She simply patted his back. “I know you didn’t mean anything by it, love. You’ve always been a good boy. A bit of a handful growing up, but good. I do wish my Martin was more like you.”

Weysh frowned at the scent of bitter regret and the sickly stink of shame, like something dying. Genevieve’s son Martin had a bad gambling habit, and hadn’t been able to shrug free of it in all the years she’d been with them. Weysh gave her one final squeeze. “Be well, Genie,” he said before following his mother to the sitting room. The fire was already blazing cheerily, but his mother went to work lighting the candelabras on the walls.

“Have a seat, Weysh,” she said as she worked. “Sylvie, my heart, leave us be for a moment. I’m sure you have studying to do.”

“That’s not fair!” Sylvie cried. “I’m part of this family, too, Maman. Stop keeping secrets from me.”

“Sylvie!” she snapped, and then closed her eyes, inhaling deeply. “This is not about keeping secrets. This will be hard enough for me as it is.”

Weysh squinted at his mother. Something was wrong. It was rare that she let her mask of propriety slip, even with him. Perhaps especially with him.

“Go, Sylvie,” he said softly. “We’ll catch up later, en?”

“All right,” she said uncertainly, finally reading the mood in the room. She slipped out, closing the door behind her. Weysh’s mother folded herself gracefully into the armchair across from him, without even offering him cake or biscuits or coffee. She truly must have been distraught.

She rubbed her temple and let out a bitter chuckle through her nose. “She’s too young,” she said. “Too young to be burdened with all of this. Perhaps you are, too, but you seem to have met the woman you want to marry”—she sighed—“and marriage is no easy thing.”

“I’m twenty, Maman, I’m a man grown.” Weysh forced a firmness into his voice that he didn’t feel.

“And was it a man grown who attacked Montpierre last week? Were those the actions of a man grown, Weysh?”

Weysh cringed. “I’m sorry, Maman.”

“Then be quiet and listen.”

A cold, unsettling feeling tingled down Weysh’s spine. Something seemed strange and off about his maman. Grave, and yet more real. Perhaps as real as she had ever been with him. The air about them loomed heavy and ominous, and Weysh could sense that the thing, that dark, shadowy thing hidden under her charming laughs and her impeccable skills as a hostess and model wife, was dangerously close to the surface.

“At first, I went to Guste willingly,” she began.