Oh, I remembered. I remembered the scarred witch, who’d slithered into our mists as a healer. I remembered the disgraced Bastien St. Pierre, and I remembered my own gruesome injury. I did not, however, remember their coconspirator—the freckled witch. The one who’d looked at me as if someone had died.

I’m your wife, she’d said, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. In the biblical sense.

Remember, Reid. She’d known my name. Called me by name.

If he doesn’t love me—if he doesn’t even remember me—what was the point in all this, Coco?

Blistering rage further quickened my step. The wind rushed past me now, burning my cheeks and numbing my ears. As if I’d ever debase myself with a witch. As if I’d ever marry anyone, let alone a bride of Satan. “Lou.” I sneered the name aloud, my breath catching around it. A hideous name for a hideous being, and Célie—

My God.

I’d left Célie alone with them.

No. I shook my head. Not alone. The crown prince, my brother—he’d been there too. He’d even shared some sort of absurd camaraderie with the creatures, as if they three were family instead of him and me. Perhaps he could protect Célie. Then again, perhaps he couldn’t. Regardless of how he felt toward them, witches held no family. I couldn’t risk it. Not with her.

I hurtled around the bend, and sure enough, a familiar hamlet rose to meet me. If one could even call it that. Comprising a single street, it boasted a parish and an inn, complete with pub underneath. The entire settlement had risen only to accommodate sailors in need of work, passing from one port city to the next. A handful of them stared as I hurtled past. It mattered not.

Without breaking stride, I headed toward the parish at the end of the road. My fist nearly leveled the door. Once. Twice. Three times. At last, a tall, spotted boy peeked his head out. His eyes widened at my ruddy cheeks, my towering frame. My palpable fury. He let out a squeak before trying to slam the door in my face. Incredulous, I caught it and wrenched it back open. “I am Captain Reid Diggory, and—”

“You can’t be here!” His feeble arms trembled with the effort to shut the door. I held fast. “You—you—”

“—require your services,” I finished roughly, losing patience and flinging the door wide. It banged against the weathered stone wall. Men outside the pub turned to stare. “There are witches in the area. Summon your priest. If no Chasseurs are near, I’ll need a contingent of able-bodied men to—”

The boy planted himself in the threshold when I moved to step inside. “Father Angelart ain’t here. He’s—he’s in Cesarine, sittin’ in on the conclave, isn’t he?”