And yet here she was, mucking out a yeti. A cute baby Yeti, with big, imploring eyes. Eyes that were going to be removed later this evening in a horrible ritual that made even Tabitha wince when she thought of it. It wasn’t as if she and her friends didn’t eat the eyeballs of dead creatures—they did, with relish—but Tabitha had never before looked into a condemned creature’s eyes while it was alive.

The baby yeti was being kept in the old stables at the back of the Old Town University. No one knew it was there, except for Tabitha and her new mentor, the wonderful Jupiter Peacock, who let her call him JP. He’d told her all sorts of things about the Diberi and their castles and mansions and great ballrooms. Tabitha sighed and looked away from the baby yeti. She’d do almost anything for JP. As long as it was going toward her ticket out of here, toward great glory, riches and beauty, she would do virtually anything. Virtually. This baby yeti thing was disturbing her in some way, though, and she didn’t like it. It kept moaning about something, and Tabitha thought she could see blood coming from somewhere. Ick.

She turned her back on it and paged one of her friends about a new diamond necklace she’d seen in the Selfridges catalog. The friend didn’t page her back. This was just typical of Tabitha’s friends lately. They were interested in homework, boys (not even real men) and the kinds of cheap cotton dresses you could get in Teen World. Well, Tabitha would be leaving them behind soon. In fact, if JP was to be believed, they’d be leaving behind most of the world soon—and good riddance too.

20

LEXY DIDN’T ASK WHERE she was being taken; she just did everything she’d been told to do. She had been instructed to tell her parents that she was going to be staying at the university overnight as part of the Winter Fair arrangements. She’d been commanded to look cheerful and excited, which she’d done.

She’d done everything JP had told her. More or less.

After all, if she didn’t obey him, the world was going to end. And little Buttons was going to be sacrificed to help make it happen. That’s what he’d said. And if ever Lexy looked as if she might forget, he’d found a way to remind her. A little pinch or a kick—or just drawing his finger slowly across his throat when he knew Lexy could see him and her parents could not.