“Oh, it’s not about what I have in me.” I smiled grimly. “It’s about what you have in you, Mrs. Palmer. Pride. Ambition. Hope. Patriotism. Dignity. Your daughter didn’t seem familiar with the Outcast, so maybe you’re not, either. That’s what they do. They subsist on human emotion. And I will feed you to the ghouls. Everything that defines you? I’ll let them take it all, every last ounce. I’ll let them suck you dry until they’re ravening, until there’s nothing of you left but an empty husk. And when they’re done with you, I’ll let them drain your daughter. Stefan?”

He appeared at my side. “Hel’s liaison.” There was a dark, dangerous note of hunger in his voice. “I await your bidding.”

There was some scuffling behind her as the coven moved to surround dear Emmy, and I heard Sinclair speaking to his father in a low, urgent voice, but I kept my gaze locked on Letitia Palmer’s. She hadn’t been afraid before, but she was now. I could see it in her eyes, in the sweat beading on her forehead. “You did what you came to do, lady,” I said to her. “You’ve fulfilled your threat. Take your victory and go, before the taste of it turns to bile in your mouth.”

Fancy wording, right? That’s what comes from hanging out with a six-hundred-year-old Eastern European nobleman. But I have to give the Right Honorable Judge Palmer credit—she was one tough lady. Curling her lips with distaste, she gave me the briefest of nods.

“Swear it,” I said without relinquishing an ounce of pressure on her necklace.

“I swear it on the bones of my ancestors,” she said in a bitter voice. By the sound of it, I was a little late with the whole taste-of-bile thing. “Emmeline and I will leave Pemkowet immediately, never to return.”

“Good.” I let go of the cowry shell. “Stefan and his men will give you an escort. As soon as you retrieve your luggage at the Idlewild, I want you out of town.”

Letitia Palmer straightened the chain on her necklace and dusted off her lavender suit as though to brush away any lingering hell-spawn taint. She presented Sinclair with the empty glass jar.

“You know what to do, son,” she said to him. “When you’re ready, you and your grandfather come on home.”

He took the jar in one hand, rubbing at his eyes with the heel of his other in a quick, fierce gesture. “Do you know the one thing that might have made a difference, Mom? You could have told me you loved me. You could have said you wanted me back because you loved me, not because you’re running for Parliament.”

“Of course I love you!” She looked surprised. “You’re my son.”