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Clarimonde drew in a deep breath and steadied her voice. “Is that your heart’s desire then?” she asked, with forced calm. “This fox, for your third task? I thought that you had higher aims than that.” She met Tertia’s eyes directly. “I have a formula; I have all of the necessary ingredients. You could have your perfume within the week. But if you truly want this fox instead…”

There was a lie buried within this claim. It was a small lie—but a lie, nevertheless. Clarimonde did have a formula, and she had acquired most of the necessary ingredients to implement it… but she did not yet have absinthe, and she still had little idea of where she might be able to source it.

Tertia had gone very still as Clarimonde spoke. There was now a subtle tension in her body that suggested she was at war with herself. Her crimson lips trembled with anger; her fingers flexed with an obvious craving for violence.

Tertia was on the very edge of indulging her worst impulses, despite the dangling offer of her dreams. But Clarimonde did not dare to push her again; her paltry, hard-won skill for deceit had reached its limits, and she knew that she could only make things worse by speaking again.

The Leanansidhe stepped closer, lowering her lips to Clarimonde’s ear.

“You do not have a week,” she whispered there. “You have until tomorrow morning.” The heat of her breath ghosted across Clarimonde’s skin, eliciting a shiver. “You will meet me in my boudoir. You will bring me my perfume. And if it does not do what you have promised… then I will peel your skin away, bit by bit, while you beg me to kiss what remains. And when I am done, and you are dead, and I have torn every last drop of magic from your corpse… then, I will kiss your rotting lips and send your bones back to my brother.”

Tertia drew back again, looking down at Clarimonde. There was a cold smile on her lips now—but it did not reach her eyes.

Clarimonde could not stop herself from looking away. Her mouth was dry, and her legs were dangerously unsteady beneath her. But Foxglove was still trembling against her chest, and she knew that could not afford to show any further weakness.

“I will be there,” Clarimonde said simply.

Tertia turned away, striding dangerously into the fog. The remaining hounds crept slowly after her, casting hungry glances behind them.

Eventually, there was only Clarimonde, and Foxglove, and Hollowvale’s dark trees, still covered in lingering frost.

“I will see you back to the Hollow House,” Mr Brand spoke from behind her. “After that… I cannot help you any further.”

Clarimonde followed the sound and saw the outline of his silhouette against the night. The black dog had returned to his side.

Clarimonde nodded slowly. “I did not expect that you would,” she said. The trembling that she had previously suppressed now worked its way into her voice. “You have done more than enough.”

There was a flash of bronze, as Mr Brand tossed something down at her feet.

By the time Clarimonde retrieved her pocket watch, he was gone. Only his black dog remained, waiting patiently within the fog.

Clarimonde glanced around for the horse that she had ridden… but of course, it was nowhere to be found.

She cursed softly.

“My apologies, Miss Fox,” she addressed the muddy animal in her arms. “It seems that we will be walking back.”

CHAPTER 21

“Everything that we are is carried within our name; it is therefore dangerous to give your name to someone else, in case they understand it better than you do. But the most powerful magicians always study their own name, in order to better understand themselves.”

LORD ELIAS WILDER TO MISS CLARIMONDE BETONY, AGE 11

Clarimonde trudged wearily after the black dog, with Foxglove gently cradled against her. The fox was a sorry sight, still caked with dirt and blood—but at least it had stopped trembling. In fact, despite the iron collar, Clarimonde soon found that Foxglove had fallen into an exhausted, fitful sleep.

No one waited for her within the yawning entryway of the Hollow House. By the time Clarimonde crossed its threshold, even the black dog had vanished.

She climbed the stairs back to the empty halls above the abbey and slipped into her bedroom. The sight of golden furniture everywhere offended her sensibilities more than ever, as she set Foxglove carefully upon the bed.

The fox heaved a weak, shivering sigh, but did not open its eyes.

The chain around Foxglove’s neck had clearly been improvised; it was held in place only by a small warded padlock. The pale light of Clarimonde’s parasol suggested that there were terrible burns beneath the fox’s fur—and though she could not see them well, the idea of them turned her stomach.

If the lock had been anything other than iron, then she might have easily removed it with a bit of appropriate magic… but iron never did yield to magic, which was doubtless why Tertia had used it in the first place.

Clarimonde dug into the travelling trunk in the corner of the room until she had found the leather case of tools and spare parts that she used to maintain her watch. “Stay very still,” she told Foxglove quietly—though she was not strictly certain that the puca could hear her. “I will have to muddle through this the old-fashioned way.”

The tools were likely not well-suited to picking a lock… but then, Clarimonde knew only very little about picking locks.