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Needstraw, and that would be beyond tragedy! My curator, don’t you know—brilliant man, can’t do without him to keep my trinkets sorted. They say you’re the one who found him?”
    Cade thought fast. “No, my lord, actually not. I only asked if that section had been explored, and nobody was sure, so they looked again.”
    “Well, he owes his life to you and make no mistake. I’ve emptied my purse for today, but there’ll be a reward for you.”
    “That’s very gracious but entirely unnecessary—”
    “Of course it’s necessary! And I’ll hear no more about it. Now, let’s find you a hack to take you home, eh?” As he smiled, Cade saw the remnants of the young man he had been, a gleaming past glimpsed behind tarnished decay.
    “I am beholden to Your Lordship,” Cade responded.
    Someone was sent to find a hire-hack. After once again expressing gratitude to Lord Piercehand, Cade climbed in after his brother and frowned as he heard Derien say to the driver, “Wistly Hall, Waterknot Street.”
    “I thought you were staying with me tonight.”
    “It’s closer to school. And there’s always a place to sleep at Wistly.”
    They rode in silence for a time. Then, just as the hack was turning onto Waterknot Street, Cade snorted a laugh. When Dery arched an inquiring brow, he said, “And once again my Namingday turns out memorable. I think I’ll stop having them. Twenty-four is quite old enough, isn’t it?”
    “I’ll let you know when I get there.”

3

    G etting Jezael home to Wistly was a nightmare. Mieka was torn between a desire to shout the horse into a gallop and the equal and opposite desire to go as gently as possible. What Princess Iamina’s driver achieved was an uncomfortable in-between: not fast enough to get them home as quickly as Mieka wanted, but not slow enough to prevent cobblestoned bumps and lurches from wringing strangled groans from Jez’s throat—in spite of whatever Mistress Mirdley had given him for the pain. Every sound his brother made sent a spasm of sick panic through Mieka’s body. He locked his fingers around the wooden side rail of the driver’s bench and scanned the road up ahead, futilely trying to find the smoothest path.
    Someone had had brains enough to send word to Mishia Windthistle about the accident; she and Jinsie were waiting at the front door with a makeshift litter. As they moved Jez slowly, safely out of the carriage, Jinsie climbed in the other side for the return journey, telling Blye she’d collar Jedris and get him home before dark.
    Blye nodded gratefully. “He’ll want to know how the accident happened, but it can wait until tomorrow, when he can actually see something.”
    Mieka helped carry his brother upstairs, and then was shooed out by his mother and Mistress Mirdley. Descending to the hall, he sat on the bottom step of the grand staircase and gnawed on a thumbnail and felt helpless. He didn’t like feeling helpless. Rarely did he get himself into situations where he did feel helpless; he was an expert at strategic departures. The last time he’d felt like this was almost two years ago, that night just before Midsummer when Cade had been thornlost in his Elsewhens, and seen Briuly and Alaen Blackpath finding The Rights of the Fae. Mieka hadn’t been alone in his helplessness; there was nothing anyone could have done. All the rest of that night and on into the next day, nobody had said much of anything, each of them imagining the sunrise scene at Nackerty Close—and, being players, they were exceptionally imaginative.
    Only once had Rafe attempted to talk about it, saying that it was Briuly who had reasoned out that the sun would hit the hiding place of The Rights at Midsummer dawn as well as Midwinter sunset, so Cade really wasn’t to blame for what happened. Mieka had the sense not to open his mouth and remind everyone that Cade had wanted the cousins to go after the treasure. Jeska had accused him more than once of pestering them about