“My parents,” Thomas began. “Do they know—？”
“My mother sent a runner to them with a message,” said Matthew. “They ought to be on their way.”
“When did Filomena leave the party?” Cordelia asked. “Did she depart with anyone?”
“She was at my flat until almost dawn,” Anna said. “She left then—insisted on going home alone.” She scowled. “I should have gone with her. Someone should have gone with her.”
“So close to sunrise,” James said thoughtfully. “So this must have happened sometime in the last few hours.”
“Anna, this isn’t your fault,” Cordelia said. “You couldn’t have known.”
“I ought to have waited and made sure to take her home—” Lucie began.
James swung about with a stern look. “You shouldn’t have walked home by yourself, Luce, not in the middle of the night. Promise me you won’t again. It’s too dangerous.”
“But I—” Lucie clamped her mouth shut. After a moment she tried again: “None of us should be out alone, I suppose. Poor Filomena.”
“Where’s Christopher?” Thomas asked.
“Apparently Father set up a patrol to search the neighborhood for any evidence,” said Anna. “Christopher volunteered. They’re still out looking.”
“Poor Kit, he was distraught,” said Matthew. “Said he’d had quite a nice chat with Filomena at the Wentworths’ party, about botany. I didn’t even know you could have a nice chat about botany.”
“I volunteered as well, but Uncle Gabriel said if anything happened to me he’d never hear the end of it from Mam,” said Lucie, looking disgruntled.
A Silent Brother—Enoch, Cordelia thought—had emerged from the Institute. He knelt down, his parchment robes brushing the snow, and peeled back a corner of the sheet to examine the body. Cordelia looked away.
“Where was she killed?” she asked. “Near Anna’s?”
“No,” James said quietly. He had pulled off his gloves and was worrying them with his bare fingers. The day had warmed, the bright sunlight falling through the bare branches of the nearby trees making a delicate pattern of latticework across his face. “She was killed somewhere else. Close to here.”
Anna looked at him in surprise. “Yes, on Shoe Lane,” she said. “She almost made it all the way back to the Institute.”
James was crushing his gloves in his hands. Lucie stared at her brother, a peculiarly blank look on her face, as if she didn’t quite recognize him, or were looking past him at something else. But there was nothing else there.
“I’m starting to remember,” James said.
Matthew laid a hand on James’s shoulder. Cordelia could not help but wonder if she should have done that—surely she should be comforting James? But the thought of touching him in public frightened her. Not because it was inappropriate, but because of what it might reveal. Surely her emotions would be written on her face. “Jamie,” Matthew said, in a low voice. “Did you have another dream?”
“I didn’t remember it when I first woke up,” James said, not meeting Cordelia’s eyes. “But now—it’s coming back in pieces.” He dropped the gloves into the melting snow, stark black against the white. “There was a girl, she was singing—singing in Italian—Raziel, and there was blood—so much of it—”
“James,” Anna said sharply, moving to block him from the view of those crowded around Filomena’s body. She glanced around at their small group. “We need to get inside.”
James nodded, white-faced. He was leaning quite hard on Matthew, who had an arm around him. “Yes. I’ll take us through the Sanctuary.”
* * *
“I’ll catch you up,” Lucie called as James led the others toward the nearly hidden entrance to the Sanctuary—the one chamber in the Institute where Downworlders could comfortably come and go, since it was without wards against them. It was often used as a meeting room, and in a pinch, a holding cell for troublemakers, since there was another set of doors inside that kept it secure from the rest of the Institute. Cordelia glanced back worriedly, but Lucie made a gesture that she hoped communicated Don’t fret. I’ll be there in a moment.
She bent down to pick up James’s gloves, just to seem as if she was doing something; by the time she straightened, the others had disappeared through the Sanctuary door. She edged around the side of the Institute, just out of sight of the front steps. Gazing directly at an odd patch of shadow, between two bare trees, she said, “All right. You might as well show yourself again.”