‘No … he’s as brave as anyone in the hunt, braver. He’ll ride anything, face down a boar or a bear … but he won’t do anything the Abhorsen is supposed to do. Nor will Yannael. I guess they’ve been able to avoid it, because nothing has threatened them or the Kingdom. Tyriel’s been the Abhorsen for nearly fifty years and I doubt he’s ever been called to deal with anything. So he has been able to forget it all and devote himself to hunting. That’s why I’ve been training myself, so there is a proper Abhorsen when one is needed.’

‘I thought it was just an overly developed case of curiosity,’ said Mogget. ‘The kind that kills cats. Myself excepted, of course.’

‘I wondered why he would just throw me in here and leave,’ said Clariel. ‘But do you think this means he won’t go and help the King at all?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Bel. He looked wretched, as if he was personally letting down the King. ‘I think he will eventually, because it’s not really Abhorsen business – I mean because it’s not to do with Death, or the Dead, or anything like that. But the hunt takes up all his mind, and until the Summer’s End Hunt is done … nothing will even be got ready.’

‘Is the King really safe in the Palace?’ asked Clariel. ‘Kilp has a lot more guards. A lot more.’

Bel shrugged unhappily. ‘I don’t know.’

‘What about Princess Tathiel? Any signs of her showing up?’

‘Not that I know of,’ said Bel. ‘What are you laughing at, Mogget?’

Clariel had never seen a cat laugh before, and wouldn’t have known that’s what it was if Bel hadn’t spoken. She thought Mogget was preparing to throw up a fur ball, since his shoulders were shaking, his eyes were closed and he was making a kind of rasping noise in his throat. He continued for a few seconds after Bel spoke, then said with dignity, ‘I find many things amusing. Abhorsens who are afraid of Death, princesses who shirk their inheritance … It’s all quite funny.’

‘I don’t think so,’ said Clariel. She balled her right hand into a fist and slapped it against the open palm of her left, making a very satisfactory thudding noise. ‘If I were … If I were either the Abhorsen or the Princess, I’d just get on with doing my job.’

‘Would you?’ asked Mogget. ‘What is your “job” then?’

Clariel didn’t know how to answer that, at least not immediately. When her parents had been killed she had lost her clear and obvious place in the world, but it had been a place she had intended to leave behind anyway.