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“Yes, dear. That’s exactly what I mean. It will take the four of you. Four women. For this matter, she will answer to one of his brides. You have everything you need in the journal to do this. I will help you prepare for the final fight, but you must consult with her first.”

I stared at Damian. “And Damian can’t be a part of this?”

She gave a light, wry little laugh. “Clemency wasn’t particularly fond of men when she was alive. I can’t imagine she’ll be receptive to one now, especially when it comes to being summoned by one. She met Aleister Crowley once. She called him a peacock in a waistcoat.”

Damian smiled at his tea. I think I understood why. For once, he’d get to sit something out.

“You’re the right woman for this, Marlowe,” Branwen said. “I’ve been expecting you for a long time.”

She glanced at a black mirror in an ornate gold frame on the bookshelf. It looked inherited.

I looked at it, too.

Branwen stood up and took it from the shelf. “This is Clemency’s scrying mirror. You will use this to summon her. She will recognize it immediately. Every step to summon her is carefully described in the journal. You will also need this.”

She took the box that had held the journal and pulled a tarnished silver locket from it.

“You are not my blood, Marlowe. But this locket contains a lock of Clemency’s hair. Wear it when you summon her. It’s the closest thing to carrying her blood in your veins.”

I took the locket and placed it in the makeup bag that held the shadow token.

“One more thing,” she said, closing the wooden box. “She deliberately left one step out of the instructions to summon her in case the journal fell into the wrong hands. To the left of her mirror, you must place something that the coven gave to you during the binding. I believe you have something.”

“I have fabric and flowers from the ceremony,” I said. “Damian used them to make a shadow token.”

“That will work.”

Branwen glanced out the window, at the forest now shrouded in darkness. “Visiting me is a risk every time. The coven has eyes everywhere.”

My breath was shallow, as if it wasn’t sure it was safe to leave me.

“And I’m supposed to…I’m supposed to persuade my friends to do this with me?”

“Yes,” Branwen said, her expression now razor sharp. “And that’s the most dangerous part. If they tell the coven’s men, they will never stop pursuing you. They will never stop punishing Damian. And this curse will continue.”

Two seconds passed as I tried to swallow what I’d heard, but they felt longer than that.

“And let’s say I manage to do that. Then what?”

“You will follow Clemency’s strict instructions—they will most certainly be strict—and unmake him. It will not be easy, Marlowe. But it can be done. It must be done.” She looked at me like I was a book she’d already read. “And I believe you can do it.”

I stared at the table. I wasn’t sure what I’d expected to hear that night, but it certainly wasn’t that I should lead a séance, summon a schoolmarmish Victorian occultist, and somehow follow her instructions to destroy a supernatural entity.

And then, somewhere underneath the fear, the part of me that proofread Vivienne’s contracts sat up.

“It’s not the retreats,” I said slowly. “The retreats are the front door. The money’s in the bottles.” I looked at her. “Which means you’re not asking me to slay some ancient monster. You’re asking me to cut off their whole empire.”

“They call it the yield,” she said. “Never a woman. The yield.” She turned her mug once. “It’s very concentrated. A season’s stock fits in a crate.”

“And when the shelves are empty—”

“The Mothers will still be wealthy women. But no one will be paying the Keepers to threaten anyone, and a leash that no one is paid to hold goes slack.” She set her mug down. “That is how my grandson gets free. This is my prediction, and as you know, I tend to be right about what’s in store for him.”

“Okay,” I said, and as I said it, it was as if I was somewhere outside myself, watching my own lips moving.

Branwen exhaled. She smiled warmly. “I’m sure you’re overwhelmed. I can see that you are. But you have all that you need in that journal.”

I glanced at Damian. I couldn’t tell if he was worried or relieved, and then I realized he was both. He’d been quiet for a long time, and now he spoke up.