He spoke as if addressing a crazy person, with pity. "The ring wasn't important to me. I'm sorry I used you to be free of Reiko."

"What did you give me before we left, Jack?" Leaning toward him, she felt like the predator now. "And what did I give you?"

He smiled and sat back on his heels. "You are clever."

And Jack's likeness ghosted away from a Fata with the face of a cruel prince and pale hair streaked red at the tips. It was the Fata Jack had threatened on the train, the one called Narcissus, the one she'd seen at Goblin Market.

"I remember you," she whispered.

"Want to know my name?" His voice had a southern lilt. He wore a cream-colored suit with an ivory cameo pinned to his silver tie and he was barefoot. The pupils of his eyes were rectangular, like a goat's.

"It won't be your real name. But I know you're called Narcissus."

"It's Narcissus Mockingbird. Since you refused the invitation we left at the Blue Lady's house, we had to devise another way to bring you and Jack to our doorstep. And dealing with that damn fox knight and giving him his heart back was one of our ways."

"Is that what you gave Sionnach Ri?" Finn remembered the black stone Sionnach had pocketed in Goblin Market. She glanced sidelong at the door, white and carved with images of twining lilies. She told herself she'd chosen to come here. "You murdered the Blue Lady."

"We left an invitation."

"You left a piece of her in a box."

"She was going to give you and your Jack to the Wolf, so don't you think she deserved it?"

"Where are Sylvie and Moth?"

"Safe. You should know, child, that Reiko Fata and Amaranthus were practically sisters. I'm just warning you."

"Who is Amaranthus?" Finn didn't believe him-none of the Fatas she'd met had had warm feelings for one another.

"Amaranthus is my sister and the ruler of us. She knows you were the cause of Reiko's death. But she's willing to overlook that, if you'll do her a good turn." He stood and moved to the door. "You did well not to eat the Goblin fruit. It would have made you believe everything I told you."

"What does she want from me?"

"A favor only a queen killer can grant her." The door shut behind him.

Finn stared at the tangerine, the Goblin fruit, as it slowly unfurled, puffed out, and became a toadstool shaded a poisonous orange.

She jumped up and ran to the door, grabbed the handle, yanked. She braced herself and pulled with a mighty effort. She slammed herself against the wood, banged her fists against it, kicked it. The room had no windows. She wanted to claw at the walls.

She sank against the door and huddled there. They had taken her coat, her backpack, her friends.

AFTER WHAT SEEMED AN ETERNITY LATER, a girl in a porcelain mask came for Finn and led her down a hallway to another decaying chamber. "There are new clothes on the bed. Make yourself presentable."

Finn brushed past her. "Thanks. Go away."

"Don't you want to know what's going to happen to you-"

Finn turned and slammed the door in her face.

She wandered around what had once been a pretty room. It had the same pale, ancient colors as the rest of the hotel, but kudzu tumbled through the windows and the giant bed was hazed with cobwebs and dust. There was a bird's nest in the fireplace and an electric lamp that flickered unreliably. She grimaced when she saw what had been laid out for her on the bed.

She put on the dress of crumpled, parchment-thin cotton the color of fresh blood, but kept her Doc Martens and tossed the red shoes out the window. She brushed the leaves from her hair in front of a tarnished mirror and scowled at the makeup left for her in a glass case. She grimly applied the lip stain and eye shadow. Her hands shook, but there was a core of ice within her that made her suspect the elixir had done more than change her scent. She would play their game, if only to convince them they'd broken her.

She searched for a weapon, found only a shard of glass. She flung it away and walked to a window, leaned out of it, saw a starlit tangle of garden, far below.

A familiar head stuck out of the window below hers.

"Sylv!" Finn gripped the sill. There was no sane way to climb down.

Sylvie leaned farther out, clutching the window frame, her dark hair swirling in the wind. "Are you okay?"

"Yes," Finn lied. "Are you really Sylvie?"

"Oh, Finn. What're they doing to you?"

Moth leaned out beside Sylvie. Finn smiled to see him back in human form. He said, "Are you all right? I'm coming up."

"No-"

But he gripped the window frame below and hauled himself onto a narrow molding that Finn hadn't even considered as a foothold. She watched anxiously as he pushed himself up, as he clambered over the sill. His white, button-down shirt, silver tie, and trousers were smudged with dust. He looked disapprovingly around the room. "I don't know what they're dressing us up for."

"You said they were ghouls."

"Yes." He prowled around, tried the door. "And they're all bat-shit crazy." He held up one wrist banded by what looked like barbed wire. "This keeps me from changing. The witch put it on me."

"The . . . witch?"

"Amaranthus Mockingbird. An old thing." Moth sat on the windowsill and glanced down. "This is my fault. Because I wronged Sionnach Ri. I wonder how many people I've done awful things to?" He looked up with a sudden smile that startled Finn. "I didn't know I was so popular here."

"Do you remember what you did? To Sionnach?"

His smile faded. "Now I do. A while ago, Lot gave me back my mortal shape and sent me after Sionnach Ri and a witch called Dragonfly. He wanted me to steal something from each of them."

Finn waited and he continued softly, "The heart of a fox knight and the heart of a witch are powerful things. Fatas who grow hearts make them into objects of power, which they hide, because such objects can be used to drain a Fata's power, or kill them."

"I know," Finn whispered.

"I didn't. When I learned, I tried to steal the hearts back. Lot turned me into a moth until your sister kissed me."

Finn sat on the windowsill beside him. She glanced down at Sylvie, who was perched on the sill below and gazing anxiously up. "It's me the Mockingbirds want, Moth. If you get the chance, take Sylvie and run."

"Now, you know Sylvie won't do that. And your sister sent me to protect you. You've got shadows in your eyes and none at your feet. You need to leave the Ghostlands soon, Finn, or you won't be able to. Don't take any more of that elixir the Goblin Market witch made for Sylvie." One of his hands rested against hers on the sill. "The elixir will change you into something that is not good. You'll be fearless, but . . . not you."

She didn't want to withdraw her hand from beside his. "Moth . . . will Lily be different?"

"She's still your sister." His voice was gentle.

"Has Seth Lot . . . has he . . ." She couldn't finish. Moth gripped her hand and said nothing, which was her answer. She wanted to vomit. She thought of cutting off Seth Lot's handsome head.

"Lily Rose is like you." Moth's gaze held hers. "She is not breakable. She said to me, once, that she would give them what they want . . . a queen. And she is a queen in that house of wolves and briars."

Someone rapped at the door. They both flinched.

"I'll see you later, fearless girl." Moth slid out the window to the ledge below, where Sylvie helped pull him back in. She looked up at Finn and winked, before vanishing from view.

A female voice called from behind Finn's door, "Are you decent, sugar?"

"Yes." A primitive terror flashed through Finn. She straightened and pretended to be stone.

The door whispered open, white paint crumbling from its mildewed wood. The air began to hum as darkness ribboned into the room, becoming a young woman in a gown of pale silk, her hair a knee-length cascade of pewter white, her eyes lined with crimson spirals. She looked so much like a real fairy as she moved across the room, bare feet peeking from beneath the ivory gown's dirty hem, that Finn felt her fear become wonder. "Serafina Sullivan, who conquered the white serpent, kissed a Jack back from the dead, and has now come to challenge the Big Bad Wolf."

"Amaranthus?"

"Pleased to make your acquaintance." The girl dropped into a chair and slung her legs over one of its arms as if to imitate Narcissus's earlier pose as Jack. There were scratches on her legs. "That dress you're wearing is Dolce and Gabbana. Do you like it?"

Finn lifted her chin. "Did you buy it? Or did it belong to a guest?"

Amaranthus smiled slyly and twisted a finger in her shining hair. "A guest left it. You're prettier than I expected. But, then, Jack Daw always was one for choosing the finer ones of your kind." The girl-thing examined her silvery nails and spoke with idle malice. "He wanted so badly to be a real boy, Jack did."

"Well." Finn felt the cold, distantly. "Now, he is."

"Oh, sugar." Amaranthus's eyes glinted. "Did you ever think that maybe he was sorry he got what he asked for? I mean, he tricked three other girls into loving him just so he could grow one of them whatchamacallits . . . a heart. But it seemed he only grew one for you."

Finn became still and tense. "Whatever you think you're doing, you can stop it."

"You ever have doubts?" Amaranthus slid into a crouch on the chair. "Ever wonder if he used you?"

"Never."

Amaranthus glided to her feet, the fabric of her gown whispering. Her gossamer cloak billowed as she moved toward Finn. "Do you know why Jack Daw is famous in the Ghostlands-or infamous, rather? He was Reiko's assassin. Oh, he might not have killed those three mortal girls with his own hands, but they died because of him. Here, in the Taibhse na Tir, he killed her enemies, and don't think it wasn't something he enjoyed, slaughtering Fatas."

The Mockingbird queen tucked Finn's hair back from her face in a sisterly gesture. "I had to be sure you weren't easily tricked, little girl. You weren't fooled by my brother. I want you to kill the Wolf. Well, I want your lover to kill the Wolf." Amaranthus stepped back and began sauntering around the room. "Seth Lot took Reiko away from me. He murdered my cousins, who were dear to me. I've made it easy for you, Serafina. I've arranged it with Seth Lot. I'm going to give you to him, a sort of peace offering-only not really. Once in the Wolf's house, you'll get Moth in, in his insect shape. He'll be carrying the weapons. Then you let Jack in. Together, the three of you should be able to do the deed."

Finn stared at her. "I'm not a killer. And how do you expect me to get Jack into the Wolf's house? I don't know where he is-"

"He's here."

Finn stopped breathing. Amaranthus resumed speaking, "He's got the poison now. You've got that uncorrupted silver dagger for pinning, and, after those two things strike the Wolf, I suppose that blade hidden in your walking stick will do to cut off the Wolf's head."

Finn sat down. If she were given to Seth Lot . . . the idea made her blood run cold and her stomach twist up. She made her voice hard. "If you just hand me over to him, won't he be suspicious? Tell him to send Lily Rose in exchange. Say you want to hold her here, to keep us apart, to avenge Reiko."

Amaranthus seemed to be considering the idea. "Lot certainly wants you. I suppose I could tell him I'd like to keep your sister as a hostage against your Jack harming me. He doesn't know I have Jack. In truth, I'll keep your sister and the pretty crow girl as insurance against you, your lover, and the moth boy returning here to retaliate. Yes. I like your idea, Serafina."

The Mockingbird swept from the room, leaving Finn to stare at the backpack left on the chair. It was her backpack, and set deliberately in front of it was the tiny bottle of elixir Sionnach Ri had gotten at Goblin Market.

This can't work, Finn thought, her hands curling into fists in her dress. This can't possibly work.

JACK SAT IN THE MOCKINGBIRDS' COURTYARD, on the rim of a well surrounded by pale, night-blooming plants. Albino bees buzzed past him. An ivory lizard scampered over his boots. When he thought of Finn being so close, he smiled.

Amaranthus slid from the shadows to sit beside him. She said, "Do you want to know why I brought you and your girl here? We want the Wolf dead."

"I believe I told you I know that."

"I've offered to give your Serafina to the Wolf. He accepted."

Jack almost went for her throat. He wound his hands into his coat to keep from doing so as she continued, "In exchange, I've asked for her sister as a hostage. Serafina will go to Seth Lot, willingly, so that her sister might be released. You and the moth boy will follow Serafina to the Wolf. The moth boy will have the poison-you did get it from Jill Scarlet, yes?-and the weapons; Lot would sense such things on you, but concealed with Moth, a being riding the shadow, they'll be undetectable. Serafina will let you both into the Wolf's house."

"You're insane."

She leaned close until her lips were only inches from his. He could smell the blood she and her clan drank from the well on which they sat, a well that led down to the river of blood running beneath the Ghostlands. "You'll do what you must because you are Jack Daw, and Serafina is a queen killer. I have faith in you."

He looked out over the night garden as despair strangled any hope left within him. "You expect us to Trojan horse into Lot's house and kill him? Then you'll let Lily Rose and our friends free and we'll all live happily ever after?"

"Lot is an old Fata, older than I am, almost a divine thing. There are only three ways that will end him, if done in succession. And you know what they are now."

One of Jack's hands, knotted in a coat pocket, touched the vial of Aconitum lycoctotum Jill Scarlet had given him.

"You have the wolfsbane-I can smell it. Your girl brought a silver dagger that our land hasn't rusted. And there's that elder-wood walking stick with the sword inside that we dare not draw. You'll figure it out, sugar. Once Serafina gets you and Moth into the Wolf's house, you'll figure it all out or you'll die." Her eyes narrowed. "You are a Jack again, aren't you? Returning has changed you back?"

He wondered what the hell kind of sword the Black Scissors had given them as he leaned close to the Mockingbird queen and whispered, "What's to keep us from returning to give you a trinity death?"

She smiled. "Because I'll have Lily Rose Sullivan and Sylvie Whitethorn. Now, would you like to see your Finn?"

A FATA BOY AND GIRL in ivory 1920s clothes escorted Finn to a candlelit conservatory, its chessboard floor tangled with morning glories and the roots of pale plants snaking out of stone urns. Mold furred the tiles and cracks spiderwebbed the grimy, glass dome of the ceiling. Nightshade, and briars dripping livid roses, ran riot. Contained within the cavernous mouth of a hearth hewn into a gorgon face were porcelain hands holding lit candles.

Jack stood before the Medusa hearth. As the glass doors shut behind Finn, she stood very still, afraid that if she moved, he'd disappear like the Fata trick he might be. "Are you real?"

"I feel that way." He was half in shadow.

She walked to him, raised her hands to his face. His skin was cooler than usual, and ancient rings decorated his fingers again-but the lions-and-the-heart ring was among them. He bent his head and kissed her as if she were a succulent thing, drawing her onto her toes as his arms slid around her until she was crushed against him and the burning butterflies coursed up from deep inside of her.

She didn't feel his heartbeat. She stumbled back against the sofa. "Jack?"

He stood still, candlelight threading his eyelashes and tied-back hair, the fur of his coat. He said, "I couldn't be weak anymore, Finn."

She kept her voice steady. "You are not a Jack. Please tell me you're not a-"

"Finn." He shed his coat and held it out to her. "Aren't you cold in that little dress?"

"I'm not cold, Jack, because I took the elixir."

His gaze was sharp. "How much?"

"Only enough."

He tossed the coat over a chair. "You're all soft skin and delicate bones. Aren't you tired of hurting and bleeding? I know I don't want to go back to it again."

Confused and a little defiant, she didn't move as he stepped close and slid those ring-jeweled hands up her bare arms to cup her face. His touch, despite his cool skin, was hot. Gently, he said, "You don't really want a mortal man, Finn, someone weak and prone to dying. You want a dark and perfect elf knight who can never be harmed, who'll always protect you."