Captain Lang seemed to shift away from Sir Perrault. I felt myself draw back a little, too, my insides twisting.

Perrault and my stepmother were old friends.

And here he was, ready and waiting.

“I don’t want to,” I burst out. “I don’t want to go!”

Alessandra cocked her head. “You dismissed Sir Perrault’s suggestion of further talks with the Janesleys. This is your remaining option.”

The captain glanced once at me, eyes and lashes the color of midnight beneath dark brows, then looked back to Alessandra. “The Beholder is ready to sail tomorrow, per your request.”

“Tomorrow?” Daddy frowned.

“It’s a long trip, dear,” said Alessandra. “Why delay?”

Horror clenched me between its jaws, gnawed my bones with its teeth.

Alessandra had set us all up like game pieces, just waiting for her opening move. The Council. These strangers. And me, rejected and out of options.

She’d planned it all so, so carefully, for who knew how long, and I hadn’t seen any of it.

“Where?” I breathed, able to manage just the one word around the fear choking me. Sir Perrault studied me like a museum piece. “Where am I going? Who am I meeting?”

Alessandra smiled at me. Her relief at her victory rendered the expression more like a baring of teeth. “It’s a surprise.”

I stared at my father, wordlessly begging him to ask Alessandra why she’d maneuvered behind his back. To tell her that my leaving was not up for discussion. That I was his girl and I needed some sleep.

But my father only watched the candles melting at the center of the table, staring into the flames.

I fought tears. My voice cracked when I finally spoke. “Daddy, aren’t you going to say anything?”

“Maybe you should take this chance, sweetheart,” he said, voice barely above a whisper. “Don’t you want to be happy?”

“I’m happy here, at home, with you.” I pieced my thoughts together like a broken mirror; my voice was jagged. “Don’t you want me here?”

“Maybe I don’t know what’s good for us anymore,” he said slowly, meeting my eyes. “I think you should listen to your momma.”

Your momma.

The words sucked the breath from my chest.

Half a mile away, the clock in the tower at the Church of Saint Christopher warned of midnight’s fall. I stood and backed away from the table, stumbling over my chair and over the Roots that grasped at the dark.

I would not be unmade in front of these people.

Alessandra’s voice stopped me, low and tight as a hand around my throat. “The harbor, tomorrow, dawn.”

I glanced from my blank-faced father to the uneasy councilmembers to the young captain, whose unsettled gaze told me he was sorry.