I groaned. “In that society handbook, she’s holding Alastair’s inkwell. It was her artéfact at one point. She was also the Fabricant; she could know where the ring is hidden, and tell us if it could work to nullify the contracts.”
“It would be suicide,” he said. “Regardless, you’d have to get to the contracts first and you don’t even know where they’re kept.”
“I do.” I pictured that third desk drawer, the infinite ledger. The ring might even remove whatever enchantment Alastair used to lock the drawer. It could solve everything. When I began pulling out the map a second time, Bel pushed my hand away.
“No.”
“Why not?”
He shook his head and stormed away.
I raced around a group of guests and grabbed his forearm. “You took me to Aligney. Why won’t you take me here? Alastair threatened Zosa. This is my last option.” My words were breathless. “Help me.”
“I can’t,” he said. At my furious expression, Bel added, “Look. If I move us there, Alastair will take away everything he’s given me.”
“Given you?”
“He doesn’t just threaten to punish me if I don’t do my job. He also rewards me.”
“For bringing back artéfacts?” Bel nodded. I couldn’t believe it. “So whatever he rewards you with is more important than all of us? More important than my sister?”
“That’s not what I meant.” He picked mud from his sleeve. “I should get upstairs before I’m seen like this.”
“What did you mean?”
With one swift movement, he ripped the map from my pocket and stuffed it down his own. “I’m getting rid of this thing.”
I stood there like a fool watching guests jump out of his way as he bowled through them toward the caged lift.
I shot after him, but he was already on the platform. King Zelig had nearly closed the cage when I skidded to a halt. I wrenched it open. Bel tried to push me away, but I ducked under his arm and forced myself in.
“Floor?” Zelig asked.
Bel glared at me.
“Six,” I replied.
“I’m ripping it up.”
“I’ll draw another.”
“Then I’ll destroy that one, too. I’m not taking you to Champilliers.”
“Why? We have nothing. What are you so afraid to lose?” When he remained quiet, I slammed a palm on the cage. King Zelig backed away. “I thought you were different, but Yrsa was right. You only care about yourself.”
Bel’s eyes squeezed shut through an entire floor. He seemed to come to some decision because his shoulders relaxed. He exhaled and said, “Alastair rewards me with memories.”
My breath froze. The distant sounds of music, laughter, the clinking champagne glasses—nothing registered as I tried to make sense of his words.
Bel idly plucked a falling leaf from outside the cage. It wisped away to pink smoke in his fingers. “With each artéfact I find, Alastair gifts me one memory. The smell of a flower, the curl of someone’s hair.” I flinched when he lifted one of my curls. “The memories are the reason I can’t stay away from the moon window. They’ve made me different from the other staff.”
“How?”
“Every memory I’m gifted brings me one step closer to remembering where I’m from . . . Who I am.”
“But you’re Bel.”
“Right. Named after my title as the esteemed bellhop, my first position before Alastair discovered my affinity for the key.”
“A bellhop?”
“Many here are missing names. I wasn’t the first to lose mine, nor will I be the last.” He drew in a lengthy inhale. “I had friends I trusted with my life, friends I loved, but one by one they were demoted, or they disappeared, or I drove them away myself, like in Hellas’s case. Then there were those whose hearts were hardened by the ma?tre and they no longer spoke to me because of the position I held.”
“I didn’t realize—”
“How would you? The memories Alastair has given back to me . . . There’s nothing I’ll do to risk him taking them away,” he said with conviction.
Then I understood. Bel was the Magnifique; he wasn’t replaceable like the other suminaires. Alastair needed another way to manipulate him, and he found it by giving Bel a taste of what he wanted more than anything, by dangling Bel’s memories like goddamned carrots.
My eyes filled with tears. “Bel—”