Malden had guessed beforehand—and been proven correct—that what he’d be allowed to see of the interior of the house would be restricted to the lower floor. In his experience, most rich men kept their offices on the ground floor of their homes, rather than force their guests to climb stairs. Thus he had tasked Kemper with exploring what he could of the upper two floors.

“The second story’s about what ye’d expect, plenty o’ bedrooms, a couple o’ garderobes, storage fer linens, clothes, and whatnot. I didn’t check much there, seein’ I was bein’ careful wi’ the time. The third story’s where things get int’restin’, though. His own bedchamber’s up there, and ooh, is it grand. Silken sheets and pillers, divans an’ lookin’ glasses ever’where. There’s chains hangin’ from the ceilin’, too, with manacles on ’em, what felt like cold-forged iron. What you think he gets up t’wi’ those, eh? Eh? Maybe human lasses is too normal for his lot. Maybe he’s conjurin’ up suck-you-bye from the pit t’have his way wi’. What you s’pose that’s like, eh? Eh?”

Malden’s eyes went wide just with imagining. In the House of Sighs, the most expensive of the city’s whorehouses, there was a famous fresco of a succubus copulating with a sleeping man. He had run many errands to the House of Sighs as a boy, and that image had been impressed firmly in his youthful mind. He’d never before considered, though, that succubi might actually exist. Did they have wings, like in the painting? And horns, and— But enough. “What of the rest of the floor? Surely there’s more than just the one bedchamber. There must be. Did you see the crown?”

“Nay, lad, nay. But I think I mighta seen where it’s hid. There’s a study on that story, a mickle space for him to write letters and do his reckonin’s. Then there’s a workshop fit for a dwarf, wi’ all manner o’ tools and materials waitin’ to be fashioned. There’s a room full o’ glassware, I ne’er seen its like, all manner and shape o’ tubes and pots and bowls, some bubblin’, some smokin’, some full o’ what looked like ghost-stuff. I didn’t spend long in there for the smell, which were like rotten eggs. The biggest room up there’s at the end of a hallway, ain’t never used by the folk o’ the house. There’s dust on the rugs in there, and the doors is all locked up tight, and the lock’s half rusted. I’m figurin’ there’s traps all over that corridor, set for any thief what dares to try for the big room.”

“But what’s in this big room?” Malden asked.