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Prologue

It is a curious thing, the scent of memory. It takes only a little to send us back in time—a trace of my mother’s lavender oil, a hint of my father’s pipe smoke. Each reminds me of childhood in its own strange way. My mother applied her oil every morning as she stared at her reflection, counting the new lines on her face. My father smoked his pipe when he received guests. They frightened him, I think, with their hollow eyes and quick hands. They certainly frightened me.

But beeswax—beeswax will always remind me of my sister.

Like clockwork, Filippa would reach for her silver brush when our nursemaid, Evangeline, lit the candles each evening. The wicks would fill the nursery with the soft scent of honey as Filippa undid my braid, as she passed the boar bristles through my hair. As Evangeline settled into her favorite rose-velvet chair and watched us warmly, her eyes crinkling in the misty purple light of dusk.

The wind—crisp on that October night—rustled at the eaves, hesitating, lingering at the promise of a story.

“Mes choux,” she murmured, stooping to retrieve her knitting needles from the basket beside her chair. Our family hound, Birdie, curled into an enormous ball at the hearth. “Have I told you the story of Les éternels?”

As always, Pip spoke first, leaning around my shoulder to frown at Evangeline. Equal parts suspicious and intrigued. “The Eternal Ones?”

“Yes, dear.”

Anticipation fluttered in my belly as I glanced at Pip, our faces mere inches apart. Golden specks still glinted on her cheeks from our portrait lesson that afternoon. They looked like freckles. “Has she?” My voice lacked Evangeline’s lyrical grace, Filippa’s firm resolve. “I don’t think she has.”

“She definitely hasn’t,” Pip confirmed, deadly serious, before turning back to Evangeline. “We should like to hear it, please.”

Evangeline arched a brow at her imperious tone. “Is that so?”

“Oh, please tell us, Evangeline!” Forgetting myself entirely, I leapt to my slippered feet and clapped my hands together. Pip—twelve years old to my paltry six—hastily snatched my nightgown, tugging me back to the armoire seat. Her small hands landed on my shoulders.

“Ladies do not shout, Célie. What would Pére say?”

Heat crept into my cheeks as I folded my own hands in my lap, immediately contrite. “ Pretty is as pretty does. ”

“Exactly.” She returned her attention to Evangeline, whose lips twitched as she fought a smile. “Please tell us the story, Evangeline. We promise not to interrupt.”

“Very good.” With practiced ease, Evangeline slid her lithe fingers along the needles, weaving wool into a lovely scarf of petal pink. My favorite color. Pip’s scarf—bright white, like freshly fallen snow—already rested in the basket. “Though you still have paint on your face, darling. Be a lamb and wash for me, will you?” She waited until Pippa finished scrubbing her cheeks before continuing. “Right, then. Les éternels. They’re born in the ground—cold as bone, and just as strong—without heart or soul or mind. Only impulse. Only lust .” She said the word with unexpected relish. “The first one came to our kingdom from a faraway land, living in the shadows, spreading her sickness to the people here. Infecting them with her magic.”

Pip resumed brushing my hair. “What kind of magic?”

My nose crinkled as I tilted my head. “What is lust ?”

Evangeline pretended not to hear me.

“The worst kind of magic, darlings. The absolute worst kind.” The wind rattled the windows, eager for the story, as Evangeline paused dramatically—except Birdie rolled over with a warbled howl at precisely the same moment, ruining the effect. Evangeline cut the hound an exasperated look. “The kind that requires blood. Requires death .”

Pippa and I exchanged a covert glance.

“Dames Rouges,” I heard her breathe at my ear, nearly indiscernible. “Red Ladies.”

Our father had spoken of them once, the strangest and rarest of the occultists who plagued Belterra. He’d thought we hadn’t heard him with the funny man in his study, but we had.

“What are you whispering?” Evangeline asked sharply, stabbing her needles in our direction. “Secrets are quite rude, you know.”

Pip lifted her chin. She’d forgotten that ladies do not scowl either. “Nothing, Evangeline.”

“Yes,” I echoed instantly. “Nothing, Evangeline.”

Her gaze narrowed. “Plucky little things, aren’t you? Well, I should tell you that Les éternels love plucky little girls like you. They think you’re the sweetest.”

The exhilaration in my chest twisted slightly at her words, and gooseflesh erupted down my neck at the stroke of my sister’s brush. I scooted to the edge of my seat, eyes wide. “Do they really?”

“Of course they don’t.” Pip dropped her brush on the armoire with more force than necessary. With the sternest of expressions, she turned my chin to face her. “Don’t listen to her, Célie. She lies .”

“I most certainly do not,” Evangeline said emphatically. “I’ll tell you the same as my mother told me—Les éternels stalk the streets by moonlight, preying on the weak and seducing the immoral. That’s why we always sleep at nightfall, darlings, and always say our prayers.” When she continued, her lyrical voice rose in cadence, as familiar as the nursery rhyme she hummed every evening. Her needles click click click ed in the silence of the room, and even the wind fell still to listen. “Always wear a silver cross, and always walk in pairs. With holy water on your neck and hallowed ground your feet. When in doubt, strike up a match, and burn them with its heat.”

I sat up a little straighter. My hands trembled. “I always say my prayers, Evangeline, but I drank all of Filippa’s milk at dinner while she wasn’t looking. Do you think that made me sweeter than her? Will the bad people want to eat me?”

“Ridiculous.” Scoffing, Pippa threaded her fingers through my hair to replait it. Though she was clearly exasperated, her touch remained gentle. She tied the raven strands with a pretty pink bow and draped it over my shoulder. “As if I’d ever let anything happen to you, Célie.”

At her words, warmth expanded in my chest, a sparkling surety. Because Filippa never lied. She never snuck treats or played tricks or said things she didn’t mean. She never stole my milk.

She would never let anything happen to me.

The wind hovered outside for another second—scratching at the panes once more, impatient for the rest of the story—before passing on unsatisfied. The sun slipped fully beneath the skyline as an autumn moon rose overhead. It bathed the nursery in thin silver light. The beeswax candles seemed to gutter in response, lengthening the shadows between us, and I clasped my sister’s hand in the sudden gloom. “I’m sorry I stole your milk,” I whispered.

She squeezed my fingers. “I never liked milk anyway.”

Evangeline studied us for a long moment, her expression inscrutable as she rose to return her needles and wool to the basket. She patted Birdie on the head before blowing out the tapers on the mantel. “You are good sisters, both of you. Loyal and kind.” Striding across the nursery, she kissed our foreheads before helping us into bed, lifting the last candle to our eyes. Hers gleamed with an emotion I didn’t understand. “Promise me you’ll hold on to each other.”

When we nodded, she blew out the candle and made to leave.

Pip wrapped an arm around my shoulders, pulling me close, and I nestled into her pillow. It smelled like her—like summer honey. Like lectures and gentle hands and frowns and snow-white scarves. “I’ll never let the witches get you,” she said fiercely against my hair. “Never.”

“And I’ll never let them get you .”

Evangeline paused at the nursery door and looked back at us with a frown. She tilted her head curiously as the moon slipped behind a cloud, plunging us into total darkness. When a branch clawed at our window, I tensed, but Filippa wrapped her other arm around me firmly.

She didn’t know, then.

I didn’t know either.

“Silly girls,” Evangeline whispered. “Who said anything about witches?”

And then she was gone.