Lottie listened intently, hearing the words like an echo of her mantra to always be kind, brave and unstoppable. But it felt hard with Jamie gone and Ellie drifting away, the future uncertain.

‘That’s stupid,’ Ellie said, her face still and emotionless.

‘Perhaps.’ The queen mother coughed and it almost sounded like a laugh. ‘But that is the way it is.’

The sliver of light clouded over and Willemena’s glance turned heavy. Lottie felt the shift in the room. A story was about to unravel, and this one would hurt.

The king and queen spoke quietly to each other, before silently making their way out. The moment the door shut, the spell was in place.

‘Hirana,’ she began, and the way she said her name, there was no hint of the malice Claude had suggested, ‘she did not simply work for us for a little while as we have told you. She designed all the gardens in the palace.’ There was a wistfulness to her voice that made her words feel like an ode to something beyond their understanding. ‘She was a genius, and had a way with flowers and horticulture that was unparalleled. We were thrilled to have her finally bring some life back to the palace gardens, and she was as deep-rooted a part of the palace as any one of us.’

‘But she wasn’t good enough to be part of the family,’ Ellie scoffed, nearly snapping the spell, but Willemena pulled the threads back together with one sharp look.

‘Is that what that despicable son of mine has told you?’ Willemena took the silence as confirmation. ‘I knew he’d get to you sooner or later. I might appear a cold and bitter old hag to you, but what happened to Hirana was not my doing, although it is my fault.’

In Lottie’s entire time working for the Wolfsons, she’d never heard the queen mother say something so honest, and there was something powerful in the admittance, like the chains of an old curse were finally coming undone.

‘We always knew Claude enjoyed the company of beautiful people, and it was important that we kept it under wraps, because he had an arranged marriage, a tradition he was perfectly fine with if it meant he would be king. He understood this but he simply couldn’t resist Hirana, and likewise she could not resist him.’

While clearly embarrassed, there was no disapproval in her tone, not a thread of the story Claude had woven.

‘Something happened between them that caused Hirana to resign from her post rather dramatically. We begged her to stay, told her the gardens would die without her, but she said she’d seen what the future of the Wolfsons was, and she wanted no part of it. We had no idea she was pregnant with Claude’s child.’

‘What did he do?’

‘What made her leave?’