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“How else d’you want me to reach you? Cork up a message in a bottle and fling it into the sea?”

“I’ll send mine if I need you.”

Cath, looking suspiciously at Aurienne over the edge of her beaker, drank. Aurienne watched the liquid descend from two hundred fifty millilitres to ninety millilitres.

“How did this patient come into your care?” asked Cath.

“He’s not a patient,” said Aurienne. “And I can’t tell you.”

Again came the shimmer of a brow. “Not a patient? But you’re caring for him?”

“Yes.”

“What’s so special about this nonpatient?”

“Nothing.”

“He’s special enough to make you break the rules.” Cath rapped her fingertips against her defective beaker. “Do youcarecare for him?”

Aurienne, suddenly rigid, replied: “Absolutely not.”

“Where is he?”

“At my parents’ house.”

Cath’s eyebrows became acrobatic. “Was your mother the one who stabbed him?”

“No.”

“You’re sure? She’d have it in her.”

“You must stop asking questions.”

“You’d be all in a lather if I did this to you,” said Cath.

“Foaming at the mouth,” agreed Aurienne.

Cath took another pull at her beaker, whose contents had now descended to forty millilitres, with no noticeable impact on her cognitive functions. Aurienne was impressed; the fumes alone were making her lightheaded.

Cath leaned back and said meditatively: “If Aurienne Bloody Fairhrim is breaking the rules, there has to be a good reason. I won’t ask any more questions.”

“Thank you,” said Aurienne.

“You’re not welcome. Your lack of trust offends me.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Shall I be quite honest?”

Aurienne, who would actually prefer Cath not be honest at all, nodded.

“Your secrecy reminds me of the situation with the Hedgewitch,” said Cath.

“Too honest,” said Aurienne.

“Sorry,” said Cath.

Aurienne watched broken bits of star anise float about asymmetrically in her flask. She had a sip. It tasted like despair. The perturbing thing—the miserable thing—was that Cath wasn’t wrong. There were certain parallels. This was how it had begun with Amagris. Furtive attractions. Illicit rendezvous with someone from another Order, outside the scope of her duties as a Haelan. Was she headed towards the old error by new paths?