I shrugged, trying to look as if mortal danger was an old friend. And it was, after a fashion. “No apology is needed. But I agree, let’s get to the Mews.”

Zaira’s eyes shone in the moonlight. “I’m not done here.”

“We don’t have much time before they’ll be back with reinforcements,” Marcello said. “We have to leave now. This isn’t safe.”

“I won’t pretend it is. But …” Zaira’s voice dropped to a mumble. “I haven’t found Scoundrel yet.”

“Scoundrel?” It dawned on me, then. “You mean … your dog?”

Marcello threw his free hand into the air. “A dog! That’s right. You almost got the Lady Amalia killed over a dog!”

Unshed tears gleamed in Zaira’s eyes. She rubbed at them fiercely.

“All right.” Some strong, bitter emotion lay under the surface of her voice. “Fine. You’ve caught me, for now. Back to the Mews. I could use a bite to eat.”

I shivered as a soldier rowed us across to Raptor’s Isle. The chill settled into my bones, making my limbs weak and clumsy; I’d stumbled getting into the boat, to my embarrassment. And the feeling I’d forgotten something important persisted, though Zaira was right there, huddled sulking in the middle of the boat.

I couldn’t erase from my mind the image of her jumble of blankets in the corner of the mouse-infested laundry. My own canopied featherbed seemed obscene in contrast.

I wanted to reach out to her, somehow, but I didn’t dare mention the laundry. And certainly not the old woman.

“This Orthys seems like an utter bastard.” The word sat uncomfortably on my tongue, but I offered it up like an olive branch.

Zaira glared. “No worse than you lot.”

She turned her back to me and settled into angry silence. I didn’t try again.

The lights of the Mews blurred across the water, until I could no longer tell how far away they were. Weariness dragged at me far more heavily than I’d expect this side of midnight.

Hells. I knew what I’d forgotten.

My elixir. I could see the bottle, sitting on my desk next to my books, ready for my evening dose. But with the Zaira emergency, I hadn’t remembered to take it, or to bring one of my three-hours’-grace vials, and I’d never expected to be out this long.

Now the last dose was wearing off, and slowly as a bud unfurling, the poison that almost killed me ten years ago was taking hold again.

My breath came in little gasps, as if I’d run a race wearing a corset. I tried to slow it down, but I couldn’t. My vision swam at the edges, narrowing toward the center. No one had noticed—Marcello was talking to the soldier at the oar, while Zaira muttered to herself—but I couldn’t hide the poison’s effects forever.