Genevieve de Troyes was a wealthy woman in her own right.

I read through the pages detailing balances of her accounts, investments, and property holdings. She owned no less than sixty percent of the Trianon Opera House, and parts of several of the smaller houses in the city. All of it was held through a company of which she was the sole owner, the fact of which seemed to be hidden by layers of lawyers and paperwork. Nearly all of it she inherited from her mother – Cécile’s grandmother – who had owned it all as far back as the records went. Genevieve was rich, even by my standards, yet she pretended to be entirely dependent on the Marquis for money. Which begged the question of why?

When Cécile first came to Trollus, I’d had her mother thoroughly investigated by those in my employ, and none of them had turned up this information. Which meant it was an extremely well-guarded secret. So well guarded, in fact, that her own daughter didn’t even know. Locking the safe, I retreated back up the stairs to check on Cécile.

She hadn’t so much as stirred. The room was warm from the glowing coals of the fireplace, so I gingerly removed my coat, feeling the bump of something heavy in my pocket as I did so. The book. I’d forgotten about it.

Extracting the small volume, I set it on Cécile’s desk and settled on the chair. It had been beneath Catherine’s body when I’d lifted her up, the only thing that had kept it from burning. At the time, I’d only paid enough attention to it to determine it wasn’t Anushka’s grimoire before shoving it in my pocket, but now, I decided to take a closer look.

Inside the front cover was a piece of parchment that had been folded many times over. I recognized Cécile’s looping handwriting, my eyes taking in a list of names and dates. The most recent was that of Genevieve’s mother, but none of the others were familiar. There was also a folded map of Trianon. The fire couldn’t have touched it, but there were tiny burn marks all over the map. None of it made any sense to me, but it must have been important for Catherine to steal it away from Cécile.

The book itself was full of spells. I read quickly, grimacing at the dark and bloody nature of the magic, until I discovered a spell intended to find a missing person. A spell requiring a map.

My father’s minion had said that Cécile was performing blood magic and I hadn’t wanted to believe it. But what I was looking at was undeniable proof that he’d been telling the truth. Picking the map up, I counted the marks. “How many times did you perform this spell, Cécile?” I asked, having felt her wake.

She hesitated. “Once. All the marks came from the same casting.” Climbing slowly out of bed, she walked behind a dressing screen, emerging moments later in a green velvet wrap.