When I finally caught sight of Pierre’s home, it was all I could do not to run toward it. Trotting up the front steps, I knocked once and then went inside.

“Get out!” Pierre’s shrill voice made me flinch. “You never take my advice anyway!”

He sat on his little wheeled stool at one of his desks, pen in hand and back to me.

“Pierre?”

The tiny troll froze, then very slowly, he looked over his shoulder. “You hide your face,” he said. “But your voice is that of the dearest girl I’ve ever known.”

I flung myself at him, wrapping my arms around his narrow shoulders and squeezing them tight. “It’s me, Pierre. It’s Cécile. Oh, it is so good to see you are well.”

Gripping my shoulders, he pushed me back. “What are you doing here? Is Tristan with you? Is he well?”

“He’s well,” I said, and Pierre’s shoulders sagged with visible relief. “He’s up on top of the rock fall waiting to lift me out when I’m ready. He lowered me through the moon hole, and Pierre, I was so terrified that Trollus almost got the first rainstorm it’s had in five hundred years.”

He laughed. “If I had any doubts that you’re really Cécile, they are chased away now.” His smile didn’t last. “Be a dear and bolt the door; the Builder’s Guild has little enough time for me, but we dare not risk one of them arriving unannounced and discovering you here.”

I did as he asked, making certain the curtains covered the front windows. “What is happening in Trollus? It feels as though fighting will break out at any minute.”

“It already has.” He passed a weary hand over his face. “The city is quite divided. After Tristan left Trollus, the half-bloods went to the King to demand their autonomy and for him to reinstate Tristan as his heir, but he refused to receive them. So they revolted and are now refusing to work until their demands are met. They’ve barricaded themselves in the Dregs, but they can’t last forever. Even if they could adequately supply themselves, Angoulême will see them put down. Already there are dead in the streets each morning, and all have been identified as those who support the half-bloods’ cause. Consorting with half-bloods not your property has become a dangerous business.”

I clutched the fabric of my cloak against the chill drifting across my skin. “Hasn’t the King done anything to stop this?”

Pierre shook his head. “He does nothing. He has played the two sides against each other too hard for too long, and now all have turned against him. He has made himself vulnerable by giving up control of the tree, and I think it only a matter of time until his life is forfeit. And with Tristan absent, there is no one capable of contesting Roland’s rise to the throne.”

“The people want him to come back?” Did he want to come back?

“They are afraid, Cécile. Tristan is their only hope.”

I forced my head to nod up and down. “I’ll tell him.”

Neither of us spoke for a moment, then Pierre broke the silence. “You took a great risk in coming here, Princess, and I think you sought me out in particular for a reason.”

“I did. We need your help.” Extracting the list of names and dates from my pocket, I handed it to him. Then I explained my suspicion about Anushka’s immortality. “I need to know if there’s a pattern.”

“Alignment of the winter solstice and the full moon,” Pierre muttered. Books floated off shelves and charts unrolled to hang in the air. I watched in silence as he flipped swiftly through the pages, eyes flicking periodically to the carefully inked charts, one hand holding a pen, which he occasionally used to jot down a date.

Though I was desperate to know if my theory was correct, I stayed silent and out of the way until he set his pen down. “Well?”

He handed me back my list, along with the page with the dates he’d written down. “Your thesis appears to be correct. Although you are missing one – the most recent.”

Knowing there was a chance the unmarked grave in the woods belonged to my maternal grandmother in no way prepared me for seeing it all but confirmed in a single, scrawled date. Now I was certain Anushka was using the lives of her female descendants to make herself immortal, and dread seeped through my veins with the knowledge that tomorrow night would be my mother’s last if I didn’t stop Anushka.

“Tomorrow night is the solstice,” Pierre said. “It is also a full moon.”

Before I could say anything, someone pounded at the door. “Pierre! Open up or I’ll break it down. We saw the half-blood come inside.”

Half-blood? It took a heartbeat for me to realize whoever was outside was referring to me. Whether they’d been watching the house or noticing me had been a coincidence didn’t really matter: Pierre didn’t own any servants. He didn’t have a legitimate reason for talking to a half-blood girl. And he especially didn’t have a legitimate reason to be talking to me.

The little troll hissed a breath out between his teeth, eyes flashing bright with anger. The room grew warm with magic, and for the first time, it occurred to me that my friend was a far more formidable force than he appeared. “Go upstairs and out the window onto the roof,” he said. “It’s one of the Duke’s men.”

“This is my fault,” I whispered. “They’re here because of me.”

He shook his head. “This has been a long time in coming, I fear,” he replied, taking my hand and squeezing it with his. “My allegiances are well known.”