the ivory of her skin, and the spun white gold of her hair. The fire had returned to her gaze, and she spoke low and fast. "If you are revealed, your already-diminished reputation will cease to exist. Miss Cressida wished to be a writer at our age, did you know?"

Mare's blood ran cold.

Lilith persisted. "My father schooled with her. She was a laughingstock. The moment she told her class of her intentions, she was cast out like a leper—"

"Stop," said Mare, breathless, helpless. Miss Cressida, with her love of words. Miss Cressida, with her love of life. Miss Cressida, forever a pitied creature, alone and useless and futureless and poor.

"Mare, listen to me. Seeing Alison deliver that envelope today was the first stroke of luck we've had since your letter was published." Lilith took Mare's hands, vying for her gaze. "Alison can tell us who sent her. We can strike preemptively. We can protect you. She can—"

A shadow fell over Mare and Lilith, and both girls spun, blinking.

There stood Alison, limned in sunlight. "I thought there was something strange at work here." Her voice held a chill, and her face remained in shadow. "So. It is true. Mare Atwood is Star's Crossing's mystery writer, after all."