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around, in search of her brother. Unable to see him, the witch stepped further into the room and stood at the foot of the Queen’s bed. The Delf looked down upon the fragile figure. The Queen looked young, no more than a teenager, and the Delf despised her youth and beauty. She was like the girl, Anna Black, but like her, she would soon be dead. The Queen’s skin was so very pale, almost translucent. Her long hair was fine like cotton, and the Delf had expected the Queen to have looked emaciated and drawn – near death – not as if she were simply asleep.
    “She grows stronger,” a voice rasped from behind her. The Delf turned to see her brother standing behind her.
    “Brother,” she whispered and went to him. Wrapping one arm about his waist, she reached beneath his hood with her free hand, and ran her broken fingernails down the length of his face. His skin felt cold, like ice, and she could feel the coarse stitching which held his flesh together. Tracing his cracked lips with one of her fingers, he let his swollen tongue slide from his mouth. He wetted her finger with it. The Delf shuddered and withdrew her hand from beneath his hood.
    “You feel so cold, brother,” the Delf breathed, her foul breath stinking of rotten meat. “You promised that we would soon be as we once were – beautiful.”
    “And we will be,” he rasped, sounding as if his throat was being squeezed.
    “But how long must we wait?” she said, followed by a fart that echoed back off the walls.
    Moving away from her, Throat went out onto the balcony and looked out across the ever-increasing desert. The Delf joined him, the wind dragging her wispy lengths of grey knotted hair off her boil-infested face. “It’s the boy, Zachary Black, isn’t it?” she asked her brother.
    He nodded, great chunks of his hood falling away. The spiderpedes scuttled over his hood, re-joining the intricate weave of the black fabric.
    “But you said that he was nothing...” the Delf started.
    Wheeling around, Throat gripped his sister’s throat with such force that her eyes bulged wetly in their dark sockets. “And I sent his sister to you!” he settled, his voice rattling.
    “But she never reached me...it was Fandel...” she gasped. “He lost the girl. I went after her. If it hadn’t been for the peacekeeper...”
    “Peacekeeper?” Throat hissed, gripping his sister’s neck tighter as if trying to squeeze the information out of her. “The peacekeepers are dead – I made sure of it.”
    “There is one...” the Delf croaked, a stream of maggots escaping out of her mouth.
    “Where is he now?” Throat gasped as if his neck had been slit open.
    “The bandits have him, they have the girl and Fandel, too,” the Delf wheezed as she clawed at her brother’s fingers around her throat. “The bandits will kill all of them.”
    “But we need the girl,” Throat spat. “She is no good to me dead – not just yet. Not until the box is open. The Queen and her reflection must die together. Where are they heading?”
    “To the volcano,” the Delf choked.
    “How do you know this?”
    “I heard Fandel bargain for his life. He said he would take them to the box if they let him live.”
    “The snake,” Throat rasped. Then slowly, he loosened his grip on his sister’s neck and turned away. From beneath his hood, the Delf heard her brother start to chuckle. It sounded like he was choking on a throat full of glass.
    “What is it?” she spluttered, rubbing her stringy neck with her hands.
    “To reach the volcano and the box,” Throat smiled beneath his hood, “all will have to pass through the outer-rim and the Clockwork City.”
    “Is that good, brother?” the Delf asked, hoping that it was, for her sake.
    “It’s more than good, it’s perfect,” Throat chuckled. “I have someone in place there that I can trust. And even if they fail me, I have riders patrolling the edges of the outer-rim. They will intercept the boy and his pathetic band of