“The efficacy of bloodshadow surgery greatly depends on how much of the injury we can see. As a rule, the more light we can throw on a subject, the more of their insides we can see in their shadow, but even strapping our patients into a shadowpult spotlight leaves the image murky. La reine believes you might be able to help us clarify things.”

Isabelle hated bloodshadows. There was nothing so grotesque as turning a human being into a bloodhollow. Yet people were bound to use the power they possessed to whatever advantage they could, and demanding all Sanguinaire abandon the principal use of their sorcery was a fool’s crusade. The only way forward was to change the principal use from harm to healing, and then to cast opprobrium on those who debased it.

For such a purpose Isabelle might be kind to the Breaker herself.

She asked, “What exactly do you see in a person’s shadow?”

“It’s as if the whole body has been pressed flat and made transparent,” Eulalie said. “Our bloodshadows can bypass the skin and attack the ailment directly.”

“Does it matter which direction the patient is facing? The shadow would be a different shape if he was sideways.”

Eulalie grinned broadly. “Madame told me you were quick.”

Sireen, having corrected course to her satisfaction, said, “I trust you two will cooperate.”

“Yes, Madame,” they said in ragged syncopation, and Sireen glided away to other duties.

The shadows in Eulalie’s bloodshadow flowed in unison like a murmuration of starlings on the wing.

Isabelle asked, “Do those dark spots affect the way your bloodshadow works?”

“You mean my little phantasms?” Eulalie said, drawing her shadow up her body and along her arms until she seemed to have been dipped in blood, if blood had indistinct shadow fish swimming in it. “I’ve always had them.”

“I’m surprised the Temple hasn’t taken an interest in them,” Isabelle said. The shadows looked like soul smudges to her. If the Temple had investigated Eulalie, that would at least be one thing she and Isabelle had in common.

Eulalie lifted her nose. “They wouldn’t dare. My pedigree is impeccable, witnessed and notarized every generation back to the Secondborn Kings. My greatest grandfather was Saint Guyot le Sanguinaire himself, first of the unbroken line.” She rubbed her mounding belly. “My blood is pure.”