Taise followed Henry downstairs just as several officers appeared in the doorway, dragging a struggling figure — bound in a chain Henry could only assume must be iron — into the house. The figure froze when she saw Taise, her face going pale and her knees buckling.

“No,” she moaned, dragging her feet even more. “No, no, no. How did you know?”

“Are you so surprised?” Taise asked cheerfully, his grin ill-suited for the occasion. “You didn’t actually think this plan of yours would work, did you?”

“Who the fuck is this?” Saoirse asked. Mrs. Raptis gasped at her foul language and glared at her, but everyone else watched Henry, hungry for their answers.

But it was Taise who answered, his lip curled in distaste. “This is my assistant, Brona Anghau.”

Brona struggled against the chains. Helena and Mrs. Raptis took wary steps away, but with the cold iron wrapped around her, restricting her magic, Brona was as helpless as Ioanna. Henry eyed her distastefully and waved the group on. “Take her to the living room,” he said. “I have several questions for her.”

When the officers hesitated, looking to Inspector Zhou, the Inspector snapped, “You heard him. I’ll join you in a minute.”

Around them, extra faces lingered in doorways — those of sleepy servants woken by the commotion. Mrs. Raptis spurred into motion at the sight of them, sending some after the officers to drag more chairs into the living room, routing others to turn on the lights or boil tea for her daughter.

Inspector Zhou rejoined Henry, Taise, and Saoirse, his gaze catching on Etta at Henry’s heels and his face pulling down into a frown. “When did that one get here?”

“Where have you been, Inspector? She’s been here the whole time,” Saoirse teased, patting Inspector Zhou on the shoulder as she passed into the living room.

Henry laughed. “You missed a few things, Inspector,” he said, quickly filling Inspector Zhou in.

Five minutes later found them gathered in the newly lit living room, the mismatched group somewhat cramped in the small space. Henry took one of the armchairs, and Taise — for some indeterminable reason — lounged at the ground by his feet, a hound perched and alert on either side of him. Brona sat across from them, in a dining room chair that had been dragged in, still bound in iron. Mirroring the hounds, Inspector Zhou had taken position to Brona’s right, an officer to her left. Saoirse perched on the window frame, and Helena and her mother took the couch, both glaring suspiciously between Brona and Taise’s hounds.

“Those things are harmless, now, right?” Inspector Zhou asked Taise. “Ms. Anghau can’t suddenly tell them to bite our heads off?”

“She can try, but they won’t listen as long as I’m around,” Taise said, absently scratching Furze’s head.

“And we’re positive he won’t suddenly order them to bite our heads off?” the Inspector asked Henry.

“Would it help if I gave you my word?” Taise asked.

“No offense, but I don’t care about that. I care about Henry’s opinion.”

Taise shrugged, but Henry saw the corner of his lip curl in displeasure. “You have my word, then, Inspector,” Henry said.

Visibly relieved at this, Inspector Zhou nodded. “Explain everything, then. Now.”

Henry glanced at Helena and her mother. As if sensing the unasked question, Helena shook her head. “I’m not leaving. I want to know why my husband died.”

Henry nodded and sat back in his seat. “I’ll start from the beginning, then. As most of you know, Ms. Evans came to me as soon as she learned about Mr. Hathaway’s death, knowing that suspicion would fall on her, and told me everything. From the start, then, I had an advantage the police didn’t: I knew Ms. Evans was innocent. And from that perspective, I was able to see things that the police were not.

“It didn’t take me long to realize that Arthur Hathaway wasn’t the intended target of the attack: Ioanna was. First, there was the location of the crime. Ms. Evans’ charm had nothing to do with it, so why did the murder take place in the nursery? Second, there was Mr. Hathaway’s paranoia, which seemed to revolve entirely around his child. It all started around the time of Ioanna’s birth — he’d had the nursery moved somewhere closer, safer. He’d barred the nursery windows, fired the sídhe nursemaid. This is why I asked about the baptism, Mrs. Hathaway. Clearly, your husband had been expecting someone — or something — to come for Ioanna. Something that involved the aes sídhe.

“Paired with the manner of death, all it took was one more clue to point me in the right direction: your husband’s sudden accumulation of wealth and his mysterious patron. Are you familiar at all with the Uí Anghau, Mrs. Hathaway?”

Helena shook her head.

“They’re an old sídhe family, known for making any kind of deal you could think of. I suspected your husband had made a deal with them, especially when Inspector Zhou checked the Customs records and confirmed Arthur Hathaway had visited the other city on the day of his death. The mystery of the beast was explained when I came across stories of the cú sídhe — magical hounds that served under the Uí Anghau. I just hadn’t understood, yet, where Ioanna fit in. It was Taise who told me of the Uí Anghau’s history, of people trading away their own offspring in desperate bargains.”

Helena shook her head. “Arthur would never do anything to hurt Ioanna. His success was important to him, but he loved his daughter.”

“You’d be surprised how often something like this happens,” Taise said, not sounding particularly sympathetic. “People will trade away something they don’t yet have and will even be happy to do so. Your husband probably made this deal months, years ago, not realizing how much the child would mean to him until she was born.”

Quietly, Henry said, “I’m very sorry, Mrs. Hathaway. While the Uí Anghau no longer authorize deals of this kind, it’s quite clear your husband tried to make one. This is where I’ll need Ms. Anghau to fill in the missing pieces.”

“Did you know Brona was the one behind this, Henry?” Taise asked, looking back at Henry.

“Yes, as soon as I saw her,” Henry admitted. “It was her boots that first roused my suspicion — I came across some prints on the grounds outside Camberley Hall, and while the shape wasn’t a perfect match, the size was. There was also the smell of tobacco that clung to her, same as the brand she left in your ashtray and at the scene of the crime, and the fact that you had left Etta with her on the night of the crime. Finally, there was the forged contract — Hathaway’s signature was messy, but yours, Taise, was nearly perfect. Whoever made it was familiar with your signature — and who would be more familiar than a personal assistant? I think she must’ve had help writing the contract, though…if I had to guess, I would say Furze’s master had a hand in it, is that right?”

Brona looked stubbornly away.

“Cooperation can lead to a lighter sentence,” Inspector Zhou said to Brona, casually. “If you tell us what happened, we may be able to reward you for it.”

“Can you promise to keep him away from me?” Brona asked, watching Taise with something between hatred and horror in her eyes. “That’s all I want. Say yes, and I’ll tell you everything.”

Inspector Zhou narrowed his eyes at Taise, but answered, “Of course we can. For as long as you’re under our custody, at least.”

Taise smiled sweetly.

“I just need you to tell me whether I’m right or wrong,” Henry said. “Sometime within the last year, Arthur Hathaway came to the House Anghau to make a deal, but because he had made another within the last six months, Lord Anghau rejected his application. It’s your job to pass those rejections along to the front desk; instead of doing so, you made a deal with Hathaway yourself.”

Brona sighed. “He only wanted money. I may not be as powerful as the negotiators, but I’m still one of the Uí Anghau. The amount he was asking for was nothing to me.”

Henry shook his head. “It wasn’t so plain as that. You saw his last deal was for healthy conception with his wife. You knew how much power sacrificing a child would give you and you decided breaking the rules was worth it.”

Taise’s lip curled in disgust. For a moment, he looked remarkably like the snarling hounds on either side of him.

“I’ve been working for the family for decades and have never been given my dues. That brat before you stole power that was never meant to be his, so why shouldn’t I?” Brona hissed, no longer looking at Taise as she spoke. “Cian was supposed to be the next lord of the house. I was supposed to be a negotiator. The previous lord promised us everything, before his demon of a son killed him and took it all!”

All eyes turned to Taise, who only shrugged. “He was of sound mind when he made the contract with me.  It was valid, enforceable, and perfectly legal.”

Henry eyed the back of Taise’s head, fitting that into what he already knew about Taise. After a moment, he shook his head and turned his attention back to Brona. “Where was I? Ah — Brona, you waited patiently for the end of Hathaway’s contract, but when Ioanna was born, Hathaway changed his mind. On Friday, he came to try to terminate early. Luckily for you, Lord Anghau wasn’t working that afternoon — you took Hathaway up to his office and spoke to him yourself, and you pretended to consider his request. He returned home happy and hopeful for the first time in months, but you were never really going to let go.”

“He offered to buy it out for a pittance,” Brona snapped, looking more frenzied the more Henry pulled out of her. She strained against her bonds. “I risked everything for this contract, for that baby. It belongs to me! I deserve to have it!”

Helena shrank back against the couch, and Inspector Zhou’s hand fell to his gun. But Taise had only to raise an eyebrow for the hounds on either side of him to stand, their fangs bared, their growls rattling low in their throats. Brona froze.