A faint rumble makes us both look sharply down the road. In the distance down the mountain, a rusty nineties station wagon is making its winding way up toward town, the sun reflecting off its tan hood.
The Heiress grabs my shoulder, making me jump. Her cowboy hat falls off into the dirt and she ignores it; her strong fingers dig in like claws. “Listen to me, Madeline,” she says again. “The purchase I’m about to make—it has to go through. Hide and watch in the trees if you want, and I’ll explain everything after. I swear it. But you must let me do this.”
There’s something new in her tone now, a ragged urgency. Her rich, throaty voice has always been the only part of her that really has seemed centuries old.
“Think,” she tells me, one hand on the reins and one on me. “If I were the orchestrator of all this, why would I have left Havenfall for so long? It was my home too, and the center of the trade besides. Why would I have left the black market’s black heart?”
I don’t know what to say to that. I can scarcely process anything she’s said. She’s accusing Marcus of being involved in this, somehow. Just the thought makes rage race through my veins.
But she’s buying, not selling. The idea of hanging back and watching feels so wrong, but the thought of letting Whit carry away any piece of Havenfall is even worse. It makes my skin crawl. If my goal is to keep Realms objects safe and secret in Havenfall, I need to let this deal go through.
The station wagon chugs up the road, closer and closer.
“Okay,” I finally say. I jerk free of the Heiress’s hand and back away, toward the trees opposite the antique shop, where there’s a clear view of the window. “Fine. Do what you have to do. But then you’re going to tell me everything.”
15
I feel stupid, hiding in the trees like this. This isn’t a child’s game. I should be in there with the Heiress, and yet here I am, on the outside, waiting.
Earlier, someone opened the antique store and let both the Heiress and Whit in. All I can see now is their shapes in the lighted window. Occasionally, the Heiress breaks from their huddle to pace the floor, the hem of her cloak one misstep away from knocking over all the dusty silver and porcelain and bringing the whole place tumbling down. A buzz in my pocket makes me jump.
I fumble for my phone to put it on silent. See that I’ve gotten a text from Dad. Miss you too sweetie!!
I ignore him. No time for that now.
Finally, finally, Whit leaves and drives away. The Heiress comes out and we head to the twenty-four-hour diner in tense silence; she’s leading her horse on foot down the side of the road.
She has her cloak balled up under her arm, worry and annoyance creasing her usually serene face. It’s starting to get hot out, but my insides feel cold as ice with anger and confusion.
Inside the diner, the girl at the hostess stand—maybe fifteen, brown ponytail sticking out of a green O’Connor’s hat—looks uncertainly between us when we come in, clearly picking up on the tension, although she doesn’t bat an eye at the Heiress’s strange outfit. She seats us at the big booth in the far corner and leaves the Heiress and me to stew in our solitude, the expanse of speckled plastic table stretching like an ocean between us.
The Heiress is glowering, clearly agitated, waves of distress and irritation rolling off her. She gazes out the window at Main Street, and I can’t tell if she’s lost in thought or avoiding my gaze or both. But I’m not going to let her off the hook that easy.
“So.” I put my elbows on the table, leaning forward so she’s forced to meet my eyes. “You said that this wasn’t what I thought it was. Fill me in. What is it really?”
The Heiress turns her gaze on me finally, looking like she’d rather be somewhere, anywhere, else. Without makeup, she looks even older, softer. She has a heart-shaped face, a sharp chin, and eyes that are still gray and clear and piercing.
“What do you know?” she asks me.
“I found some papers in your room.” There doesn’t seem to be any point in talking around that bit now. “I know you’re trading magical artifacts. Enchanted things.”
“I wouldn’t have thought a modern girl like you believed in such things,” the Heiress says, witheringly. “Everyone knows the magic of the Adjacent Realms is bound to its bearers. Only people carry magic.”
I feel my hackles go up. “It doesn’t matter if the magic is real. You’re telling people it is.” My anger, held at bay while I hid in the trees, is rising rapidly now. “You told that creepy-ass dude from earlier that magic is real, and it can be found at Havenfall.”
The Heiress’s eye twitches when I swear. She might not understand the slang, but she understands my tone just fine.
“I’ve told him nothing he didn’t already know,” she said. “There are many who know the true nature of Havenfall. Humans all over this world of yours. There always have been.”
My face must betray my shock, because she tilts her head at me.
“Come, Madeline, did you really think a place such as this could truly be a secret? This is the nature of magic. The green children of Woolpit. Canneto di Caronia. The Fairy Flag. I could go on. There are always leaks, but the world doesn’t end.”
I wait for her to say more, but she doesn’t. My mind races. If I take her at her word—that magic really can be bound to objects … what does that mean? I think of her room, glittering with dusty trinkets, and I skim over Havenfall’s grounds and perimeter and everyone who walks through its doors every day. Marcus trusted his people, and I trusted him. How could he not have known about this? Or worse, how could he have known and done nothing about it?
“It predates Marcus’s term as the Innkeeper,” the Heiress says, reading my face. “It predates even my time there. Secrets—and magic—always find their way free.”
My head feels like it’s spinning as I try to wrap my mind around this new information. “How many people are involved?” I whisper. “How many have had their hands in this?”
“It’s hard to say,” the Heiress says calmly. “Hundreds. Maybe more than a thousand.”
“That’s—” Anger and fear twine together inside me. “A thousand? How are you so relaxed right now?”
“We’re still here, aren’t we?” she retorts. “The inn is still standing. And I’m on your side of this. I am trying to right the wrongs.”
“You don’t understand! There’s no such thing as an open secret in this world!”
I clench my hands hard under the table, nails digging in. How can I make the Heiress understand a world full of cell phones with cameras and microphones? The Internet? “Everyone talks about everything online now. If you don’t keep something a total secret, everyone will know soon enough.”
“Ah, but you forget that humans are selfish creatures,” the Heiress says evenly. “If there’s something to be gained by it, they will hold their tongues.”
I bite my own tongue as the waitress approaches with our food: a chicken sandwich for me and coffee and scones for the Heiress.
She breaks off a corner of the scone and eats it delicately, then makes a face. “Too sugary.”