Her smile suddenly fades and she takes my hands. “But I’ve heard … you know how gossip comes to us, from those we take in and shelter.… Is it true what they say?”
I sigh. “Don’t listen to Venice’s gossip, Annalena. You should know better than that—a good sister like you!”
My friend’s cheeks color with embarrassment. “I’m not so very good,” she says quietly.
Darling girl. Does she have any idea of the corruption that lies outside this convent? But time is pressing. “Annalena, can you take me to the Abbess?”
She looks surprised. “If that’s what you want,” she says, getting to her feet. I stand up too, and we walk past the rose gardens towards the Abbess’s rooms. It was a walk I always dreaded, and some of the old fear creeps over me now. But I straighten my back and shrug it off. She has no power over me any longer. I can walk back into the daylight at any time.
The Abbess is sitting in her usual place, as if she’s never moved in all those months since she dismissed me. Above her head hangs the painting of a lion, the Agliardi Vertova family crest. There is her Bible, the lettering picked out in gold. I clear my throat, and the older woman glances up. I wait for one of her usual chastisements, but instead her face melts into a warm smile. Most disconcerting.
“Laura,” she says, getting up to move from behind her desk. “What a pleasant surprise.”
Her sour mouth suggests it’s anything but.
“Abbess.”
“You’ve changed,” she says as her eyes range over the curls heated and set around my temples. Her forehead creases in a frown of disapproval.
“You haven’t,” I say. The words tip out of me before I can stop them, and we both look at each other for a moment, shocked. Then the Abbess has the good grace to laugh.
“Don’t worry,” she says. “I know what you mean. Time moves more slowly inside the House of Mary and the Angels. Now, what can I do for a fellow sister?”
She smiles, and it takes me a moment to realize the meaning of her words. For she was never a sister to me here. She can only mean some other kinship that we share.
“You too?” I ask. Somehow—even now—she makes me feel small and foolish.
“That’s right, Laura. I was a member of the Segreta long before you even knew it existed.”
“The society’s range is wide,” I say. “I just didn’t realize how wide.”
“Come, come,” the Abbess says, striding towards the door. “You want to see the girl, I presume.”
Before I can respond, she is already out of the room, her footsteps ringing on the flagstones of the corridor.
We arrive at the doorway of a tiny cell, and I need to duck my head to step inside. A girl sits on the edge of a bed. She looks up at our entrance, the whites of her eyes two unearthly pools in the gloom.
“Call me if you need anything,” the Abbess whispers to me. Then she is gone, closing the door behind her and shutting most of the light from the room.
The girl scrambles back on the bed, bunching her knees up to her chin. Her hair hangs in greasy tresses, and I can see bruises along her arms. Someone has restrained her forcefully. She’s like a terrified animal, ready to run or attack. She watches my face.
I take a tentative step farther into the room, and a moan of fear erupts from the girl.
“Please don’t be afraid,” I tell her. No response. From the girl’s dark skin and eyes, I can see that she is not Venetian. But haven’t I seen a flash of those eyes before?
“Do you understand me?” I ask gently. No response. I try again in different languages—the French I’ve been learning since leaving the convent, and the Latin I knew too well within—asking the girl where she is from. Nothing. Her limbs are shaking. What can I do? I cannot leave here without information. I’m risking all my links with the Segreta just to be standing here now.
“Do you know anything of a woman called Aysim?” I ask, getting straight to the point.
Suddenly, there’s a reaction. Her eyes blaze and she leaps up, standing on the bed, her hands balled into fists as she glares down at me. She looks fierce and proud and absolutely unwilling to tell me any of her secrets.
I push on. “Prince Halim, Aysim’s brother, is distraught. His sister …” I hesitate, then