I nodded. My father had gone through something of a mid-immortality crisis about two and a half decades ago and done his damnedest to impregnate every breeding courtesan he could find. The first attempt had resulted in my brother Val, the second in me and the third and fourth in Avery and Dede. Four live births out of nine pregnancies over a five-year period – pretty potent for a vampire.

“She’s missing.” He didn’t need to know the particulars – like how she had last been seen at her favourite pub. “I want to know what happened to her.”

“Nay, you do not,” the prince replied cheerfully. “Pretty wants to know where her sibling is. The prince knows.” He petted the little goblin on the head as he bared his teeth at me – a smile.

Sweet baby Jesus. Even my spleen trembled at that awful sight.

Trying to hide my fear was futile, as he could surely smell it. Still, I had to give it a go. “Would you be so kind as to share my sister’s whereabouts, my lord? Please? I am concerned about her.”

If there was one thing goblins understood it was blood – both as sustenance and connection. Offspring happened rarely because of their degree of mutation, and were treasured. No decent goblin – and I use “decent” as loosely as it can possibly be construed – would turn down a request that involved family. “New Bethlehem,” he replied in a grave growl.

I pressed a hand against the boned front of my corset, and closed my fingers into a fist. I would not show weakness here, no matter how much the prince might sympathise with my plight – he was still a goddam goblin. “Bedlam?” I rasped.

The prince nodded. “She was taken in two nights ago, in shackles.”

Albert’s fangs. I blasphemed the Queen’s late consort to myself alone. My mind could scarcely grasp the reality of it. “You’re wrong,” I whispered. “You have to be wrong.” But goblins were never wrong. If he hadn’t known, he wouldn’t have said. That was their way – so I’d been taught. “Honourable monsters”, Church had called them.

“Alexandra.”

I jerked. I shouldn’t be surprised that he knew my name. Of course he knew it. It was the posh way he said it – his voice sounded almost like my father’s.

He stood before me – I was right, he was my height. The little one remained glued to his side. I had the sudden and inex plicable urge to reach out and pat her on the head, just as I had wanted to do to a tiger cub I once saw in a travelling exhibit. The comparison kept my hand fisted, and at my side. I wanted to keep it.

“Your prince regrets telling the pretty lady this news.”

I turned my attention back to him. The pity in his eye almost brought me to tears. Why should a monster pity me?