Alert as he might be, he did not see one of the shadows separate from the others and follow him. It crept closer and closer, close enough to stretch out a hand. Close enough for a chill to blow on his neck, as of a cold breath. Close enough that fingers tipped with claws might reach around his neck to trace his throat…
There was a scream, high and unearthly. Piers spun round, taut with fear. No one there. He tucked his chin—which wasn’t really weak at all, Mother said, it was all a matter of angles—into his cravat, and continued marching up the street. Perhaps more quickly than usual.
A fox stared at him with baleful eyes from the shadow of a bin.
Emma had crept after Piers, sensing her quarry’s breath. But just at the moment of triumph, when her claws were poised to score the soft white flesh of his throat—a terrible pain came, chiming through her teeth. She must have screamed, because it burned as though she’d touched a frayed wire. She lost her command on the shadows that hid her. And then Piers was turning. In anothermoment, he’d see. That could not happen. She had reached for fox form, frantic as it slid from her grasp like a slippery fur coat. There was no more room for error. She stopped, breathed, found the edges of her fox form. Willing herself to be firm, she pulled it around her.
And it worked. She had not been sure it would, not until the new skin closed around her and cobbles pressed into her four paws. She had actually managed a full transformation, and to stay in it. But her satisfaction had been short-lived.
Piers turned a corner and disappeared. Unscathed. A snarling wind of hatred and disgust swept through her. And as she tasted its grit on her tongue, she realized it was not for Piers. It was for herself. She had chased after the Turnbulls, all that time ago. Had let them dress her in ears and a tail. She had abased herself for their stupid cheers. And now she skulked by their refuse, not even able to land a scratch on them. Emma’s fox form shivered in her grasp like a coat in a gale, threatening to fly open.
They had nothing to fear.Shewas nothing to fear. She could not even use the claws and fangs she had made for herself—
A passing car roared by, and Emma lost her grip. She shot back up into human form. She patted herself wearily. Her clothes were still there, at least. Nancy had drilled it into her to treat fox form as a skin she pulled over her own. Transforming that way seemed to keep clothes trapped under the layer of fur. Otherwise, she risked leaving behind every stitch she wore.
She’d done that once, when she’d been so tired she’d tried shoving herself straight into fox form, like someone slamming a door. The fox shape had not stuck, and she’d found herself crouched naked on the floor of the pantry, her clothes in a heap beside her.
“Never mind, love.” Nancy’s cheeks had been pink from the effort not to laugh. “That was almost a full transformation. It’ll be easier soon.”
“But when?” Emma knew she was whining. “Please tell me you had this much trouble with shape-shifting.”
“I can’t say that, exactly. But don’t worry, love, it was different for me.”
“Different how?” Emma struggled with her gown. The sleeves were laced to the bodice, which was hooked to the skirt, and every cursed fastening needed tightening.
“I chose this.” Nancy’s soft fingers made quick work of the fastenings at Emma’s neck. “Being a fox maiden. I wasn’t trapped or tricked, or surprised to get here, like the rest of you. I couldn’t wait to transform.”
“Youwantedit?”
“Oh, yes. Arm up, now.” Emma raised her arm obediently, and Nancy bent over the lacing. “I wanted the adventure, like. Always dreaming of it, I was. A world bigger’n I had. And I got it, too. Other side now.”
Emma switched arms automatically, deep in thought. “Wanting it—helped?”
“Your mind’s a powerful part of magic, Emma. You force your body to do what it’s scared of, it fights you. But you find something in it that brings you joy? Then you’ll get along, right enough. You just have to listen.” She had patted Emma’s shoulder and stood.
Cursing Piers, Emma drew back to the wall behind the bins. The clubhouse door burst open again, spilling a tide of girls in hockey uniforms and murderously high heels. As they staggered down the steps, something sparked in Emma’s brain. She pulledthe shadows around herself and ran straight up the stairs, weaving among the group.
“Oy, did you—”
“Stop pushing me!”
Drink-blurred eyes might just have caught the billow of a shadow at the top of the steps, as of a cloak fluttering. The person beneath it, leaping. But the University Women’s Hockey 1st had enjoyed too loud and punch-soaked a night to be interested in shadows. The last of them traipsed down the staircase. The front door swung shut.
Pressed into the shadows beyond, Emma’s breaths echoed in the dark. The cold marble grandeur of the Turnbulls’ entry hall lay dozing before her. A vixen’s smile spread over her face. There were more ways than one to hurt a Turnbull. And she was in exactly the right place to start.
CHAPTER 31
Memories haunted the grand staircase. Hugo, florid face beaming in the tailcoat and tie of the Turnbull annual dinner. Julia beside him, pale as a phantom in her mermaid lace gown. Emma herself running up the steps, red gown streaming behind. Alive as a flame.
At the top of the stairs, the ghosts left her. Fox instinct ran through her, a live current.Beware.She flattened herself against the wall. Voices murmured ahead, from a door thrown open to the passage. A door burned into Emma’s memory. The dining room, where they had served her plates of bleeding flesh. Where she had broken their bowl. Where she had seen Jasper’s expression change to cold, implacable anger.
She had to force her feet forward, every step silent and sinking in the thick carpet. Firelight flickered from the doorway, casting silhouettes on the wall. She caught the outline of a bow tie, the edge of a tailcoat. Emma pressed herself to the doorframe and peered in. Turnbulls sprawled in chairs dragged around the fireplace. Glasses of port dangled from their hands, tawny as the flames behind.
Francis Carr, once her partner for dinner in this very room. Eddie Spencer, Guy Cavendish, Philip Cranbottom, Atticus Tremaine, and Rory Clarke. Their names were growls in her throat.
“They were back again,” one of them was saying. “Asking questions.”
“They’re journalists.” Atticus Tremaine yawned. “That’s what they do.”
