I ran back toward the pool of murky water where I'd almost drowned beneath the sludge. I searched until I found it. Snatching up the hunting knife, I discovered a discarded scarf and cut the end off to wrap around the ancient relic, using the longer length of the scarf to tie around my waist. No one would believe a servant owned a blade forged by Zrenyth himself, so I had to keep it hidden. I tucked the misty blade into my makeshift belt and headed off.

Burnt grass crunched beneath my bare feet as I sloshed through mud and pools of tacky sludge. Everywhere was cinder and ash, as if a gigantic hearth had been cleaned out from the heavens.

Crows.

These were the remains of Jurgana's crows that had met their end, purged by lightning.

The wounded lay where they'd fallen, with family or friends tending to their wounds or simply holding their hands to comfort them. Physicians had arisen from the panicked mob and aided the injured with potions and poultices which they had gathered, I assumed, from our infirmary. They quickly inspected wounds and rattled out instructions before moving onward. Some were lifted and draped like ragdolls in the arms of those who carried them to the Banquet Hall where I could see the beginning of a make-shift infirmary taking shape.

I picked my way through those I could no longer help. Their corpses littered the blackened grass. Most of the dead were from our House, but no House it seemed had been untouched by Jurgana's beasts.

As my gaze roamed around, my breath left me with a whoosh. Above a throat gouged out, ribboned flesh a stark burgundy against gray skin, were eyes wide with terror, glassy and lifeless, staring blankly upward. Hilda. A man knelt beside her, gently ran his fingertips against her eyelids, and closed them one last time. Young, she'd been so young, and full of excitement to enter her new life as a cadet for the Deniauds.

Grief carved a hollow inside my chest. Black despair rattled inside the void, and the emptiness inside was cold, so icy-cold and fathomless. I wanted to fill it with life. Pretend, at least, that there could be good once more. But, I wasn't sure if we could move past this and learn to live again.

My thoughts spiraled to Mr. Whiskers.

And a sudden overwhelming urge to find him overtook me.

He'd dragged me out from beneath muddied waters and saved my life. If anything, as selfish as it was, I needed life. We'd known one another only very briefly, but in that reckless moment, I didn't care. I wanted the warmth of the living, to grab hold of it, taste it, and I wanted to take whatever I could steal from him.

I waved a hand in front of my face to disperse the smoke, a cough racking my body as I squinted, furtively searching for him, terrified I'd find his broken body amongst the dead. My gaze snagged on two figures sagging against one another and leaning against the makeshift stage, strewn with broken musical instruments and half-torn netting. Crossbows were discarded on black-oozing grass and bamboo torches were jammed into the earth and half-tilting over.

"Oswin! Beckah!" I cried out. A brief spearing of joy reforged the shattered remnants of my soul. I barreled towards them and threw myself into Oswin and Beckah's open arms. "You're alright!" Tears streamed down my cheeks. Both of them looked as if they'd crawled out of a chimney flue.

"We're fine," Oswin reassured me. His big arms wrapped around us both. Dried blood crusted Beckah's hairline and everyone was covered in ash, including me. But I didn't care and neither did they as we grinned at one another.

"Where were you?" I asked them both.

"Helping Varen Crowther take down the crows," Beckah answered, wiping at the dust-stained tears caught in her eyelashes.

My eyes grew round.

The mysterious Varen Crowther.

"Varen was savage!" Oswin spun around and mimed holding a crossbow and shooting bolts at a ridiculous rate into the sky. "Tat-tat-a-tat-tat..."

Beckah fanned herself, bugging her big brown eyes at me. "He's also hot."

My laugh was broken and feeble, yet honest. Only Beckah could say something like that at a time like this.

"He kept yelling at me to do stuff, like 'go get the fucking weapons' or 'fucking hold it higher—higher!' and he didn't know my name, he kept calling me Osborne-whateverthefuck."

"Scary, but hot," Beckah added. "Hot—but gods was he freaking scary."

"He was a beast. Enormous. All wild hair and glowing fire-red eyes with talons and sharpened fangs!"

"Where is he?" I rubbed away my tears and rose on tippy toes to look around the lawn. But too many people were dashing around quickly and there were waves of wounded being assisted into the mansion. Something itched the back of my mind at that description.

Oswin said, "He took off after he'd destroyed the crows with a lightning bolt."

I chewed on my bottom lip, feeling a lot better about what I'd coerced Freddie to do. If people believed it was Varen Crowther, all the better.

"He and his sister decimated the dogs," Oswin continued and I was half aware of him mimicking Varen slicing twin blades in the air. I frowned, unable to spot this gigantic, half-man half-beast that was Varen Crowther. Oswin cleaved whirls of smoke apart with his pretend swords. "He ended almost all of them before Master Sirro saved us all from Jurgana's locusts."

"Locusts," I breathed in surprise and awe as I twisted back to Oswin. I hadn't known she'd wrought a spell of locusts.

Beckah clasped a hand to her front. "Hellsgate. I thought it was our end."

"A great wall of them." Oswin slashed a meaty hand in a great arc, palm upward, in front of his body. "Master Sirro came in and—poof—dust."

Holy Zrenyth!

The might of Master Sirro taking on one of his own kind too.

My ears pricked as I heard my name being shouted. Through swirls and whorls of smoke, a figure moved toward us with a strange rolling gait. Marissa appeared through the smear of black. A heel had snapped off one of her shoes and she lurched into a faster pace, waving bruised arms and shrieking, "Tabitha!"

I broke away from Oswin and Beckah and sprinted for my friend. We fell into one another's arms, my face pressed into her silky floral dress which was torn and reeked of death and sweat. We clung tightly to one another. "I was so worried about you. Where were you?" Marissa choked out.

"I was out by the bonfire trying to get to Freddie."

We pulled apart only so far as to look at one another better. Marissa's hair, which Joann had sprayed into concrete beach curls, was now teased upward like one of those troll dolls at the end of a pencil, and a hysterical burst of laughter threatened to bubble from my throat.

"Is he okay?" she asked.

"He's fine...I'm fine."

Marissa's bottom lip wobbled and her eyebrows slashed upward as tears welled in her blue eyes. "I can't find my father."

I stiffened in her arms. I'd seen Romain earlier in the Servants' Quarters. I'd knocked into him, and while I was sprawled on the floor, he'd managed to peek inside my gaping backpack and see what I'd stolen from Laurena—her golden locks of hair: a princess's crown. Not that he'd have realized that at the time.

Even inside the mansion, Romain would have heard the screaming as I had. I'm sure he would have come straight here to see what had caused the chaos.

Byron strode through the carnage, his expression stark and grim. He paused to offer comforting words to the injured, or words of encouragement to others. Servants were hurrying from the mansion with armloads of bandages and carrying medic bags filled with science threaded with magic, poultices, and potions that could quickly heal those wounded if we got to them in time.

Yet my gaze was caught on the Upper Ranks who were leaving in droves. I watched the privileged members of our society check on one another and then leave with pitying glances cast over their shoulders, or none at all. As if this hadn't happened to all of us collectively. But some of them paused as if they saw us for the first time. They slowly swept their gazes over the lawns at those sagged over the dead and listened to their keening. Some sons and daughters of Houses broke into a walk, hastening toward the lawns, leaving the safety of the mansion, determined to help and assist in some manner.

"There he is!" cried Marissa, almost sobbing the words as she pointed her father out. Romain hurried toward Sanela, who stood outside the living room that we'd adorned like an early winter. Her younger daughters, all of them wearing shocked expressions, stood nearby, clustered together like frightened rabbits.

Marissa and I darted to the small courtyard where the Deniauds were gathered. Marissa threw herself at her father. Relief shone in his eyes as he hoarsely spoke her name, wrapping his arms around her.

Sanela was immaculate, with nothing but a small bit of ash clinging to the hem of her expensive dress. She must have been inside the mansion, safe. However, Romain had black gunk that had dried on his fingers and was splattered up his forearms, as if he'd battled hand to hand with a beast, and blood soaked his white shirt too. Human blood, though not his I realized, as he didn't seem to be wincing with pain.

Sanela wrung her hands, and the wealth dripping from her wrists, the diamonds and gold were gaudy against the filth and death surrounding us. Panic and confusion about what to do ruled her unhinged gaze. No one had encountered this type of reckless devastation at the hands of a Witch during our reign serving the Horned Gods.

"Tabitha." Sanela's curt tone cut through the air, a superior note to it as if she had sunk into her role of hostess. I stiffened, wondering what she was about to say. "Go help the Wychthorns pack their belongings."

I blinked at the utter ridiculousness of Sanela ordering such a thing. But in that moment, I felt sorry for her. I understood why she'd fallen into what was familiar to her.

Another thought slammed into me hard—Laurena Wychthorn.

Oh my freaking gods!

There was a slim chance that Mr. Whiskers had been able to steal more glamour potion and administer it to Laurena after the debacle of the haircutting heist and before Jurgana had emerged from the Hemmlok Forest.

But if he hadn't...

I had a tiny chance to save myself.

I knew for a fact that Irma Szarvas and Rosa Battagli used glamour to enhance their looks. If I could steal some potion from either of them and get to Laurena first, if she was still asleep, then I might be able to fool her into thinking she still had her hair.

"Sanela, if the Wychthorns wish to leave," barked Romain, fury darkening his eyes, "then they can sort their own things out." The sharpness in his voice was almost a physical slap.

Sanela's expression became icy as if affronted. "This is all they'll remember... If anyone was interested in a union with our House, they'll now think twice about marrying Marissa—"

"Momma, who cares?" yelled Marissa, flinging a hand around. "Look around. Our House is hurt, everyone is hurt. People have died because of..." A glimpse of anger burned in her eyes that shimmered with tears. "Jurgana turned on us!"

Dangerous, so dangerous to say that aloud.

"Marissa," Romain warned, softly. "This is our way of life. No one comes out of this unscathed."

"It's okay. I'll check on the Wychthorns," I interrupted, placing a pacifying hand on Marissa's arm just as I saw her mouth open to lash out. I caught in my periphery Byron moving past us as he helped carry a wounded child toward the infirmary. Byron had obviously overheard what Sanela had asked me to do. His gaze snapped upward to the higher levels of the mansion, and the banks of windows. I suppose he too was thinking about his sister.

Sanela ignored everyone, folding an arm around her youngest daughter's shoulders and staring at me as if to ask why I still remained there when I should have already followed through with her instructions.

Romain's thin mustache twitched as his lips pressed into a narrow line. He frowned and rubbed his creased forehead with a dirty hand. There was an unspoken apology in his blue eyes when he turned to me, moving closer. "You do that, Tabitha. Thank you." I was just about to leave when he quietly said, "I'm sorry, she's not handling it very well."

I dipped my chin and shrugged a shoulder. "No...I expect we all aren't."

As I hurried off, exhausted and running on pure adrenaline, I heard Sanela address Romain. Her voice maintained that imperious tone she was born with. "Romain, you need to go too, and offer our thanks to the Wychthorns that they graced us with their company this weekend."

"Sanela," Romain snapped. "For gods' sakes wake up and see what's happened. People have died. People are dying. Our people. Our House."

I didn't hear Sanela's response, as I'd already ducked inside the mansion. I picked up the heavy wet skirts of my dress and hastened my pace. I tracked mud with me as I made my way up the stairs to the upper levels. My feet ached and every part of my burning muscles protested at being pushed to my limit. But there was much to do, and when it was over it would be time to find out who had died, grieve, and bury the dead. I knew in my heart most of the casualties would be the Deniauds. I would have sat beside them sharing meals in the Servants' Hall, slept nearby, and worked alongside them. My heart was as heavy as my footsteps as I ran, hurrying down the hallway with its wooden floors, the sound of my bare feet reverberated against the golden-papered walls.

Everything in the hallway was too bright. Too bright and rich with vibrant colors. The wealth hanging on the walls in gilded ornate frames or sitting on antique furniture felt grotesque with its shallowness. I wanted to shy away from it all. Find a dim, dark place and shatter, weep for those who had fallen.

Not yet...not yet...

My first task was to steal some glamour potion, just in case Mr. Whiskers hadn't. I prayed to Skalki that Laurena was still asleep. My hair, damp and straggly, swayed like a pendulum as I sprinted toward the guest bedrooms, trying to decide who to steal from—Rosa or Irma.