“Can you magic us out?”

I released the bar again, returning to the middle of the cage, equal distance from all sides. Though the white patterns flared once more, they floated untethered when they reached the bars, unable to touch them or move past them. Not a promising sign. Closing my eyes, focusing my energy, I sought the lock on the bars—simpler than the one on the treasury door of Chateau le Blanc, made of iron, yet strategically placed outside the magic wood. The harder I tried to reach it, the more the pattern frayed until it disintegrated completely. “Fuck.”

To his credit, Reid didn’t even flinch. Instead he gripped the bars in earnest, testing their weight. “I can break them.”

“You have a broken finger.”

That didn’t stop him from trying to snap the wood for the next ten minutes. Knuckles bloody, arms shaking, he finally punched the bar with all his might, succeeding in only breaking another finger. When he cocked his fist to strike again, furious, I rolled my eyes and dragged him back to the center of the cage. “Yes, thank you. That was helpful.”

“What are we going to do?” He tore a frustrated hand through his hair. I caught it before he could damage it further. His broken fingers had swelled to twice their normal size, and blood welled dark and purple beneath the skin. He turned away. “This brilliant plan of yours has a few holes.”

I repressed a scowl, wrapping another pattern around his hand. “I can’t control every variable, Reid. At least this one didn’t involve mustaches and crutches. Now shut it, or I’ll give you a real hole to complain about.” An empty threat. The Chasseurs had disarmed both of us before throwing us in here.

“Is that supposed to be innuendo? I can never tell with you.”

I jerked at the pattern, and it snapped his fingers back into place, shattering my irritation in the process. He winced and wrenched his hand—now completely healed—out of mine. “Thank you,” he muttered after another moment. “And . . . sorry.” The word sounded pained.

I almost chuckled. Almost. Unfortunately, without irritation to distract me, panic crept back in. I couldn’t magic us out of here, and Reid couldn’t break the bars physically. Perhaps I could shield us within the cage somehow, like I’d done on the bridge. If they couldn’t see us, they couldn’t march us to the stake. Even as the thought formed, I knew it was no real solution. We couldn’t hide here indefinitely, invisible. Perhaps if they opened the cage to investigate, however . . . “The others will come for us.” Whether I spoke to him or myself, I didn’t know.

“Philippe won’t let Jean Luc within fifty feet of this room.”

“It’s fortunate, then, that Jean Luc isn’t our only ally. Coco will know where we are. She’ll bring Claud or Zenna or Blaise, and they’ll break us out.”

He leveled me with a frank stare. “I don’t think you grasp the number of huntsmen living in this tower, Lou.”

Leaning forward, I rested my elbows on my knees. “I don’t think you grasp that I lived here too.”

“You did?” Surprise colored his tone. “How?”

“I was your wife. The Archbishop couldn’t have separated us, even if he wanted to—which he didn’t. He arranged the whole marriage.”

“Why?” Now he leaned forward too, his eyes trained on mine. Hungry for information. His earlier words echoed back to me: Tell me how to remember. If we were going to die at sunset, Coco’s argument hardly applied anymore, did it? Another mad idea formed on the heels of that realization. If Reid remembered, Morgane would too. If the others didn’t come for me, she would. She’d tear this tower apart brick by brick if she learned the Chasseurs intended to burn me.

Of course, Reid still had a point. She’d never been able to tear it apart before. Stripped of her title, she’d hardly be able to do it now.

“You know why.” I shrugged, the thoughts tangling into a helpless knot of confusion. My foot tapped restlessly. “I’m his daughter. He wanted you to protect me.”

He scoffed again, an angry sound, and gestured around us. “I’ve done an excellent job.”

“Our friends will come for us, Reid. We have to trust them.”

“Where are they, then? Why aren’t they here?”

“Hopefully they’re out rescuing your mother and brother. That was the whole point of the endeavor, if you remember.”

His face flushed, and he looked away. “Of course I remember.”

The guards flung the door open unexpectedly this time. In the split second it took for the knob to unlatch, a third idea formed, and impulsively, I transformed into the Maiden as two Chasseurs stepped through. Their eyes flew wide when they saw me. “Oh, please, messieurs!” I wrung my hands with a cry, pacing before the bars without touching them. “The witch—she tricked me. I’m a scullery maid upstairs, but while I was washing the linens, I heard a voice singing the most beautiful song.” I spoke quicker now, disliking the calculated gleam in the older one’s eyes. “I just had to follow it, messieurs—like some outside force compelled me to do it, like I was in a trance—and I didn’t wake until I’d unlocked the door and let her go. Please, please, let me out while the other still sleeps.” Gesturing to Reid on the floor, I allowed my lip to quiver and tears to spill down my cheeks. It was easier to feign distress than I’d anticipated. “I’m so sorry. You can dock my pay, you can relieve me of service, you can lash me, but please don’t let him hurt me.”

Though the younger looked likely to leap to my rescue, the older stilled him with a smile. It wasn’t a compassionate one. “Are you finished?”

I sniffed loudly. “Will you not help me?”

In two strides, he crossed the room to the circular table, rifling through the papers there. He pulled one from beneath a crucifix paperweight and held it to the light. Though sketched with rudimentary lines, the drawing portrayed my face—the Maiden’s face—well enough. My distraught expression fell flat as I leaned against the bars. My form reverted once more. “Good for you.”

“Yes,” he mused, examining me curiously. “It rather is. It seems you’ve inherited your mother’s gifts. His Majesty will be pleased to know it.”

“That—that’s La Dame des Sorcières’s daughter?”