Like Mallow, slipping free of her duties and visiting Joseph in his study. The diary confirmed it—Mallow had been seen, followed. And not just Mallow would suffer if Darcy flapped her jaw. Flapped—just like a vulture’s wings. Let her carry that secret to the sky.

Mallow ripped the pages from the diary a few at a time, as many as she could tear at once with her sore hands. She crumpled the papers in her fist and dropped them into the bottom of an empty coal bucket. Before dawn, she’d cover them over with coal. She’d visit all the fine young ladies and fill their hearths with coal and secrets. Light the fires to warm their shivering, feeble frames. A little piece of Darcy in every room, in the nest of every little featherless bird.

Mallow smiled and listened to the maids in the hall disperse. Heard the rickety doors close all along the corridor. Would they all lie awake, concerned for their missing monarch? Mallow supposed not. Surely they each remembered their time as the favorite. Remembered the turn, the shift—the lunatic feeling of falling from favor. It isn’t something one forgets easily, or forgives, ever.

***

They found one of her slippers after a few days, once the search reached the mountain trails. It had landed, exposed like a beacon on the cliffside. They assumed she fell. None ever guessed that she flew.

Mallow cinched her pack straps. The somber party gathered at the foot of the trail. They linked arms, not just to ensure all ground was covered, but also to bear each other up over the rough terrain of the gorge.

It was all Mallow could do to keep her eyes on the rock at her feet and away from the cliff face above, where birds circled the discolored splash of rocks.

No one with any sense looked for Darcy. They looked for pieces. And no one looked at the sky.

Mallow watched the toes of her shoes scuff the rocks and tried to enjoy the hike. Breathed deeply and savored the sun on her neck. Listened to the rhythmic flapping of Joseph’s coat tails in the breeze.

Mallow had counted on the eagles and vultures, but she hadn’t allowed for crows. They didn’t often come to the mountain, when they could do so much better in the village below. But there in a crow’s cache—in a heap of fractured glass and tin—there were Darcy’s glasses. The birds were in on it, and now everyone knew it. Eyes drifted skyward.

Mallow felt sweat run under her collar, smelled it dissolve the starch. Not a giveaway in this sun. Natural to sweat out here.

The search line broke apart, and they scattered like a convoy of ants with a stick tossed in their path. They scampered through the cracking dry brush and dusty rock, scraping through anywhere that might hide a clue.