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“Powerful people do not understand basic decency, by and large. In fact, I often question whether they understand anything at all.”

LORD ELIAS WILDER TO MISS CLARIMONDE BETONY, AGE 16

Clarimonde managed only a brief, fitful bit of sleep in the hearse; the entire time, she remained aware that she was lying down in the place where there ought to have been a dead body.

Eventually, however, she felt Foxglove’s hand at her shoulder, rousing her gently. The hearse had stopped moving.

Clarimonde blinked slowly awake, struggling to regain her bearings. The world outside of the carriage was still pitch black; only Foxglove’s moonlit attire illuminated her immediate surroundings, though the faerie’s icy blue eyes still glimmered in the darkness.

“I believe that we have arrived,” Lord Foxglove said. The puca had returned to being a man, at least for the moment. Clarimonde found, to her great consternation, that she still had trouble looking at him directly; the scandalous image of Lady Foxglove in her waistcoat and trousers had been burned indelibly into her mind, and she could not seem to shake it loose.

Clarimonde tried to sit up, but found herself entangled within an extra layer of fabric. She glanced down, still drowsy and puzzled, and saw that Lord Foxglove’s frock coat had been draped across her while she slept.

“It is even colder now than when we first left,” Foxglove informed her. “It would be terribly embarrassing if you were to introduce yourself to the new Lady Hollowvale with a sniffle and a sneeze.” He offered her a warm smile, full of knowing humour. Somehow, his expression managed to convey the idea that they were already great friends, conspiring together against the rest of the world.

Clarimonde flushed beneath that smile, though she didn’t want to do so. Intellectually, she was well aware that Lord Foxglove had dedicated himself to the task of winning her over. The reality of his personal attention was heady, though, and impossible to dismiss.

I do care, sometimes, he had told her. The words echoed in her mind, dangerously treacherous, even as she knew that they didn’t matter.

Clarimonde did her best to shove those reactions aside, as she sat up more carefully. She peeled his coat away and offered it out to him, trying to ignore the scent of violet that still lingered upon it. “I appreciate the thought,” she said. “I am sure that would be less than impressive.”

Lord Foxglove took the coat and pulled it on absently, now looking her over with a critical eye. “Do let me fix your hair,” he said. “It does make for an adorable mess right now, but I believe that we are hoping to make a different impression.”

Clarimonde turned her head obligingly in order to give him access to her hair. “I always feel as though you are softening the truth,” she murmured. “You needn’t do that, you know. You could just tell me that I’ve turned my hair into a crow’s nest while I slept.”

The faerie worked at her hair again with his long fingers, industriously tugging stray strands back into place. “Are you suggesting that you would prefer me to be rude?” he asked, with a hint of amusement. “How novel.”

Clarimonde grimaced. His fingers felt wonderful against her hair. She rather wished that they didn’t. “It makes me anxious,” she admitted. “It’s just that I can never tell this way when something is truly wrong. I think that you might say pleasant things even if I looked like a hag—and then I might embarrass myself. Do just be plain with me, if you can bring yourself to do it.”

Lord Foxglove was quiet for a long while as he worked at her hair. Because he was so intent upon warming Clarimonde to him, however, she thought that he was really considering the idea. Finally he pulled back and assessed her, crossing his arms over his chest. “It did look like a crow’s nest,” he acknowledged. “But you know that I cannot lie. I do enjoy messy things, even if they are not always called for.”

He pressed Bellamira’s braid into Clarimonde’s hand then, and she realised that he had taken the opportunity to remove it from her hair. He closed her fingers gently around the braid, with a sombre look on his narrow features. “I doubt that we wish for this to be the subject of any immediate conversation,” he said. “But I suspect that you will wish to keep it somewhere, all the same.”

Clarimonde tightened her hand around the braid, as her heart gave a small pang. “All of that is true,” she said softly. She tucked Bellamira’s hair reluctantly into her pocket, just next to the brass pocket watch that was already there.

Lord Foxglove looked her over one last time, then nodded to himself. “Into Hollowvale, then,” he said. “From this point forward, you must show only perfect certainty before the lady of this realm. You are not better than her—but neither are you beneath her. She will inevitably come to realise that you are well matched, and that your proposition is in her best interests.”

Clarimonde suppressed her immediate reaction to this assertion, trying not to let her lips twist with distaste. At least, she thought, she must have managed a cold lack of expression, since Lord Foxglove did not prompt her again.

Instead, the faerie knocked once upon the carriage wall. The door opened in reply, and the back stairs unfolded themselves; a soupy white fog billowed inside to join them, clinging damply to Clarimonde’s skin.

Lord Foxglove stepped out first, offering his hand to Clarimonde as she followed down the steps, clutching her valise in her other hand. Her boots clicked softly as they landed upon a hard, uneven surface, and Clarimonde glanced down with a frown. Though the light of the faerie’s waistcoat was even more muted in the surrounding fog, it was just bright enough to illuminate the worn cobblestones beneath their feet.

“Is this really Hollowvale?” she asked him dubiously. “I don’t recall Winnie ever mentioning cobblestones when she spoke of it.” The mist absorbed her voice, blunting its sharp edges with a smothering hush.

Lord Foxglove peered around them with a speculative look in his cold blue eyes. “It is absolutely Hollowvale,” he assured her. “I know this fog. I know the way that it breathes. But there is something… different about it. I cannot quite put my finger on it.”

After another moment, he shook his head and turned back to Clarimonde. “We require a bit more light, I should think. I believe that you brought a parasol here with you. Could you retrieve it?”

Clarimonde returned briefly to the hearse, and brought back the lacy black parasol that Winnie had liberated from Lady Longfell’s wardrobe. Lord Foxglove took it from her and opened it, glancing over the lace with careful consideration. “Yes indeed,” he murmured to himself. “I believe that this will do.”

The faerie skimmed his fingers idly across his moonlit waistcoat, as though brushing off a bit of dirt. Droplets of light scattered away where he touched, clinging to the parasol’s lace like brilliant spiderwebs. Clarimonde watched, oddly spellbound by the sight, until he had finished.

Lord Foxglove offered the parasol back to her, clearly very satisfied with himself. “There,” he said. “Any decent magician ought to have a bit of moonlight with them, regardless. It’s timeless material, always in fashion—and relatively easy to come by.”

Clarimonde took the handle from him gingerly, marvelling at the glowing pearlescent threads that now covered the parasol. As far as she could tell, Lady Longfell had owned only expensive things—but Foxglove’s brief ministrations had added a delicate, breathtaking wonder to the material that no amount of money could have replicated. “This is beautiful,” she said. “Have you made something like this before?”

Lord Foxglove sniffed dismissively—but Clarimonde caught a brief flash of pride in his expression, all the same. “It’s really just a parlour trick,” he said. “One does not always have the time to weave new coats from sorrow or desire while travelling from place to place. A splash of something fresh is often more than enough to make things interesting again.”