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I almost don’t hear the smallpssstfrom across the street.

Halting mid-step, I turn—half convinced I misheard the sound—and startle at the sight of eyes in the hedgerow. My own eyes narrow, and I glance left and right before peering closer into the branches of the holly bushes. The eyes are large, too large to be human, and deep brown, almost familiar. They look like they belong to—well, to alutin. Amandine boasts very few farms, however, and even fewer fields—the terrain is too mountainous, the soil too infertile—which means this lutin has either traveled a long way from home or is very,verylost.

“Hello?” I call the greeting to it softly, lifting a placating hand as I did in Farmer Marc’s field so long ago. Has it really only been two weeks? It feels like lifetimes. “Excuse me? Are you... quite well?”

The lutin shuffles a little in the hedge, his overlarge eyes unblinking.Mariée?

I stiffen instinctively at the word, at the expected yet unwelcome intrusion in my mind. “I do not answer to that name.”Then—feeling I might as well do it properly— “I am Célie. Who might you be?”

You know me, Mariée, and I know you.

My frown deepens at the familiar trill. Surely it cannot be... “Tears Like Stars?”

He nods, gesturing for me to come closer, and the holly branches quiver all around him at the movement.I must speak with you, Mariée. We must speak.

“I—” Strangely reluctant to cross the street, I descend the last of the doorsteps, waiting for him to leave the shadows of the bush and approach me. When he does not, I draw to a halt at the edge of the cobblestones. “How did you find me?” I ask, unable to keep a wary note from my voice. Did he somehow catch my scent in La Fôret des Yeux and follow me to Amandine? And if so, how had Michal not noticed? I lift a delicate hand to my nose, my eyes watering anew. Even from across the street, I can tell Tears Like Stars smells rather... odder than before. The thick floral scent of his perfume is new, yet even it cannot quite disguise the fouler scent beneath. Indeed, he smells almost like—

Dropping my hand, I shake myself slightly and refuse to finish the thought. His scent cannot be what I think it is. Not here. Not now. Not on such a lovely autumn morning.

I need your help, Mariée.He gestures more emphatically now, and I cannot help but creep closer. He seems so agitated, his movements convulsive and strange, as if it takes conscious effort for him to use his limbs. A great, fat fly buzzes in the branches around him, loud and unnatural in the hush of the street. With a start, I realize the boy and his dog have gone back inside.I need your help.

“Why do you call me Bride?” Despite the cold touch of fear on my neck, I lift my chin, speaking louder, clearer in the bright morning sun. “Has something happened to you?”

Closer. Come closer.

“Not until you explain. Is something wrong?”

He thrashes his head in distress.I need your help, Mariée. Cold like frost. He needs your help to fix us.

I stop abruptly in the middle of the empty street, filled with equal parts revulsion and concern. “Who needs my help?” Unbidden, my hand slips into my pocket, and my fingers curl around the silver hilt of the knife. “Who ishe?” Then, throwing caution to the wind— “Is it the Necromancer? Is he the one who needs my help?Tell me, Tears Like Stars!”

Tears Like Stars, however, merely jerks his head and gnashes his needle-sharp teeth, gesturing andgesturingfor me to close the distance between us. Two more flies soon join the first. Though they buzz around his shadowed face, he does not swat them away. He does not even blink, instead rocking back and forth between the bows, clutching his knobby elbows and reciting,Cold like frost. Wrong. We are cold like frost. Help.

The sight of him there—his mind clearly affected—is so pitiful, so heart-wrenching, that I scowl at myself for ever being disgusted. This isn’t his fault.Noneof this is his fault, and he desperately needs my help, not my condemnation. If the Necromancer has hurt him somehow, perhaps I can heal him again. At the very least, I can return him to his family in La Fôret des Yeux, and they can care for him properly.Right.Squaring my shoulders, I move to march straight into the holly bushes, but the door bangs open behind me at that precise second.

“Célie.” Voice quiet, Michal stands in the doorway—just outside the rectangle of sunlight upon the entry floor—with his hands clasped behind his back. “Please come back inside now.”

On either side of him, Odessa and Dimitri stand tall and silent, watching. Though I cannot see their expressions in the gloom of the entry, if the tightness of Michal’s eyes is any indication, the three have indeed been watching me. The realization curdles in my stomach. Unfortunately for them, however, they can do nothingmorethan watch—not with the sun so high and beautiful in the sky. I lift my chin higher, striving to sound calm and assertive. If he can be civil, I can be civil. “I have a friend in trouble, and I intend to help him.”

Dimitri moves forward, but Michal blocks him with an arm, flexing his hand upon the threshold. “That creature is no longer your friend.”

I bite down on a scathing retort—because this isn’t about Michal any longer. This isn’t even about me, not truly, and if we don’t help Tears Like Stars soon, he might inadvertently hurt himself. “He needs our help, Michal. Something is wrong with...”

The rest of the words die on my tongue, however, as I turn to find Tears Like Stars no longer hiding in the hedgerow. No. He stands directly in front of me now, and thatsmell—I didn’t imagine it before. My eyes instantly begin to water, and it takes every ounce of my willpower not to retreat a step. This close, he reeks undeniably of rot, of decay, but worse still—his once-swarthy skin looks unnaturally pallid in the sunlight, paper thin and sagging slightly upon his pointed face. An eerie white film covers his overlarge eyes as he stares up at me.

Now I do stumble back a step. “What—whathappenedto—?”

Before I can finish, he seizes my wrist with his long fingers. They feel like ice.Come with me, Mariée. You must come with me.

Choking on the smell, eyes still streaming, I try to wrench myself away, but his grip only tightens, viselike, until I nearly cry out in pain. “Let me go, Tears Like Stars.” Though I try to keep my voice measured and calm, a note of desperation breaks through, and Michal curses viciously from the door behind me. “Please. You don’t—you don’t want to hurt me. We’re friends, remember? I gave you elderberry wine,deliciouselderberry wine.”

His head continues to thrash, as if he cannot hear me at all. And perhaps he can’t. Perhaps he can say only what the Necromancer has told him to say, candoonly what the Necromancer has told him to do.My master needs help. He commands me to help him, and you to help me.

“Who is your master?” I crouch to peer helplessly into his wretched eyes, and afly—it lands directly upon the sclera of his pupil. Choking down bile, I swat it away with my free hand. “What is his name? Did he”—fresh gorge rises as the same fly flits into my hair—“did he kill you, Tears Like Stars? Did your master take your life?”

A drop is not enough. We must have it all.

“All ofwhat? My blood? Does he need”—I swallow hard—“a-all of my blood to—to resurrect the dead? Is that what he did to you?”