It wasn’t a great plan, but it was a plan, and the depressed silence in the kitchen grew until Ellasbeth began shouting at the pixies to get out. They were singing now, and Lucy was joining in, shrieking just for the hell of it. The woman needed help, but I wasn’t going to go in there. Neither was Quen by the look of it, wincing from the shrill voices raised in rhyme and mayhem. Unable to take it anymore, Rex slunk past the kitchen, probably on her way to hide under my bed. Chaos. My life was chaos.

“So I guess the first thing would be to get the rings, preferably without Nick knowing?”

Jenks darted to the hallway to rescue Ellasbeth. “We’re going to have to steal them.”

Quen stood, his pox scars standing out sharp against his pale expression. “I’ll talk to them again,” he said, but Jenks was right. We’d have to steal them, and I stared at the ceiling, going through what I’d need. Rope, silence charms, something to remove aura residue . . .

“Worth a try,” I said as Jenks yelled at his kids to get outside.

Finally there was only Lucy’s loud “singing” as Jenks’s kids left and Ellasbeth staggered into the kitchen, the weight of both girls nearly bringing her down. “Abba!” Lucy cried, her eyes alight as she reached for him. It about broke my heart, but in a good way. Quen immediately took her, having to forcibly pull the blanket-wrapped Lucy from Ellasbeth when the woman indicated he should take Ray instead.

“Coo ox! Coo ox!” Lucy crowed as she patted her blanket, then gently touched Quen’s chin. “Abba, coo ox!”

My face warmed as Ellasbeth’s eyes scanned my kitchen, lingering on the scorch marks, the water glass overturned on the windowsill, and finally to the dusty box. She said nothing, and I would have given a lot to know what she was thinking. Jenks whispered something into Quen’s ear to make him blink, and she frowned. Ever stoic, Quen gently took Lucy’s fingers and pulled them from his face. She was still going on about “coo ox.” I had a bad feeling I knew what she was saying. Ellasbeth, though, was clueless.

“What does that mean, anyway? Coo ox?” the woman asked, clearly thinking our sudden silence meant we’d been talking behind her back.

“Ah, that’s Ku’Sox,” I said, and Ellasbeth’s expression blanked.

“Coo ox!” Lucy crowed, making a show of smelling the blanket. Quen was mystified, but I winced as I figured it out.

“That’s the blanket that Al gave me,” I said. “It probably smells like the ever-after.”

Horrified, Ellasbeth stood, her face red. “It smells like a demon!” she exclaimed, and ignoring Lucy’s triumphant “Coo ox! Coo ox!” she snatched Lucy from Quen, pulling her out from the blanket and letting it fall to the floor.