“Then I suppose there is only one way to discover if your words are truth, Mazarine,” I said.

“Perhaps. But I also do not give my knowledge and magic away freely,” she countered, lacing her long, gnarled fingers together. “And I do not think you have enough gold or bone marrow to satisfy me.”

“No, I don’t,” I agreed, choosing not to dwell on the bone marrow part. “But there is something I have that I think you will want.”

She waited, watching as I opened my leather satchel. I withdrew a fresh sheet of parchment, a stick of charcoal, and she laughed.

“You have drawn me so many times, Clementine. Why would I want another portrait?”

“I have drawn you in disguise, Mazarine of the Mountains. This time, I will draw your true face.”

Her humor melted, replaced by longing and the glitter of vanity. I had her, and I concealed my smugness as I continued to hold up the paper, waiting to be marked.

“But then again . . . perhaps you don’t want any evidence of your true nature on paper,” I said, and began to pack my supplies away.

“Wait, Clementine.”

I paused, and she fought a war within herself.

“The portrait of my true face will be enough for payment,” she eventually said. “But now the question I must ask is if you are willing to pay the cost of my disguise.”

“Tell me the cost, then.”

She poured a glass of wine. “I will take half of your heart and turn it into stone. It will divide you, and you will turn colder. Because half of who you once were will be no more, you will need to surrender half of something you love to hold the spell. Your art or your magic, most likely, since those are two things that have always been with you, growing alongside you year by year.” She took a sip of her wine, but her gaze never left mine. “So what will you choose to give up, Clementine Madigan? Your art or your magic?”

I didn’t want to relinquish either one.

For the troll was right: magic and art had been with me always. My two constants, my two greatest achievements. Both light and fire in my imagination, growing year by year alongside me, deepening and flourishing even in the hardest moments of life. And my dream of mastering deviah magic, when my magic and my art would coincide as one beneath my prowess, slowly began to die.

“My art,” I whispered. “I will give up my art.”

Mazarine nodded, but she wasn’t surprised. She had known my decision and my weakness, as I had known hers.

“Then let it be done,” Mazarine said, and rose from the divan. “Come and draw my portrait, and I will grant you my magic, a disguise of your choosing.”