“Such a shame then that I’ll leave a really terrible review about your mother’s hospitality,” said JP.

“Well—”

“And, of course, kill your friend.”

“What?”

“The one with the long hair. The pretty, feisty one. What’s her name? Oh yes. Euphemia Truelove.”

“No!” said Lexy. “Stop it! Stop saying these things. And stop threatening my friends.”

“Not that any of these things will matter if the world ends,” mused JP. “You all think that Madame Valentin’s prophecy is wrong. But you are in for a nasty surprise. Sometimes the most foolish people speak the wisest truths. I know Hieronymus Moon would agree with that.” JP reached for his necklace and tapped the pale ceramic bottle in which Moon’s spirit was supposed to be. He continued. “I can in fact guarantee your friend Euphemia’s safety. And the safety of the world. And the continued existence of your adorable kitten—who might otherwise come in handy in a spell calling for a hundred live cats. But only if you do exactly what I say from now on. Do you agree?”

Wolf and Lucy looked at one another. They had no idea what was going to happen next. Everyone else in the stark white room had been “eliminated.” Had they been killed, or just removed to some other place? Wolf was surprised to find that he wasn’t at all frightened. He was just angry. He’d come here looking for Natasha, and instead he’d been bombarded with all sorts of ridiculous questions.

Lucy’s eyes were wide. Wolf could tell she actually was frightened. Which was probably a more rational response than his own. But Wolf knew that fear can lead to bad decisions, so he didn’t let himself feel it: not yet. And he tried to feel less angry, too, because it is also well-known that angry people do irrational things. He took some deep breaths and tried to clear his mind. He told himself he could feel whatever he liked later, but for now, feelings were not going to help him very much.

The screen flickered to life once again. On it was a list. Wolf remembered some book he’d seen when he was a very small child—there were never books in any house he’d lived in, so it must have been at a school, or in a library—where you had to say what connected four or five different things, or which was the odd one out. Here, on the screen, you could say that what everything had in common was that it was alive.

And in peril.