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“You truly don’t care about Lacrimosa?” Camille asks disbelievingly. “I thought the two of you were friends.”

I bite my lip to keep myself from making a sound as I wait, helplessly, for his response. Alastair’s expression remains aloof. “Lacrimosa and I may have been friends once,” he says, “but we’re not anymore.”

The stairs creak beneath my bare feet. Alastair glances up. His eyes meet mine. Stormy gray, no sign of the bright spark of Therion’s accusing gaze. He regards me with a look that’s as shuttered, as unreadable, as a featureless mask. Then he turns away.

Camille goes after him, following him out through the garden. He’s tense, hands fisted at his sides. She catches hold of his arm, says something to him that’s too quiet for me to hear. He only scowls and shakes his head. She returns to the house, stands beside me as we watch Alastair retreat in the direction of Saltswan. “Gods, he’s insufferable sometimes,” Camille sighs. “What really went on between you two when I was away at school?”

Part of me wants to tell Camille everything that happened with Alastair after she left for boarding school in Trieste. Our promise offriendship. His fingers wound through my hair.I missed you.The coldness of his rejection after that summer bonfire.

The other part doesn’t want her to know how much he hurt me. How much it still hurts, even now. “Nothing happened. We grew apart, that’s all.”

Camille raises her eyebrows, clearly skeptical. “Really?”

“Really.” I keep my face studiedly neutral as I close the door, my fingers trembling against the frame. I want to go after Alastair, but I’m tired of chasing him, of begging for the help he won’t give. “I think we should go back to the altar,” I tell Camille. “Will you come with me?”

She nods. “Of course I will.”

Together, we go into the kitchen and begin to gather up the detritus from last night. The obsidian mirror lies discarded where it fell from my hands. Camille wraps it in a handkerchief and puts it in her pocket. I’m afraid to touch it. Afraid of what lies ahead. Each time I’ve entered the sea caves, I’ve come back changed. Whatever awaits me there now, it will not be salvation. But I need answers. A way to stop the strangeness, the haunting, the way my life is spiraling apart.

I need to speak with Therion.

We leave the house and cross the breakwater, go down onto the beach. As we follow the shoreline toward the caves, I tell Camille about my promise to Therion: How I’ve married him in exchange for the restored salt. How I’m supposed to be with him for half of each year for the rest of my life. But I don’t tell her about the debt, or that it was Alastair who demanded it be paid.

She looks at me, her expression grim. “If you’ve escaped him, then perhaps you shouldn’t go back to the altar. What if you call on him and he steals you away to his world?”

There’s part of me that agrees with her, that wants to run. But what I was granted when I awoke here instead of the chthonic realm was not a reprieve. “I’m seeing visions,” I explain to Camille. “I’m losing time. Alastair says Therion was banished, but how does that explainwhat happened last night when I touched the mirror? How does that explain what happened to Alastair? It’s like we were both…”

I trail off, unable to make myself put it into words. Camille’s mouth twists, a troubled frown. Her lashes dip. “It’s like you were both possessed.” She draws out the mirror, clutching it tightly as she refolds the fabric around it. “All the more reason that you shouldn’t go back to Therion again.”

The sight of the mirror in her hands makes a quaver of apprehension trail down my spine. But I square my shoulder, trying to feel resolute. “I have to speak with him, Camille. I have to find out what’s gone wrong before it gets worse.”

She sighs grimly, “Yes. I know. I would still like to run away, though.”

We exchange a fleeting, helpless look, then continue on in silence. The cave is ahead, a dark mouth in the shadowed edge of the cliff. The tide is low, the sea a distant murmur beyond the beach. As we pass through the arched entrance to the grotto, the air turns cool. The stone floor is as smooth as polished marble.

Camille casts me a veiled glance. “Sometimes I wish we were still children, and the three of us were all friends the way we used to be. The way it was before I went away to Trieste. I’ve missed you so much, Lacrimosa.”

Her words are like a ribbon, one end in her hand, the other end knotted around my heart. She’s tied back her hair with one of my barrettes, and this small detail, along with her fatigue-shadowed eyes, her crumpled, slept-in clothes, makes me feel warm with longing. Even like this, tired and worried, Camille is beautiful. The same aquiline features that make Alastair so severe are, on her, an ethereal kind of loveliness. She’s all watercolor hues, pastel rose and lilac.

“I missed you, too,” I murmur, my face gone hot. “I wanted to write you letters but Alastair said it wasn’t allowed.”

“Ugh, that place. No letters allowed at Beauvoir Academy except from your family. Father only wrote to scold me when I failed mymathematics exams, or to remind me to behave. At least Alastair sent nicer things. I asked him about you once. He mailed a drawing of the sea and a quote from his favorite poem.”

I laugh, though it’s bittersweet, remembering the in-between time when Camille was gone but Alastair was still my friend. “What did the poem say?”

“I don’t know. It was in Tharnish.”

I start to laugh harder, and Camille laughs, too. Then she reaches for my hand, clasps it between her own. My stomach flutters. She raises my hand to her lips, her eyes alight with fierce protectiveness, all zealous flame, and kisses my knuckles. “I won’t let Therion steal you. I promise.”

A hot shiver traces up the inside of my wrist, as though she’s whispered the words across my skin. I want to curl against her, let that fierceness cover me like golden armor. I’m so drawn to Camille, but it feels like danger. I know what it means—this longing, this wanting. How letting someone close means to lay your throat bare.

I want to trust Camille. I don’t want to be afraid of her in this way.

We go to the altar, our hands still clasped. The cool, dim light illuminates the velvet cloth and scattered shells. I find a box of matches, strike one, light both candles in their iron holders. Camille unwraps the mirror and sets it down.

We each drink from the flask of chthonic liquor. As I watch her swallow, I think about how the last time we were here, she kissed me. I stare for too long at her mouth, the way she licks away the indigo stain from her lips.

I’m so grateful she is here with me.