“Well, this is something a little different. We’re the Brethren of Zoise.” Elise took a small card from the pocket of the sports top she was wearing. On one side was the lotus flower symbol, on the other, an address and the times and dates of when there were meetings. “It’s a new form of yoga. Holistic. There’s a big focus on community, in case you couldn’t guess that by the ‘brethren’ thing. I think it’s what you came here looking for.”

Daisy thought she might be right.

“Do you have a mailing list I can sign up for?”

3
A LEISURELY SATURDAY

Susan’s room was not one in which to step lightly. Or, indeed, heavily. Or at all, if you wanted to avoid breaking your neck. The floor was carpeted in clothes, and Daisy secretly held the theory that Susan simply rolled out of bed and across the floor and emerged in whatever wrapped itself around her before she got to the door. It was the room of someone whose brain was too busy to bother with something as frivolous as hygiene.

However, Daisy found herself there because someone had hacked into her university e-mail account and sent disturbing e-mails to everyone in her contacts list. (It was a toss-up as to which was worse: sending her grandmother a ransom demand or the Vice Chancellor a link to some NSFW fan fiction.) There was only one person Daisy could turn to.

“Does your skeleton have a name?” Without moving from the safe spot on the bed, Daisy knelt so she was level with the skull, squinting into its eye sockets as it leered out of the wardrobe.

“If you can guess, it’ll spin straw into gold for you.”

“Rumple-skeleton!”

“Nope.”

Daisy looked crestfallen for a moment, then brightened up. “The Duke of Skellington?”

“Wrong again.”

Daisy opened her mouth, then shut it. “I’m going to think about this.”

“You do that”—without looking up, Susan cocked her finger at Daisy—“or the skeleton will eat your firstborn.”

Daisy side-eyed the skeleton and whispered, “You wouldn’t do that to a friend.”

Her gaze drifted around the room and settled on the jar of teeth Susan used as a paperweight, an item that Esther coveted with overwhelming intensity.

“Where did you get—”

Susan turned abruptly, cutting her off. “Daisy, I love you, but this kind of work needs silence. I’m going to give you a golden five-minute window of opportunity, and then you’re going to leave me in peace.”

“Oh.” Daisy drooped.

“Don’t look so downhearted. Esther would do literally anything for an offer like this, and I’m giving it to you.” Susan held up the timer on her phone and pressed start. “Five minutes. Go.”

“Name the skeleton.”

“Indiana Bones. A fellow archaeologist.”

Daisy’s expression darkened. “Indiana Jones is a very bad archaeologist. You’re not meant to meddle with mystical objects like that.”