The black lacquered carriage door flew open, hitting the stone mounting block with an echo that cracked through the dripping silence of the courtyard. Two footmen scrambled down, but before their white-gloved hands could offer an escort, silk petticoats billowed against the iron steps. Luzia Morvath pitched forward. A theatrical shriek tore across the gravel as she collapsed in a rustling heap on the wet slabs of the grand portico. "My ankle—merciful heavens! It gave out on the risers!" Luzia's voice trembled, pitch-perfect in its agony, pitched precisely to carry into the soaring vaulted entrance hall. "The salt dampness... the carriage step was slick!" Ignac materialized at the threshold like ink spreading through milk. His expression was flat, his shoulders rigid beneath his livery. "Madame Morvath. Lord Brostev does not receive callers without prior correspondence." "I cannot walk!" Luzia clutched her left limb, where a neatly pinned lace wrap peeked beneath emerald velvet. "Would you turn away a daughter of House Morvath onto the crags while an engine roars in my marrow? Fetch a settee. Fetch the master!" Within ten minutes, the sheer, ruthless stubbornness of high-society entitlement breached the ironclad isolation of Griefmire. Luzia was carried not to Davorin's private sanctuary, but dumped by Ignac’s pointed instruction onto the horsehair divan in the drafty North Parlor. And because Maida had been dismissed into the fog an hour prior, the duty of serving hot infusions fell directly to the quiet, biddable replacement. Zelyma kept her chin tucked, pinning on the soft, vacant smile of a nervous kitchen girl. Beneath the starched bib of her apron, her pulse was cold and measured. Her palm subtly smoothed the folds of her pocket, verifying the contours of the tiny silver key Ignac had slid under her tray earlier that morning. "A steaming cup of chicory and dried bergamot, Madame," Zelyma murmured, dropping a bobbing curtsy as she set the silver tray on the low table. Luzia did not look at the tea. She looked at Zelyma's face, her pale eyes narrowing with the acute cruelty of an apex predator inspecting a mouse on its carpet. "Davorin keeps such plain little things about him now. No wonder he hides behind iron doors." She adjusted her propped leg, her face smooth, showing not an ounce of the pain she had howled over minutes ago. "Lord Brostev values quiet above all, Madame," Zelyma offered, dipping her head submissively. "He values what I tell him to value." Luzia reached for the porcelain cup. Her rings clinked against the delicate handle, then suddenly, deliberately, her wrist flicked. Boiling water and dark tea sloshed across the rim. It didn't spill toward the divan. It splashed directly over Zelyma’s bare knuckles and wrists. The heat bit like barbed wire. Skin scalded instant crimson. Zelyma did not scream; she swallowed the gasp whole, forcing her shoulders to hitch in theatrical terror as porcelain shattered on the hardwood. "Stupid cow!" Luzia shrilled, springing half-upright—putting full, unhesitating weight on her supposedly shattered ankle. Her palm rose, claws splayed, ready to strike Zelyma across the cheek. "You dared scald a guest of this house? I'll have the skin stripped from your—" A hand seized Luzia's wrist in midair. The strike never landed. The grip was iron, sudden and brutal enough to pop the tendons in Luzia's forearm. Davorin Brostev loomed over the divan, his dark coat smelling of rain and the bitter herbs Zelyma had brewed for him in the glasshouse. His voice was a razor dragged across ice. "You stand remarkably well on a ruined joint, Luzia." Luzia whimpered, trying to pull back, but his grasp only tightened until her knuckles turned tallow-white. "Davorin... she spilled boiling broth! She is clumsy—she ruined my velvet—" "I watched through the glass partition," Davorin cut in. His gaze wasn't on Luzia. It dropped down, fixing completely on Zelyma's trembling, blistered knuckles. The dark hollows beneath his eyes darkened further, a terrifying, quiet fury coiling in the line of his mouth. "You tilted the cup into her flesh." "She is a common drudge!" Luzia spat, vanity overriding fear. "You would humiliate me for a gutter-born maid?" Davorin twisted her wrist a fraction of an inch to the left. Luzia gasped, dropping to her knees on the rug. "Touch a single person in this house again," Davorin whispered, leaning down so his words struck only her ears, "and your carriage will return to the capital empty while your body feeds the gulls at the foot of the Bleakcoast crags. Do you understand my meaning?" Luzia nodded frantically, tears of genuine pain finally springing to her lashes. Davorin released her as if dropping offal. He turned toward Zelyma. The lethal tension in his posture didn't leave, but his tone softened into something taut and raw. "Go to the dispensary. Put lard and winterbloom on the burn. If you lift another kettle today, I will burn the kitchens down myself." Zelyma kept her eyes lowered, curtsying with just enough trembling servility to satisfy his perception of her fragile innocence. "Yes, sir. Thank you, sir." She backed out of the North Parlor with hurried, scurrying steps. But the moment the heavy oaken door clicked shut and she turned the corner into the servant corridor, the docile slump left her spine. Her burnt hand throbbed fiercely, but pain was simply an operational tax. She slipped down the narrow service stair, avoiding the main halls where footmen hovered. Luzia’s luggage had already been carried up to the Blue Guest Suite on the second floor while the woman remained pinned downstairs under Davorin's venomous surveillance. The suite door was unlocked. Inside, three velvet trunks sat untouched alongside an ornate, brass-bound satchel tossed carelessly upon the vanity chair. Zelyma approached without making a sound on the thick wool runner. She reached into her apron pocket and drew out the silver key Ignac had provided. The metal was cool against her blistering skin. She slipped it into the satchel’s miniature padlock. A muted click rewarded her. She lifted the flap. Inside were no perfumes, no love letters, no social registers. There was a single thick vellum parchment, folded thrice. Zelyma unfolded it with careful, grease-free thumbs. It was an architectural schematic of Griefmire Manse, detailing the subterranean escape passages and hidden load-bearing pillars of the foundation. And on the third floor, Davorin Brostev’s private bedchamber had been circled with thick, oxidized rings of dried blood.

The Sprained Ankle