Mary flew back down to the lake, settling her huge clawed feet into the damp grit at its edge. She waited, and was rewarded by the crown of blonde hair surfacing just beyond the shallows. Bell coughed and choked, her tattered dress rising up around her like a pale moon. Mary changed too, confident that, if it was needed, she could call on the rocks around her to defend her.

‘I knew I hadn’t killed you.’

Bell slowly waded towards the shore. Her left arm hung uselessly by her side, a kink in her forearm the reason why.

‘You bitch,’ said Bell. ‘You’ve ruined everything.’

It wasn’t what Mary expected to hear. She had a right to be angry, but to be so resolutely, stupidly, stubborn? ‘I don’t get it, and I don’t get you. Why won’t you just give up?’

‘It would have worked.’ Bell kept coming. The splashing water was up to Bell’s knees, then her shins, now her ankles. ‘It would have worked if it hadn’t been for you.’

‘Your plan? To scare open a door back to London? Fucking hell, mate: we’ve had the shit scared out of us so many times tonight, it’s pretty obvious it’s never going to work.’

Bell was getting uncomfortably close, her feet slipping on the loose rock just under the surface.

‘Everything had to be just right. And it was, until you showed up.’ She was a miserable sight, her dress all but falling off her, rags held together by a few stitches. White and gold cloth, once rich, like her, just dropping away, piece by piece.

‘Was that … Was that a wedding dress?’

They were face to face.

Bell wiped the water out of her eyes. ‘Yes. It was mine.’

‘You just happened to be wearing it, when, what? You were attacked by bears or something?’

‘Don’t pretend to understand. Don’t pretend to know what it’s like, to be married off, like some prize cow.’

‘Okay. I don’t know what that’s like. But fucking hell, whatever happened to you, why can’t you just leave us alone? You’ve done all this – all this, everything – to yourself. By behaving like a, a …’

‘A dragon.’

Crows was a snake, sneaky and slippery. Stanislav had been whatever he’d become, that primal chaos she’d first witnessed down by the lake that lay at the heart of everyone. Bell was a dragon, cruel and hard. And she, she was an eagle. What did that say about her?

‘Sounds like some bloke had a lucky escape.’

‘If I could, I’d—’

‘What? Hit me? Is that it? Is that all you have?’ Mary leaned in. ‘It’s your answer to everything, and you’ve got nothing left.’

‘I have everything,’ said Bell. ‘I still have everything.’