“She kept company with me. She keeps company with Cécile.”

Aiden was quiet for a minute. “She’d not knowingly harbor Anushka – it’s too much of a risk. If the trolls ever discovered we were working against them… No, my mother cannot be involved. You will not speak to her of this, and neither will I.”

“You haven’t told your parents, have you?” Catherine’s voice was amused. “They have no idea how caught up in the King’s web you really are. Nothing more than the troll king’s errand boy. After generations of regents so carefully toeing the line between keeping the trolls placated and imprisoned, you hand them the keys to the realm for the sake of your greed.”

“You overstep yourself, La Voisin. The gratitude I felt for you in my youth was used up a long time ago. And besides, if my plan works, I’ll have accomplished something that no other regent has…” He broke off. “Did you hear something outside? If that’s de Troyes lurking about…”

Above, there was a flurry of footsteps and the sounds of a struggle overhead. A familiar voice shouted, “Let me go.” Sabine.

Lord Aiden was swearing as he struggled to subdue my friend, and I held my breath, afraid he’d hurt her. “Open the cellar. We’ll have to keep her here for now.”

The trapdoor flipped open, and I closed my eyes so they wouldn’t realize I was awake. Boots thudded down the ladder, then Sabine was tossed forcibly next to me. She sobbed raggedly around the gag, and I recognized a garbled version of my name. Only when the trapdoor shut again did I open my eyes and nudge her with my knees.

Faint light trickled through the floor, but it was enough to see her face soften with relief. I jerked my chin upwards. Listen.

“Do you see now why time is of the essence?” Aiden said. “The girl won’t be the first to come looking – no doubt the stable boy is lurking about as well, and he’s had contact with the trolls before. He’ll go to them for help.”

“Pardon first. Then I’ll cast the spell, and we’ll learn the identity of the witch everyone so desperately seeks. You need me far more than I need you, my lord. You cannot exploit” – she spat the word out – “Cécile without my help. Remember that.”

“Why would you care?” Aiden asked. “She’s naught but another tool in their arsenal.”

“I pity her,” Catherine replied. “The trolls took her against her will and then manipulated her sentiments so that she’d agree to this bargain. You forget that I saw her when she lay dying in Trollus – she has suffered enough.”

He laughed. “I think you give her too much credit, Catherine. She cares a great deal for the prince, that much is certain. She considers many of them her friends. She wants them freed.”

“I don’t think she does. Not deep in her heart,” Catherine said. “Because if she did, the trolls would already be loose.”

“Are you suggesting she has sabotaged her own hunt?”

“I don’t believe her oath would allow her to do so, but regardless, that’s not of which I speak.”

My pulse sounded loud in my own ears, every muscle tense with anticipation of what she would say. I’d known she’d been holding back information about curses, and it seemed now I was about to discover what. I only prayed it would not be too late.

“Think of what they did to her. They didn’t treat her badly or keep her a prisoner in a cell. They married her to a handsome young prince. They made her a princess, and did what they could to make her love him. I knew within an instant of meeting that creature of a king that he was far more clever and complex than you gave him credit for.”

“What of it?” Aiden demanded. I wanted to know the same thing, but at the same time my stomach clenched at the idea my emotions had been manipulated. Had the King really known I’d fall for Tristan? That he’d fall for me? Worse, had he actively manipulated us into it?

“The curse is an act of will,” Catherine replied. “Will, fueled by an intense desire to see something done and cemented by magic.” A chair scraped a bit on the floor, and I could all but see her leaning closer to him. “And it can be broken by will; by an intense desire to see the curse ended driven like a hammer with the force of magic.”

I felt numb. Rolling forward, I rested my forehead against the damp earth of the cellar, unable to meet Sabine’s questioning gaze. The idea that my role in the prophesy was to be bait had been bad enough, but this was worse. That the King had predicted bonding me to Tristan would make me fall for him, and that my love for him would give me the power to break the curse? I didn’t like that. It made me feel sick and even more used than I had before. It made me feel as though falling in love with him hadn’t been my choice, but part of a plan much greater than I knew.

“An interesting notion,” he said after a minute. “But how she feels about the trolls is of little import. What matters is that the troll prince loves her. It was he who told me there was a loophole in the girl’s promise in a desperate hope that I would help her. And I will, but it will come at a cost to him.”

Oh, Tristan. Tears dripped off my nose into the dirt.

“Her promise to the troll king was thus: I promise to do whatever it takes to find her and bring her here.” His laugh had a hysterical edge to it that made me cringe. “Cécile never went into Trollus. Here is the sand she was standing on when she gave her word, and that sand exists outside the barrier.”