Until I Die - By Plum, Amy Page 0,30

to it, and that probably encouraged her. We went out a couple of times, but as soon as I realized I couldn’t make myself feel something that wasn’t there, I ended it. I hadn’t actually seen her since then—

it’s probably been about forty years. I asked JB to send another emissary on those errands.”

“She’s got to resent me for being with you, then.” I recalled Violette’s slipup at Philippe’s funeral—about revenants who were with humans—and wondered if she hadn’t actually said it on purpose. A little jab at the human who had succeeded in doing what she hadn’t: capturing Vincent’s heart.

“Actually, she’s talked to me about you already,” Vincent said. “She was pretty gracious about it and congratulated me on finding such a ‘lovely young lady.’” His imitation of her voice and ancient speech style made us both laugh. “No, seriously, she seems to really like you.”

“So it’s just Arthur who’s being a jerk?” I ventured.

“Seems like,” he said, “even though that’s so untypical of him. He took off right after the meeting, obviously to avoid me. Violette asked me to forgive him. She said she had warned him not to bring it up but that he had felt obliged. She was going to talk to him later.”

“That was nice of her,” I said, warming to the strange girl. “It’s over, anyway. I just want to forget about it now.” And as I mentally turned the page on the afternoon’s humiliation, something occurred to me. “Vincent, I found something about revenants in Papy’s library last night.”

“Really?” It was rare that I surprised Vincent instead of the other way around, but right now he looked like if I pushed him with one finger, he would keel right over. “Can I see it?”

I led him to the study, peeking in first to make sure Papy wasn’t there. Checking the clock on his desk, I saw that he wouldn’t be closing the gall ery for another half hour. We were safe.

I pulled the bestiary out of its protective box and, placing it on Papy’s desk, turned to the revenant page. Vincent’s eyebrows shot up as he saw the illustrations. “Wow, this is really rare, Kate. There is almost nothing about revenants remaining in human book collections.”

“Why not?”

He went on staring at the book as he spoke. “Dealers like your grandfather know that if they find anything, they can sell it for a fortune to a group of anonymous buyers. These collectors snatch up anything revenant-related before it even comes on the market.” Vincent glanced at me. “JB’s one of them. He has stacks of these old manuscripts in his library. I doubt Gaspard’s even worked his way through half of them.”

“Yeah, well, Papy must really treasure it, then,” I said, wondering why he would pass up a good sale to keep the book in his library. Maybe he hadn’t seen the revenant page and didn’t realize its value.

Vincent’s attention was back on the book, and he mouthed the words to himself, following along with his finger. “You know Latin?” I asked.

He smiled. “Yes, it used to be required in schools before people decided that dead languages weren’t good for anything. Do you want to know what it says?”

“I actually had an attempt at decoding it last night,” I admitted.

“Of course you did,” Vincent said, his eyes glimmering with amusement. “I can’t imagine you turning down that kind of challenge.” He looked back down at the book, and as he read the article aloud in English, I was pleased that I had gotten the gist of it myself. When he was done, I didn’t point out the fact that he had purposely skipped the last two lines. If I were in his place, I wouldn’t want him to think he was cursed to be with me.

“So what’s the deal with the ‘bardia’ term?” I asked. “If that’s actually what you are, why do you call yourselves ‘revenants’?”

“Good question,” responded Vincent. “I guess it’s just kind of gone out of style.” He mulled it over for a second. “Actually, it’s probably a kind of superiority thing—we think we’re the real deal, while the numa are more like deviants. You can ask Gaspard about it, but I think ‘bardia’ is based on a word that means ‘to guard,’ so it would actually be the more accurate term for us. It’s used in our official documents. But say ‘bardia’ to Ambrose or Jules and they will definitely look at you funny.” He flipped through the book’s pages