We’d decided the two of them would search for black pearls. Though not ideal, Coco and I needed to remain with Nicholina. We couldn’t easily drag her through the streets with bound and bloody hands. I shuddered to think of her actually speaking if we did find someone who sold them.

By the third village, I’d heard enough of her to last a lifetime.

She reclined atop a rock on the edge of the forest now, moaning and tugging against her rope. Her hands hung limp and useless from her wrists. Like bloody carcasses. “We’re hungry. Shall we venture into just one hamlet? Just one? Just one, just one, to have some fun?” She cast me a wicked glance. “Just one to find a sticky bun?”

I looked away from her blistered hands. Couldn’t bear the sight of them. “Shut your mouth, Nicholina.”

Coco lazed within the roots of a knotted tree while we waited. She picked at the fresh cut on her palm. “She won’t stop until you do.”

“Oooh, clever mouse.” Nicholina sat up abruptly, leering at me. “We don’t just live beneath her skin, no no no. We live beneath yours. It’s warm and it’s wet and filled with short—angry—breaths—”

“I swear to God, if you don’t stop talking—”

“You’ll do what?” With a cackle, she pulled at her ropes again. I pulled back. She nearly toppled from the rock. “Will you harm this pretty skin? Will you strike this freckled flesh? Will you punish us, oh husband, with a good, hard thrash?”

“Ignore her,” Coco said.

Heat suffused my face. My neck. My hands clenched the rope. I could ignore her. I could do it. She wanted a reaction. I would give her none.

Another handful of minutes passed in silence. Then—

“We need to relieve ourselves,” Nicholina pronounced.

I scowled and shook my head. “No.”

“Perhaps in the trees?” She continued as if I hadn’t spoken. “Perhaps they deserve it. Naughty, naughty trees. Perhaps they’ll observe it.” Rising to her feet, she cackled at her own perverse joke. I tugged her rope irritably.

“I said no.”

“No?” Disbelief—still feigned, still disingenuous, as if she’d somehow expected my response—laced her voice. Lou’s voice. The sound of it made me ache and rage in equal measure. “You’d have us piss down our leg? Your own wife?”

“You aren’t my wife.”

A sick wave of regret washed through me at the familiar words. At the memory. The ring I’d once given Lou, golden band and mother-of-pearl stone, weighed heavy in my pocket. Like a brick. I’d kept it with me since Léviathan, anxious to return it to her. To slide it back on her finger where it belonged. I would do just that at L’Eau Mélancolique. I would marry her right there on the beach. Just like last time, except proper now. Real.

Nicholina gave a feline grin. “No, we aren’t your wife, are we? Which makes us your . . . what, exactly?” A pause. She leaned closer, brushing her nose against mine. I jerked back. “She fought, you know,” she breathed, still grinning. My entire body went still. My entire being. “She screamed your name. You should have heard her in those last moments. Absolutely terrified. Absolutely delicious. We savored her death.”

It wasn’t true. Lou was still in there. We would free her.

“She can’t hear you, pet.” Nicholina pursed her lips in a sugar-sweet display of sympathy, and I realized I’d spoken the words aloud. “The dead don’t have ears. She won’t hear your cries, and she won’t see your tears.”

“That’s enough,” Coco said sharply. Though I could see her trying to tug the rope from me, I couldn’t feel the movement. My fist remained locked. Blood roared in my ears. “Shut the hell up, Nicholina.”

She fought, you know.

Nicholina giggled like a little girl. Shrugged. “All right.”

She screamed your name.

I took a deep breath. In through my nose. Out through my mouth. One after another. Again and again.

You should’ve heard her in those last moments. Absolutely terrified.

I should’ve been there.

It’s your fault it’s your fault it’s your fault

Beau and Célie arrived at that moment, and Coco succeeded in tugging the rope from me. Glowering at their empty hands, she snapped, “Nothing? Again?”

Célie shrugged helplessly while Beau lifted said hands in a lackadaisical gesture. “What would you like us to do, Cosette? Shit the pearls into existence? We aren’t oysters.”

Her nostrils flared. “Oysters don’t shit out pearls, you idiotic piece of—”

“Shit?” Nicholina supplied helpfully.

Coco closed her eyes then, forcing a deep breath, before looking up at the sky. Though smoke still obscured the sun, it must’ve been late afternoon. “The next village is about two hours up the road. It’s the last one before L’Eau Mélancolique.” Her expression hardened, and she met my gaze. Jaw still clenched, I nodded once. “Reid and I will search it too.”

“What?” Beau looked between the two of us incredulously. “Célie and I are perfectly capable—”

“I am sure that’s true,” she snapped, “but this isn’t the time for a pissing contest. We need to find those pearls. This is our last chance.”

“But”—Célie leaned forward, blinking rapidly—“but Nicholina . . .”

Coco lifted her fist. She’d wrapped the rope around it. The movement forced Nicholina closer, and Coco stared directly into her eyes. Every word promised violence. “Nicholina will behave herself. Nicholina doesn’t want to die, and she’s wearing the face of the most notorious witch in Belterra.” She tugged her closer. Nicholina had stopped grinning. “If she causes a scene—if she steps one toe out of line—they’ll lash her to a stake right there in Anchois. Nicholina understands that, doesn’t she?”

Nicholina sneered. “You won’t let us burn.”

“We might not be able to save you.”

Nicholina glowered now but said nothing. Though I reached for her rope once more, Coco shook her head and started forward. “She stays with me,” she said over her shoulder. “You can’t bring yourself to kick her ass, but I can. It’s what Lou would want.”

Anchois boasted three dirt-packed streets. One of these led to the dock, where dozens of fishing boats bobbed along black water. One housed the villagers’ ramshackle dwellings. Carts and fish stands littered the market of the third. Though the sun had fully set, firelight danced on merchants’ faces as they hawked wares. Shoppers slipped arm in arm between them, calling to friends. To family. Some clutched brown paper packages. Others wore seashell necklaces. Bits of agate sparkled in the hair of impish children. Gnarled fishermen gathered at the beach to sip ale in groups of twos and threes. Grousing about their wives. Their grandchildren. Their knees.

Coco peered down the market street, trying to see through the gaps in the crowd. She’d tied one of Nicholina’s hands to hers. The sleeves of their cloaks hid all blisters. All blood. “We should split up. We’ll cover more ground that way.”

I tugged Célie away from a cart of scrying stones. “Fine. You two go to the dock, ask if anyone has heard of black pearls in the area. We’ll search the market.”