were allowed in. Did his books scream like the ones in the Hôtel Séguin as they dragged him away?
A tear slipped from her eye and landed on the word here.
Where it had fallen, the blue ink blurred. Its edges dissolved and the space around the words trembled. Had he hidden something in this letter? She blinked and the words ran together, nothing more than a smudge.
But then they sharpened.
I did not dare send the three things at once, lest they be intercepted by the people who are watching the shop. Come soon, and please be careful.
He’d found the book she’d been looking for: The Silver Leaf. What were the other two things?
Hastily, she reread the lines as they started to fade. In a minute, they were gone, as if they’d never been. As she began to fold the brown paper up, her fingers came across something hard. An object, caught in the wrapper’s folds.
It was a tiny vial. She knew what the narrow label wrapped around its neck would say before she picked it up. Blaise Delouvet. He’d already worked the magic of tempus fugit from the book he’d found and made the blur. These were his tears.
She held it up to the light: pale green liquid filled a quarter of the crystal vial. Between her fingers, the glass radiated a small heat, like the flame of a candle. But why her? Why did he want her to have them—did he really think they would help her, in case he himself was gone? Without him there was no blur to be made.
Unless.
Three things, he’d written. The vial of his tears. The Silver Leaf. Was the third thing the book that explained how to make the blur?
But it wasn’t at all clear from his letter where that book was. He might have already sent it to her, and it hadn’t yet arrived. But she didn’t think so. Come soon, he had written. Perhaps it wasn’t The Silver Leaf that was at the shop after all. Perhaps it was the book explaining how to make the blur, the one he’d disguised with a blue binding. The one he’d told her he’d kept in a safe place. It had to be at the shop. Somewhere.
Carefully, she slipped the vial into the secret pocket sewn into the seam of her skirt. It felt both light and heavy at the same time.
On the silver salver lay another letter, facedown. She flipped it over. The dashing, impatient letters spelling out her name set her heart to running. Hands shaking, she unfolded it and pressed it flat.
Mon âme—
I send these lines to you in haste. Two days ago I said my adieux to the Cazalès family. The grandmother is brave but frail, and when she requested I accompany the family by coach to London, where she has a cousin, I could not refuse, though it kept me from Paris longer.
London is a city of marvels—I wish you had been with me to see it.
She imagined a crowded street, Lazare watching the unfamiliar passersby not with displeasure or annoyance but instead with his intense, consuming gaze. The signs in foreign English, the conversations a babble of unintelligible words. For a terrifying moment she thought he meant to stay. She skipped to the end.
I am already in France. The farmer who drove us from Saint-Cloud has taken me in. Tomorrow morning, as early as I can, I land at the Champ de Mars. Please ask Rosier to bring a wagon.
And then, underlined twice:
I regret everything.
He did not ask for anything. Not for her to be there, not to forgive him. There was only regret and longing.
While he’d been gone, her friend had been murdered, and she had published a pamphlet defending magicians. Even if she had wanted to, there was no way to be rid of her magic now, nor even to contain it. How big was his regret?
As always, I am yours, body and soul—
Lazare
She surprised herself by bringing the paper his hands had touched to her mouth and kissing the place where he had written his name.
He was safe, and he was coming home to her. Perhaps not everything was lost. Perhaps there was some way to mend what was broken. Throwing open the door to her room, she ran down the hall, letter in hand. When she reached the grand staircase, she leaned over the banister and shouted: “Sophie? Rosier? Lazare is nearly home!”
43
It was nearly dawn. Soon Lazare’s balloon would appear over the horizon. The