The darkness of the Tombs pressed down. “Oh, no,” Jennifer said, her voice small. “Please, Tom. Anything but that.”

They laughed, a weird, incongruent sound in that place. But if LeBlanc knew Sophie was coming, Tom thought, then what was there to prevent him from taking her now? From her bed in Bellamy House, or the Channel ferry, or an Upper City street? What would keep him from just killing her on the spot? He couldn’t think of a thing. And LeBlanc seemed to have allies in the Commonwealth that none of them had been aware of. His sister had enemies on every side, and there was nothing he could do about it.

“Now close your eyes, Jennifer,” he said slowly, “and imagine you’re on the balcony of your flat. The tiles are cold, but you’ve got a blanket wrapped around you. You’re camping out, like you and Sophie did when you were little. The sky is black, and you can hear the water of the Seine falling down the cliffs. And I’ve brought you a light, so you won’t be frightened …”

LeBlanc lit his last candle and stepped back, admiring his work. He stood inside a giant circle of fire, dozens of tiny, blazing flames that lit the polished floor of his private rooms, sending bright, flickering light onto the black-painted walls. LeBlanc’s flat, connected by a door to his office, looked like the rooms of a holy man, or a hermit. Serviceable, plain, unadorned. But he knew Fate was soon to offer him better.

His new black and white robes rustled pleasantly as he moved to a table in the center of the circle, draped with a cloth that had been stitched together, half white, half black. It matched the streak in his hair. A coal fire burned in a small brass brazier, and swinging above this, suspended on a tripod, hung a burnished pot filled with water. LeBlanc looked up as Renaud entered.

“You have brought it, Renaud?” The secretary approached and presented a small vial of rust-brown liquid over the candle flames. “Good. Very good. The blood of the brother should be perfectly adequate.”

He set the vial beside the pot. Tiny wisps of steam were beginning to curl into the air. Then he clicked the latch of a plastic box, not reformed, but Ancient, smoothly ribbed and shining black. Inside was a row of four small plastic bottles, also Ancient, two partially filled with a dark liquid, two with white, all fitted with a heavy wax seal. LeBlanc chose one of each color and lifted them to the light. Formed into the plastic of each bottle was the word HILTON.

“This is a dear sacrifice, but I think it is needed, Renaud. When to kill the Red Rook is a decision that lies heavy. But what will be, will be, and therefore has already been. The Goddess will show the path.”

He set the bottles to one side, picked up the vial Renaud had brought, and began pouring Tom’s coagulated blood into the pot that was just beginning to boil. And then the door to LeBlanc’s office creaked open slowly. LeBlanc paused, paralyzed, still in the act of pouring Tom’s blood, while Renaud slipped farther into his corner. Premier Allemande stood looking at them, blinking at the dozens of candles dripping wax onto the floor.

“There you are, Albert,” said Allemande, voice as soft as LeBlanc’s. He was a small man, unassuming, in trousers that were just the slightest bit too long for him. He turned and waved a hand, instructing his escort to wait before he shut the door on them.

“You did not come to the viewing box tonight, Albert. And the last one was so lively, too. She gave us quite a show.” He indulged in a muted chuckle as he removed his spectacles, cleaning them with a handkerchief. The viewing box had been built with such proximity to the Razor that occasionally there was spatter. “We can only hope your Red Rook will be half so entertaining,” he continued. “I am disappointed you missed it. Very disappointed. Or perhaps you have lost interest in the justice of the city, Albert?”

“I apologize, Premier,” LeBlanc said, steadying himself against the table. LeBlanc’s reply was just as soft as Allemande’s, only his voice betrayed a tinge of fear. “Forgoing something enjoyable is often a sacrifice required by Fate. The greater and more personal the sacrifice, the more the Goddess will attend us.”

“While I am of the opinion that official executions should be attended by my ministres,” stated Allemande, holding up his spectacles to the candlelight, “especially my Ministre of Security.”

LeBlanc bowed slightly, a move of both apology and deference.

“I take it you have an important question to ask of your Goddess?”

LeBlanc glanced once at Renaud, and then at the boiling pot, the edges now ringed with brownish foam. If Allemande discovered that the man rotting somewhere deep below them was not the Red Rook, then it would be the Ministre of Security’s head that the officials of the city would enjoy watching roll across the scaffold. He could always allow Tom Bellamy to die as the Red Rook, of course, have the sister quietly killed, and Allemande need never be the wiser. Sophia Bellamy could be dead by the next dusk if he chose. But would that displease the Goddess? Or no? Fate had not removed Luck from him, and he would not choose the death of the Red Rook without consulting her. Who he would not be consulting was Allemande. He set down the vial.

“Yes, Premier. I do have a question for the Goddess.”

“Well, by all means,” Allemande replied. “Let’s hear it, then. I am always in need of amusement.”

Renaud stiffened in the corner where he had retreated, watching his master carefully, but LeBlanc only smiled, a creeping crack that widened across the bottom half of his face. He stood a little taller. What did he have to fear from an unbeliever like Allemande? Was he not fated to become all that Allemande was, and more? Was he not marked by the sign of the Goddess in his own hair?

“I will be happy to, Premier. Perhaps you would allow me to show you.” LeBlanc picked up the Ancient plastic bottles as Renaud seated Allemande in a chair. “Yes,” LeBlanc said, holding up the bottle of white liquid, “and no.” He raised the bottle of black. “Life and death. Those are the answers of Fate. One of these answers she will give us, and show us what is to be.”

He looked to the air, where the steam from the pot was rising. “Goddess, is it your will that I kill now, while the Red Rook is in my hand? Or do I wait, and grant life until the proper time, that the Rook may become a sacrifice to you?”

He waited, bottles raised to the Goddess, then dropped them simultaneously into the bubbling pot.

Sophia paused on a small stone bridge, water churning and splashing beneath her feet, rushing on its way to the sea cliffs. She thought she’d heard a faint rustle in the trees to her left, but the noise did not come again. She looked skyward. The north lights were muted tonight, faint undulating waves of pale green and a bit of red, the sky behind them spangled with the last of the stars. That’s what Tom had always said: spangled with stars. The stars, he said, were from Before. She wondered if Tom had gotten her note, if he knew she was coming for him. If he didn’t, then he didn’t know his sister at all. But she’d wanted to make sure he hadn’t forgotten to hope, like their father. Their father had forgotten everything but despair.

She’d sat for a long time on the floor of Bellamy’s room, coming up through the trapdoor beneath his rug—Bellamy House was full of such oddities—watching his back as he gazed out the black and empty window. It had been very quiet, only Nancy snoring faintly in the other room. She thought her father had been asleep as well, but it was hard to tell. Nancy said there wasn’t much difference either way.