“Oh.” LaLa worried her lip between her teeth. “I suppose I owe him an apology for stabbing him with that butter knife, then.”
“You’re the one who stabbed him?” Evangeline was begrudgingly impressed. It would take a lot of strength and determination to seriously wound someone with a butter knife.
LaLa shrugged a shoulder. “It was probably an overreaction, but it wasn’t just because I thought he’d told you everything. He was being nasty about my engagement—”
“From what I’ve heard, you deserved it,” the Handsome Stranger interrupted.
“Don’t you dare lecture me, too,” LaLa spat. “You’re half the reason we’re in this mess. If you hadn’t—”
LaLa broke off as the Handsome Stranger vanished. Poof! He simply disappeared, leaving nothing but a dart that fell to the floor.
“What happened to him? And why did you just say he’s half the reason we’re in this mess?”
“I’m not sure we have enough time for me to explain everything.” LaLa frowned at where the dart had fallen on the floor. “Jacks probably removed him, and I imagine he’ll do the same to me soon. So you need to listen carefully.”
“But this is my dream,” Evangeline protested.
LaLa sighed. “I don’t have time to explain how Fates can manipulate dreams. You’re just going to have to trust me.”
“Why should I trust you after everything you’ve done?”
LaLa gnawed on her lip, looking unusually nervous. “I never wanted Apollo to kill you. You really are my friend, Evangeline. I just made a rash decision the day I learned that you could open up the Valory Arch but that you weren’t planning on doing it. It was a horrible mistake. But I really didn’t want you to die. That’s why I put the mirror curse on both of you—I thought, if Apollo actually hurt you, he’d be injured as well, and then he couldn’t keep hunting you. Everyone knows he’s a terrible shot, so I didn’t ever believe he’d hit you in the heart with an arrow.”
As apologies went, it was far from the best one Evangeline had ever received, and yet it felt earnest. LaLa looked up at her with pleading eyes, and Evangeline could see they were also rimmed in red and splotches of smeared kohl. LaLa had looked so sparkling and perfect when she’d first stepped into the dream, but the longer Evangeline watched her, the more she could see the signs of anguish all over her pretty face.
Evangeline knew from her experience with Jacks that Fates had different moral lines from those of humans, which made it easier to forgive LaLa. But Evangeline still felt wary of her friend. She could believe LaLa didn’t want her dead, but it was troubling to know that she’d been all right with her being hunted down. “I want to know why you did it. What’s in the Valory that you want so badly?”
“Evangeline, we don’t have time for this,” LaLa said. As she spoke, gems fell from her skirt onto the floor. “The dream is already starting to fracture.”
“I don’t care,” Evangeline said. “I can forgive you for what you did, but if you want me to even think about trusting you again, I need to know why you did it.”
“The Valory is either a treasure chest that protects the Valors’ greatest magical gifts—or it’s a magical prison that is home to an abomination that the Valors created.” LaLa twisted her mouth as if the words had come out all mangled.
“Stupid story curse,” she muttered. “I’m afraid, since I’m not actually in the Hollow, I still can’t tell you what’s inside the arch.”
“Well, you need to tell me something,” Evangeline said. She still wasn’t sure she could believe anything LaLa told her, but she wanted some sort of explanation.
“I might be able to tell you a story.” LaLa started to pace the tavern, her shining boots clacking against the wooden floor. “Once—there was someone I loved more than anyone else. He—” She broke off abruptly and wrenched her mouth as if she couldn’t say what she’d originally planned. “He could shift into a dragon—a large one,” she finally shoved out. “As you know, dragons like hoarding treasures, and I’ve always liked wearing sparkling things, and that was why he found me. He was flying in his dragon form, and he plucked me from the ground, thinking I was treasure.”
LaLa’s face turned wistful as she picked a gem off her glittering skirt. And Evangeline remembered a young man who looked like a dragon at LaLa’s party, dancing with a girl costumed like treasure. “Were there people who dressed like you and your dragon at the ball?”