Carefully, I carried it along the edge of the lobby. When I reached the salon, I flung the cage door open and poked the bird awake. Liquid black eyes darted around while its claws clicked, scrabbling its way out. It was nearly the size of a dog.
It stretched its long neck and took off into the dining room, straight for a guest’s jeweled headpiece. It didn’t take long for the effect I wanted. Chairs toppled as guests screamed and ran out.
Hellas swung an upended chair. But the beast of a bird continued to peck at the woman’s head, while the clearly intoxicated man next to her giggled like a child, toasting his wine glass to the spectacle. Blue flames tipped toward the bird, away from the now-empty bar.
No one paid me any attention when I dipped behind it and grabbed the gold paste, slipping it down my pocket. When I glanced up, Zosa looked right at me.
I froze.
Seconds passed. She took a step in my direction. Her pink lips moved, like she was speaking my name, but she was too far away to hear clearly. My throat closed up at the thought that she still knew me somehow, that there was a chance I wasn’t forgotten like I’d assumed.
Zosa was too thin. Her dark eyes shone like drops of oil. A tear dripped down my cheek, and I couldn’t look away. It took everything inside me not to run to her.
Madame des Rêves appeared out of nowhere, an enormous lavender wig limp around her shoulders. She held that tarnished hand mirror—the same one from the ma?tre’s office. Fanning herself with it, she yanked on a tasseled rope to release the curtain, but two guests had wrapped themselves up in the velvet, hiding from the bird. The curtain wouldn’t close.
Des Rêves grumbled then pulled a small cage from offstage. I blinked away fresh tears when she touched her talon to each chanteuse’s shoulder.
Alastair burst into the room. “Who let the library bird loose?”
I dropped to my knees and scrambled under a café table.
“I don’t know,” Des Rêves said. “One moment, it was just there.”
The salon door was close, but they’d see me if I left. I’d have to wait here until I could make my way out unnoticed—calling attention to myself now would be fatal.
The bird snapped at a guest. An angry vein bulged in Alastair’s forehead. He plucked the silver mirror from Des Rêves’s hand, just as he’d done at the first soirée. He ran a finger over it as if checking for cracks.
It seemed an odd thing to do, given the circumstances. Clearly the artéfact was precious to him, even though the inkwell was Alastair’s main artéfact, the talon Des Rêves’s. They must both be using the mirror for something. I wondered what. Another question I didn’t have the answer to.
The bird shrieked.
“Enough!” Alastair mumbled something softly and stomped the ground with a resounding crack. A wave of marble moved out from where Alastair’s heel hit, toppling café chairs, sending crystal crashing. The bird stilled.
Alastair leveled his glare at Des Rêves, at the three birds hopping around next to the gilded cage. “Where is Frigga?”
“Probably in her room. She isn’t due for another hour,” Des Rêves said.
“Probably? She’s responsible for the birds,” Alastair said, incensed. “Get her down here now. Have her put those songbirds away then remove that thing.” He pointed to the black bird as it chomped on a slice of mangled cake.
Responsible for the birds.
My mind reeled. “Frigga,” I muttered to myself, memorizing the name. If she were responsible for the birds, she might know where Zosa was kept, how to get inside the aviary. Alastair and Hellas had keys, but there could easily be more.
Alastair’s boots crunched over broken glass. Before he turned around, I darted toward the salon door, looking back once to see Madame des Rêves shooing Zosa toward the cage.
* * *
“Are you alive?”
I opened my eyes. I’d fallen asleep hunched next to Bel’s bed. He stood over me. His fresh shirt hung open, exposing his clean, muscled chest. He caught me looking and I forced my eyes down to his wound. This morning, it was nothing but a bright red scar.
Relief shot through me. I had an urge to spring up and wrap my arms around his neck, but I stifled it at the memory of his ramblings last night. I touched my mouth, remembering the feel of his thumb running across my lips.
“Do you . . . remember when I brought you up here?”
“I remember my door opening. The rest is a bit fuzzy.” Bel skewered me with a wry look. “Why? Did I say something I should apologize for?”