Of Wicked Blood (The Quatrefoil Chronicles #1) - Olivia Wildenstein Page 0,4
wishes to coin throwers. Do I believe this? No. But I like legends and have read Istor Breou, an old tome on the history of Brumian magic, from crumbly cover to crumbly cover more times than I care to admit.
My boot catches on a slick cobble, and I grip the wheelchair tighter to avoid faceplanting. Alma elbows me after I’ve regained my balance. I think she’s about to offer to replace me at the helm but nope. She nods to two guys leaning against the well, sipping from hammered copper mugs. It takes me a minute to make out who they are—Paul and Liron.
Liron is Alma’s ex. They met over the summer when they both worked as counselors for the university’s summer camps, then dated until October, after which they amicably parted ways. They still hook up from time to time, but that has more to do with pickings being slim around these parts than ardent attraction.
“Liron was telling me that Paul wants to ask you out.” She says this in a stage-whisper which I pray doesn’t carry to the boys.
“Who wants to ask Cadence out?” Papa’s legs might not work, but his ears work way too well.
“No one, Papa.”
“Paul Martinol.”
I shoot Alma a pointed glare, which just makes her smile brighten. I swear, she lives for embarrassing me.
Papa stares poor Paul down, making red blotches appear on his skin. Like me, he’s a blusher. He might be worse than I am, actually. Or maybe it just looks more acute, because his hair is red and his skin’s bathed in freckles.
“Not interested,” I say to both Alma and Papa.
My heart’s set on someone else.
Someone completely unattainable and completely uninterested.
Someone whose house we reach a couple minutes later up on Third Kelc’h.
Adrien Mercier.
Camille’s son swings open his front door, golden hair slicked back, shirt sleeves rolled up to his elbows. After flashing us a wide smile and chanting Joyeux Noël, he seizes Papa’s chair and hoists it up the two front steps, muscles bunching inside his long forearms.
“Charlotte couldn’t make it I see,” she tells Adrien, waggling her brows at me. “What a shame.”
“If you weren’t my best, and only, friend,” I hiss, “I’d toss you into my family’s crypt.”
“Oh, please.” She rolls her eyes. “I’d love it. I’d get to hang out with Viviene.”
“Who’s dead.”
“Not according to the rumor mill. Her ghost’s been spotted all over Brume.”
“By drunks and tour guides.”
Supposedly, I descend from the legendary enchantress who trapped Merlin in a cave under a rock in the neighboring forest of Broceliande. Alma’s convinced I also descend from Merlin, but Viviene was reputed to have had many lovers, so who really knows?
“Here.” Adrien reaches for my silver puffer jacket, and his fingers graze mine. “Let me get that.”
Cheeks blazing, I murmur a rapid-fire merci and streak into the living room where Papa and Adrien’s father, Geoffrey Keene, are exchanging niceties even though they never have anything nice to say about one another.
Both Geoffrey and Papa married into Brume’s founding families. Where Geoffrey kept his own last name, my father took my mother’s, something which Geoffrey rails him about at least once a year. In my opinion, I find Papa’s gesture generous. Maman wanted me to carry her maiden name, and Papa wanted to make sure no one ever forgot I was his baby girl.
But the root of their hatred runs deeper than taunts about family names. My father’s loathed the Mayor of Brume since he tried to seduce Maman, despite both of them being married.
“Bonsoir, Cadence.” Geoffrey’s eyes, which are the same mosaic of brown and green as his son’s, stroke up my body, taking in the skinny black pants I’ve paired with a sleeveless, chunky turtleneck. I don’t think he’s looking at my outfit as much as the curves around my hips and chest.
“I made some vin chaud,” Adrien announces. “Can I get you all a glass?”
“Yum.” Alma settles on the leather couch. “Bring it on, Professor M.”
“Your parents couldn’t make it back for the holidays?” Geoffrey asks Alma.
“Oh, you know my parents, Monsieur Keene. They’re not big on holidays.” She scoops up a handful of cashews from the low table and chomps on them while I go help Adrien ladle the mulled wine into mugs.
Both Alma’s parents were professors here at the university. They had Alma late in life, and then, two years ago, they left her under the care of my father and moved to an island off India’s coast where they teach English to underprivileged children.