Jean Genie
Copyright© 2026 by Rachael Jane
Chapter 8: The Confrontation
By the time Mateo fumbles for the flint, I am gone, slipping through the door, down the hall, and out into the early morning light. The cold air hits my face like a blessing. I run through the narrow streets with the documents pressed against my ribs. Magic guides my route. Whether it’s the bracelet’s magic or my own, I’ve yet to determine.
Behind me, Mateo shouts for the cleric. I hear a door slam and the echo of footsteps. But I am faster. And I’m no longer the helpless young woman who was imprisoned in the Burgalimar dungeon. I am Jeannia Valcázar. A bound spirit and agent of the Maristela Bracelet. And now, I’m the keeper of the truth that will free Don Carlos.
As I reach the safety of the shadows near the Albaicín, I feel a fierce satisfaction. We have what we need. And for the first time, I feel something like triumph.
I reach the Fuentes mansion just as the pale light of dawn brushes the rooftops of Granada. The city is stirring, but the world still feels half‑asleep, perfect for slipping through the servants’ entrance unnoticed. The documents hidden in my gown may be invisible but they feel heavier than iron.
I find Rosalia in her chamber, sitting rigidly in a chair as though she hasn’t moved since I left. Her eyes snap to me the moment I enter.
“You’re back,” she breathes. “Tell me you’ve found something.”
I close the door behind me and draw the folded papers from my gown. “I’ve found what we need.”
I remove the cloaking magic that keeps the documents hidden. Rosalia’s hands tremble as she takes them. She spreads the documents across her desk, the letters in Don Mateo’s handwriting, forged evidence, secret correspondence from someone connected with the Inquisition, and worst of all, a sealed note from Doña Esperanza instructing the cleric to ‘ensure the prisoner does not leave the tribunal alive.’
Rosalia’s sinks into her chair, staring at the papers as though they might burst into flames.
“This ... this cannot be real,” she whispers. “My mother would never...”
But the words die on her tongue. She reads the first letter and then the second. After reading the third her face drains of colour.
“Jeannia,” she says in a barely audible voice, “my mother ordered this. She ordered my father’s death.”
I kneel beside her. “I am sorry, my lady.”
She shakes her head violently. “No. No, she must have been deceived. Manipulated. Mateo must have tricked her...”
“She was not tricked,” I say gently. “She was the one pulling Mateo’s strings.”
Rosalia presses a hand to her mouth. Tears spill over her lashes. She looks like a child who has just discovered that monsters are real ... and that one of them sleeps under her own roof.
“How long?” she whispers. “How long has she been plotting this?”
I hesitate. “Long enough to attempt your father’s downfall, and to succeed in deceiving the Inquisition. However, your marriage to Alonso maybe an afterthought following the death of your husband. They seek Alonso’s help, and you are intended as his reward.”
Rosalia’s expression shifts. Her grief gives way to something sharper, darker.
“Or perhaps my late husband was lured to his death as part of the plot,” muses Rosalia.
The same thought had crossed my own mind, but that wasn’t what I was sent to establish.
“She has always said that she was acting for the good of our family,” murmurs Rosalia. “But now I see that she really meant for the good of herself.”
Rosalia rises abruptly, pacing the room like a trapped animal.
“All my life,” she says, “I have obeyed and trusted her. I have believed that her coldness was strength. It was no secret that she never loved my father, but she respected him. Or so I believed. Just as I believed that she loved me.”
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