“They say this place is cursed,” Dante continued. “During one of the governor’s many parties, his wife discovered that he planned to poison her so that he could wed his younger mistress. Rather than drinking the poison, the wife added three drops of her own blood and poured it out as an offering to one of the Fates—the Poisoner. She vowed to live the rest of her life in service as one of his handmaidens, as long as he granted her one request.”
“What did she ask for?”
“The wife didn’t know who her husband’s mistress was, but she knew the woman was at the party. So she wished that her husband would only remember his wife.”
“What happened then?”
“The Poisoner granted her wish. After drinking a poisonous glass of wine, her husband forgot every person he’d ever met, except for his wife.” Dante shot a wry glace at the statue pouring her bottomless pitcher.
“Is that supposed to be the wife?” Tella asked.
“If you believe the story.” Dante sat on the edge of the fountain, letting the red water trickle behind him in soft musical notes as he continued with the tale. “The wife wasn’t pleased. The Poisoner had erased everyone from her husband’s memory. A governor isn’t useful if he only knows one person. Once word of his condition escaped he was stripped of his position, and soon they were to be forced out of their house. So, even though her first bargain had not ended well, the wife spilled more blood and called on the Poisoner again, asking him to restore her husband’s memory. He warned her if they did this, her husband would try to kill her once more. So the woman promised to serve the Poisoner in the afterlife as well, and asked for another favor. She requested the power to make her husband forget just one person. The Poisoner agreed, but again he cautioned that there would be consequences. The woman didn’t care—as long as she kept her home and her title.”
“I think I know where this is going,” Tella said.
“Do you want to try finishing the story?” Dante offered.
“No.” Tella sat down beside him on the edge of the fountain. “You have a voice for telling stories.”
“Of course I do.”
“You are so full of yourself.” She leaned closer to elbow him in the ribs, but Dante took the opportunity to slide his heavy arm around her waist and tuck her into his side.
He was so warm, a human shield sheltering her from the rest of the world. She allowed herself to press closer to him as he said, “The Poisoner restored her husband’s memory. Then the Fate told the wife that if she took a pitcher of water and poured it out into the pool in the center of the courtyard, it would turn to wine that would have the power to make her husband forget the other woman he loved. The wife obeyed, but as she poured out the water and it turned to wine, she also began to transform, shifting into stone while her husband watched from the balcony above. He’d only had his memory back a few short hours, but it had been long enough for him to call on a Fate as well.”
“So he had her turned to stone?” Tella asked.
“He wished her dead, but the Poisoner had promised she’d keep her home and her title, and the Fates always keep their bargains.”
Both Tella and Dante shifted to watch the frozen woman once more. She didn’t look furious, as Tella would have suspected, or as if she were attempting to fight the spell. Instead, she almost appeared to relish it, tipping out her cursed wine the way another person might spill a dare or a challenge.
“It’s believed that anyone who drinks from this fountain can forget whatever they choose,” Dante said.
“And I thought you were telling me the story to help me forget.”
“Did it do that?” he asked.
“For a minute,” she admitted. But sadly that moment had already passed. Tella dipped her finger into the fountain, coating it in swirls of bitter burgundy. It would have been so easy to put her finger in her mouth, close her eyes, and erase what her mother had said and done.
But even if she believed Dante’s tragic myth, she wasn’t sure she really wanted to forget. Tella dropped her hand, smearing the cursed wine against the white of her sheath.
“You know what the saddest part is? I should have known all along. I was warned,” Tella said. “When I was a child, I read my fortune. It contained the Prince of Hearts. So for almost my entire life I’ve known I was destined for unrequited love. I’ve never let myself become close to anyone, except my sister, for fear they’d break my heart. It never even occurred to me that the one I really needed to protect myself from was my own mother.”
Tella coughed on a sound that felt like a sob and sounded like a wounded laugh. “It seems the people who say you can’t change your fate are right.”
“I don’t believe that,” Dante said.
“Then what do you believe?”
“Fate is only an idea, but I think by believing in it we turn it into something more. You just said you’ve avoided love because you’ve believed it wasn’t in your future, and so it hasn’t been.”
“That wasn’t the only card I pulled. I also pulled the Maiden Death, and shortly after, my mother vanished.”
“Just a coincidence. From what I’ve heard of your mother, it sounds as if she would have left whether you pulled the card or not.”
“But—” Tella almost told him about the Aracle and all the predictions it had shown her. But had it really revealed the future, or had it been manipulating her along as she’d suspected last night? Had it used glimpses of possible futures not to help her, but to guide her toward Jacks so that he could free the Fates?
Tella had thought herself so bold and daring by attempting to change her mother and her sister’s fate. But maybe Scarlett’s fiancé was actually a decent person. And maybe the Aracle had lied about her mother, too. It had shown her in prison and dead, but if Tella didn’t win Caraval, if she left the cards locked in the stars’ vault, her mother wouldn’t die or end up bloody in a jail. She’d just remain where she was, trapped in a card.