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He picks up his overcoat from the chair and has put one arm through it when he pauses and turns abruptly toward the closed door. With the coat hanging down from his shoulder, he strides across the room and opens the door. Camille is on the other side.

“I told you to leave us alone,” Alastair snaps. “How long were you out there eavesdropping?”

She brushes past him and comes over to me, staring with wide-eyed wonder. “Are you really married to Therion?”

I nod helplessly, too overwhelmed to tell anything but the truth. Camille takes my hand, looking at the salt crystal ring, how the stone gleams in the muted lamplight. Her fingers are long, elegant—pianist hands. She strokes her thumb gently against my palm. My stomach gives a flutter, like a trapped butterfly. I want to lean my face into her shoulder.

But then she turns to give Alastair a scolding look. “You might have told me the whole of it at the bonfire, instead of being so mysterious about why I should follow her to the beach.”

“You followed me because Alastair told you to?” Realization settles in, and I pull away from Camille, rubbing my hand against my skirts, wanting to wipe away the feeling of her touch.

She bites her lip, looking chagrined. “We wanted to be sure you weren’t… going to be harmed.”

“Harmed by who, exactly?”

Alastair steps forward, regarding me coolly. “I thought your brothers were going to sacrifice you to Therion, to restore the mine. Like a Salt Priest ritual.”

“You thought they were going tosacrificeme?”

“Is it so much different from the truth?”

“He was worried about you,” Camille says quickly. “We both were. He told me to follow you, and I did, because I wanted to know you were safe.”

I glare at Camille. “And I suppose he told you to kiss me as well?”

Alastair lets out a startled laugh. “You kissed her?”

I clap my hand over my mouth, horrified at what I’ve done. “I’mleaving.”

I storm out of the library, my face burning. I’m on the verge of tears. Camille runs after me, catching hold of the door before I can slam it. We’re out on the landing, in the shadows, watched by an enormous framed portrait of a gray-eyed Felimath ancestor.

“Lark,” she says, reaching out to me. I step back before she can touch my arm. “I owed Alastair a favor. He was suspicious after the bonfire, and he asked me to follow you. He wasworried. I’m sorry I deceived you. I should have said something then, but I didn’t want to ruin your night once I realized you weren’t in danger. At least, Ithoughtyou weren’t in danger. And the kiss—” She pauses, biting her lip.

“I don’t want to talk about it. I’m going home.”

I hurry down the stairs, sniffing fiercely as I fight back tears. For a brief, foolish moment I had been drawn to Camille, enough that I letdown my guard. But now all I can think of is Damson and how everything ended between us. Her sharp-edged smile as she whispered to her new friend, their eyes on me as I came toward them. How I knew they had been talking about me when I wasn’t there.

And now Alastair and Camille have done the exact same thing.

I picture Alastair laughing as he told his sister how I came to Saltswan and cried when I tore up the letters I’d written him. Shame burns across my cheeks, hotter than bonfire embers.

I rush out into the night, tip back my head, and let the wind cast over my face. Clouds have covered the moon; I can barely make out the clifftop path beyond the manicured garden. But I forge ahead anyway, ignoring the sound of footsteps behind me.

A beam of light dances over the ground, throwing my shadow into an enlarged silhouette. Alastair draws up at my side, holding a flashlight. Camille is farther back on the path, hopping on one foot as she tries to lace up her boots.

“You’re going to fall into the sea,” Alastair warns, gesturing to the edge of the clifftop with the beam of his flashlight.

“Good. I’d prefer that than being anywhere nearyou.” I feel so wretched and humiliated. I turn my back on him and continue walking. He stays at my side, his long-legged steps easily keeping pace with me.

“I’m still going to walk you home. If someone really is sneaking around your house, it isn’t safe to go back on your own in the dark.”

I glare at him. Lit from beneath, Alastair’s face is thrown into a chiaroscuro, which makes him look like a pen-and-ink sketch. I wish my brothers were here. I wish for anyone excepthim.

But when I imagine myself back in the empty cottage, chased by those same creeping shadows, I feel cold and scared and I don’t want to be alone. Wretchedly, I realize that I’ve started to cry.

Alastair searches through his pockets, then passes me a clean, folded handkerchief. “It isn’t poisoned, if you’re wondering,” he says.

I snatch it from him, wipe my eyes, and blow my nose. As I do,Camille catches up to us. Her feet are now shod in brown leather boots, and she has a woolen scarf bundled up in her arms.