Lady Death's Diary: Chapter 12

Bellcrest Opera House had been constructed under Loren’s grandfather, King Ignatius. Ornate arches lined the Opera’s exterior façade to the effect of making the building appear taller than its actual five stories. Two oversized marble statues, both bearing King Ignatius’ likeness and consequentially looking a great deal like Loren, flanked the driveway leading up to large golden gilt doors, which were thrown open each performance night.

Letty gasped as we entered. On the vaulted ceiling, a sea of swirling color depicted The Battle for Bellcrest. The first time I’d ever attended the opera as a child, Theo had delighted in pointing to the fresco’s far-right corner, where a man bearing the Rhys family crest on his shield was in the process of being bloodily beheaded by a soldier in Tivall colors who, like the statues out front, bore a disturbing resemblance to my fiancé. I hadn’t realized at the time that my ancestor wouldn’t be the last Rhys executed thusly.

I felt momentarily tempted to draw Letty’s attention to the scene, as I knew she would be appalled by its brutality. Witnessing her wholehearted delight over the Opera House interior, however, I decided that such petty revenge was beneath me.

Letty practically pranced up the steps towards the auditorium, where Loren awaited us in the Royal theater box. In her excitement, she dropped her newest creation. The hand-beaded lace fan tumbled down the grand stairwell, its clacks as it hit each step echoing throughout the domed chamber. She picked it up with a blush. I glared at a passing nobleman, old enough to be our grandfather, who had taken the opportunity to leer at her posterior.

“Be more aware of yourself, Letty,” I snapped as he hurried away.

Her lips parted slightly; I was usually more patient with her clumsiness. “I’m sorry,” she said, though her furrowed brow showed her cluelessness over why she ought to be contrite.

I sighed. She might eventually try to kill me, but it had been unfair to chastise her simply for bending over. Yet if I informed her of the man’s stare, she would be unable to relax for the rest of the evening . . . which would in turn agitate Loren. My head still throbbed from Dragon’s healing and Delphine’s interrogation, and I lacked the forbearance to deal with a malcontent princeling.

I wanted nothing more than to lock myself in my room with my journals and see if I could puzzle out just what the sorceress knew about my condition. Had I accidently given something away? Inadvertently alluded to my past lives? It rankled that, instead of addressing the matter, I was stuck attending the opera with my fiancé and his future lover.

“Let’s get this over with.” I took Letty’s arm. “Loren will be annoyed if we’re late.”

“I don’t understand why you’re not more excited, Tru,” she said. I half-dragged her up the steps, as she kept wanting to pause and admire the art overhead. “We’re going to see a real opera! Lady Gwendolyn claimed ‘Desire’s Folly’ was the most romantic show she’d ever seen, and you know how often she attends performances.”

“We’re here.” I pulled back the velvet tapestry covering the opening to royal theater box. Loren stood from his seat, his bored mien instantly transforming into a smile as Letty entered behind me.

“I’m thrilled that you ladies could join me tonight,” he said with a bow in her direction. “Imagine my astonishment to learn you’ve never been to the Opera before, Lady Letticia.”

Letty fiddled with her fan, once again nearly dropping it. “There’s much of Bellcrest that I’ve yet to experience. Though coming here has been high on my list.” Her large violet eyes flicked towards me, and I bristled at the silent implication that I had been negligent in my unwanted duty as chaperone.

We took our seats on either side of Loren as the horn played, marking five minutes until the performance began. Letty leaned over the railing of the box with her mouth ajar. “It’s so crowded down there.” She pointed to the ground floor three tiers below, where commoners paid two half-suns each for a standing ticket.

“The theatre fits over two thousand,” Loren informed her. “Half of those tickets are for standing spaces. Lucky for you, I have the best seats in the house.” He dimpled mischievously. “It would be a lark to go down there though, wouldn’t it?”

“If you don’t mind being trampled,” I said. “Two women were killed last month when an understudy took over for Lapernce and the crowds rioted. I attempted to bring up new safety measures with Councilor Venuda but she claimed the matter is outside her jurisdiction.”

“How awful!” exclaimed Letty.

Loren folded his arms. “I was only jesting,” he said crossly. “No need to get so serious about everything, Tru.”

“Two people died, Loren,” I retorted. Even Letty’s mouth twisted in distaste over his comment. “Your people. If the government won’t step in to ensure people’s safety, I fail to see the point of the Council’s existence.”

No one spoke. I held my breath: vocalizing such thoughts could easily be construed as seditious. I hadn’t intended to go that far, yet one of the victims had been only sixteen. My age. Unlike me, she wouldn’t have a chance to redo her life.

Loren broke the tense silence. “I’ll discuss the matter with my father.” He placed a hand on my knee reassuringly, looking even more handsome than usual in his formal black coat and crisp white neckcloth. “Perhaps he can order Wrenly to lower the occupancy limits or some such.”

I smiled back at him. Loren was thoughtless, yes, and inarguably self-absorbed. Occasionally, however, I was reminded why I’d once adored him.

I glanced towards Letty. Perhaps she felt the same now as I had then, seven lifetimes ago.

“Loren, would you mind switching chairs with me?” I asked. “I can’t see center stage from my current seat.” It was a blatant lie—the box belonged to the King, after all. My view was unobstructed.

Still, Loren was too well-bred to call me on it, even if his expression darkened at my request. We changed seats so that I was positioned directly between him and Letty.

I made a poor barrier, as far as walls went. This was the opera: true love conquered all on a nightly basis.

*****

“Desire’s Folly” was the recent creation of a Fengali playwright who’d fled his home country after composing a ribald ditty about his current emperor. He’d sought refuge at Bellcrest Court, where King Eldin granted patronage on the condition that the writer continue to point his mocking pen at foreign leaders rather than the Verdan nobility. As a result, the piece bordered on political propaganda. On the surface, it was a love story between a humble shepherd and the princess of Fengal. The princess endured all sorts of humiliations at the hands of her father, who promised her hand to one foreign prince after another. All the princes had some sort of flaw: one was an old man on his death bed, another had a nose so long he tripped over it, and a third insisted on walking backwards in order to present people with his “best side.” The fourth, most likeable, prince was in love with his valet.

The princess and the shepherd despaired of ever being together—the actress’s heartfelt aria bemoaning fate’s cruelty caused Letty to visibly tear up. After numerous trials, the fourth prince and the shepherd discovered that they were long lost identical twins and agreed to switch places. The shepherd married his beloved and became the next emperor, and his brother happily ran off with his manservant.

The performance was in equal measures a romance and a comedy of errors. I found it more amusing than emotional, but Letty’s eyes were rimmed red by the time the curtain closed.

“Imagine being so in love with someone,” she sniffled as Loren escorted us outside, “but knowing your relationship is forbidden.”

Loren clasped her gloved hand between his own. “Now, then, don’t cry,” he said gently. “It ended well enough, didn’t it?”

I coughed. Loren released her hand, guilt radiating off his tense shoulders even in the darkness of night. He bowed curtly as our carriage pulled up and the coachman opened the door. “Thank you for tonight, ladies. I trust I’ll see you both at tomorrow’s picnic?”

Letty’s head swiveled my way; I was the one who usually arranged our schedule and made sure that she knew what to expect for the various different types of social occasions. But I was weary of playing nursemaid to someone whom I knew would stab me in the back. Her reaction to tonight’s performance confirmed her feelings: she was the shepherd, and I was the unwanted fiancée engaged to her beloved. Except when her and Loren had married in my past, I’d never been fortunate enough to have a handsome manservant of my own with whom to elope. No, “Desire’s Folly” wouldn’t have been near as humorous had the shepherd murdered the prince to take his place.

Even in a farce, love was victorious. Suddenly, all I wanted to do was curl in bed and sleep until it was my ninth life already.

I stiffened.

No. There would be no ninth. I’d keep Letty away from Loren, no matter how much a villain they believed me.

“I have prior engagements,” I said. “We won’t be able to attend.”

Loren ignored my refusal. “I’ll tell Vincent he can skip so that our numbers will remain even. Lady Letticia, until tomorrow.”

“Oh, but . . .” Letty’s soft protest was lost as our carriage pulled away. Disinterested in anything she had to say after she had so clearly advertised her misplaced affections this night, I ignored her the entire trip back to the castle.

Later, long after Letty and I parted ways, I locked the door to my room and retrieved my journal from its hiding place in Yainharrow’s dusty shell. I also took out a pair of silver-framed spectacles—the contraption was decidedly unfashionable, and too identifying to wear in public. Still, they saved me from squinting.

I crawled into bed and began rereading each entry by the light of the glowstone on my nightstand. Letty’s involvement in each of my deaths was undeniable. When Theo had shot me, she’d been the one to bring me to the dueling grounds. Who was to say that she hadn’t somehow tampered with his pistol so that it misfired? She alone would have had access to the family quarters where Theo kept it as well as reason to try and ensure Loren’s safety. Not to mention the highwayman from my second death. Loren’s plea that I be granted a light sentence apparently hadn’t satisfied her.

What nagged at me most was how Letty had been able to accomplish all this by herself. I knew from my first and fifth deaths that she had an accomplice. Loren obviously thought she hung the moon and would believe anything she claimed; he’d easily bought her story about seeing my face during his attack in my first life. But who had really wielded the knife? I recalled the bloody bandage wrapped around Loren’s hand and his pale grimace of pain—my memories faded but that sight had left enough emotional impact to remain vivid.

I frowned. Much as I loved the idea that Armond was Letty’s accomplice, I lacked any semblance of evidence. His cufflink didn’t match that of my mysterious assailant during my fifth death, and I’d made sure that he and Letty rarely interacted with each other. I groaned. Why had I let Loren bullrush me into that picnic tomorrow?

My only guess besides Armond was one of the Councilors. Perhaps they hoped Letty would prove to be a malleable ruler and wanted to use her to push their own agendas. I flipped through my journal, rereading my various trials. Councilor Wrenly’s disdain for Letty had been evident, and Venuda was too honorable despite her short temper, not to mention female (I’d definitely been pushed off the tower by a man). Which left Hargraves or Timons. Either was a more likely mastermind than my constantly tongue-tied stepsister. Not that their involvement absolved her in any way, but it helped to explain how she came across as so guileless.

I rubbed the bridge of my nose and sighed, taking off my glasses and placing them on the nightstand next to me. I was too tired to get out of bed and put back my journal, so I settled for tucking it under my pillow with the intention of replacing come morning.

Sleep came with relative ease despite the unwelcome developments in Letty and Loren’s relationship, my exhaustion outpacing my anxiety. My dreams were restless, a combination of flashbacks and imagined futures. I was in chains, I was in a carriage, I was tied to a stake. Flames danced beneath me, blistering the soles of my feet and inching higher as I struggled against the rope.

My eyes opened and I sat up with a gasp. Bedsheets tangled around my legs, resembling the bindings of my dream. But I still felt unbearably hot.

The bed’s canopy was a curtain of flickering orange flames. Acrid smoke choked my lungs. The fire was real.

I hadn’t even turned seventeen, and I was already going to die.