Jane had the taxi driver let her out at the corner. She stayed close to the tall limestone buildings lining Park Avenue, wanting to avoid the sight of the gaping black windows at the top of the Dorans’ mansion. In the months she had lived there, she had never been able to shake the feeling that someone was watching her from those windows. Of course, now that she thought about it, it was probably Charles.

I can’t believe I’m coming back here willingly. Again.

Jane shivered and tapped her code into the panel beside the carved wooden door. Gunther was awake enough to approximate a wave, but she was reasonably sure she heard him snoring by the time she reached the narrow back staircase. At least there would be a record of her using her code to come home, even if he didn’t remember. She had been sorely tempted to use the service entrance instead of the ostentatious front door, but had changed her mind after imagining Lynne in a black fury, demolishing half of Brooklyn because she didn’t realize that Jane was back.

When she slid open the door into the kitchen, her heart zoomed down to the tips of her toes. Lynne was exactly where she had been when Jane had run out earlier: sitting at the kitchen table, sipping tea from a delicate porcelain cup. Jane opened her mouth to speak, but found herself frozen indecisively, her mouth wide, and still holding the door handle.

“Nice try,” Lynne purred. Every instinct of Jane’s screamed at her to run, but whether it was fear or some kind of spell, she felt completely unable to move. “But you’ll still have to go through with the fitting,” Lynne went on, standing to her considerable full height. “The couturier was simply beside himself, of course, but he’s a professional, and I did eventually feel compelled to remind him of that fact. So he’ll just have to come a bit early tomorrow if he really can’t manage with the measurements that he has already.” She glided majestically across the tiled floor and tipped the remains of her tea into the sink. “Do let me see your nails, dear.”

Jane felt a faint prickling in her fingers and toes, as if they had been numb and now the feeling was returning. The wooden door clicked shut behind Jane and she realized that she must have let it go. She held her hands in front of her uncertainly. Her nails didn’t have blood under them like Dee’s had, but the shell-pink polish didn’t look new, either. “Jin Soon had a wait,” she heard herself saying, “but the hairdresser said she could change out the polish tomorrow as long as it’s something simple. Which is fine.”

Lynne nodded slowly, her odd, dark eyes riveted on Jane’s. “Dorans go to the front of the line, Jane,” she said finally. “Especially on such a special occasion.”

Jane forced herself to breathe; it would be harder to sound natural if her face was turning blue. She had been convinced that Lynne knew about Yuri somehow—honestly, she had believed it on some level since she had left Dee’s apartment. But if Lynne did know that something was wrong, she was playing it impossibly cool. So I just have to keep up the act until tomorrow, Jane reminded herself desperately. “Of course,” she said out loud. “I’m just a little emotional, I guess. About the big day. So I’ve been kind of out of it. I’ve never been married before. It’s kind of a new experience for me.” Jane let out an inane giggle.

Lynne’s eyes narrowed, but her peach lips pursed together thoughtfully. After a long moment, she seemed to accept that excuse, and stepped away from the sink. “Perhaps you should lie down, dear,” she suggested, and Jane gratefully hurried forward, toward the hall that led to her room. “Do let me know if you plan to go out again tonight,” Lynne added from somewhere behind her, in a voice that could have frozen fire. A fierce chill ran down Jane’s spine and, not trusting herself to speak, she nodded once before she fled down the hallway.

It wasn’t until she shut the door of her bedroom that she began to sob. Her chest heaved as her anguish poured out in salty waves, and she wondered for what felt like the millionth time exactly how she’d gotten here. When she’d met Malcolm, she felt like she’d been rescued from years of heartbreaking loneliness. But their relationship had plunged her straight into hell, and she’d gone from French Orphan Swept Off Her Feet to Kill-or-Be-Killed Girl.

She kicked off her shoes and padded into her spacious closet. The discreetly hidden lighting glowed to life, making each sleeve, skirt, strap, and heel look like a work of art. She stretched onto her tiptoes to reach the Louis Vuitton hatbox that sat on the back of a high shelf (“Every New York woman who’s anyone needs a hatbox!” Lena from Barneys had sworn) and pulled it down, narrowly missing her own head.

She brusquely tossed the lovely Lanvin hat inside out of the way. It settled on the closet floor, glossy black feathers quivering. Four layers of tissue paper followed it quickly, and finally Jane felt the dusty-soft paper of the manuscript that Dee had given her to read—discreetly—at home. The curious and eventually institutionalized Rosalie Goddard had not been especially inclined to share the source material for her controversial book. But in her diaries, she had mentioned the names of a couple of books and their authors. Misty Travers had located one of them in her extensive back room. Hope she has enough room back there to hide Dee, Jane thought, and then she shut those thoughts out. There was nothing she could do now, and fretting wouldn’t help.

Instead, she carried the manuscript gently back to the carved and canopied bed, pulled the silk duvet over her aching body, and began to read. Because she was tired and tense, the words mostly ran together, but after a few minutes she began to get the sense of what she was reading, and another minute after that, a familiar name jumped out.

The first woman to discover this amazing reserve of natural magic and bend it to her will was a queen in her own land. Before Ambika died, she divided her massive wealth among her seven sons, and bequeathed her magic among her seven daughters.

The sons have disappeared from history, but for centuries the descendants of those seven daughters passed their magic through the female line, just as Ambika did, and seven distinct families emerged. Gradually, perceived inequalities between the families’ powers caused jealousy and strife. In the Middle Ages, plain fighting broke out when witches realized that a fallen witch’s powers could be stolen at the moment of her death. These battles eventually attracted attention even from the non-magical community, inciting fear and hysteria.

In the resulting hysteria and suspicion, most of the accused and executed “witches” were innocent. When the occasional real witch was caught and killed, however, the power was transferred to her survivors, and so, most active witches were willing to overlook the civilian casualties of their wars. By the late seventeenth century, however, two of the seven families had been wiped out completely, and this danger was considered less acceptable to the witches. A truce was called amongst the remaining five, and once again magic went underground.

The world grew steadily smaller, though, and the signatories of the truce grew further and further from their descendants’ collective memories. Once the danger in Salem had passed, large numbers of witches immigrated to the New World to establish control over unclaimed swaths of the Americas, and the vast new territory reignited old conflicts.

A floorboard creaked, and magical pulses arced between Jane’s fingertips. The power that began to pulse in her veins felt so strong that she was almost surprised she couldn’t see it moving under the skin of her arms. If someone comes in here, I could kill them, she realized. A dead body at her bedroom door would be a lot harder to walk away from than Yuri’s had been, not to mention the fact that there was a decent chance that, in her panic, she might blow up someone relatively harmless, like Sofia. It was kind of no-win, and she wished for an old-fashioned key-and-tumbler lock on her door.

After a moment, it occurred to her that she could put her extra magic to use to make the next best thing.

Focusing her attention on the heavy mahogany bookcase beside the door, she tried to pull enough magic together to move it. Her attention was scattered, though, and the magic responded accordingly. An antique clock covered in gold plate crashed from the fourth shelf to the ground with a loud bang. Its glass face shattered into thousands of tiny glittering pieces on the carpet. She guessed it had probably cost a small fortune, but even more important, it had made an impressive amount of noise for its size. She wondered if someone would come to check on her.

Or just burst in and attack her.

Jane redoubled her assault on the bookcase, willing it to move just a little, but it only rattled in its place, sending a couple of dusty, leather-bound books onto their sides. She could almost hear Dee chiding her for focusing on the wrong thing, and she closed her eyes. The bookcase wasn’t the point; it was just an object for her power to act on. Before she could make it act, she needed to concentrate on the power itself, and make it obey her will. She spun Gran’s silver ring on her finger and turned her focus inward, exploring her magic.

After a stubborn moment, it began to respond, like millions of tiny pinpricks in her veins. She drew it together slowly, patiently, so deep in her own mind that she could no longer feel her own body. With her magic at the ready, it was almost easy: the massive piece of mahogany slid in front of the door as if it were gliding across ice, and, for once, Jane didn’t feel entirely spent.

In spite of its bulk, the bookcase looked somehow fragile against the door—thin and almost insubstantial. It certainly wouldn’t stop Lynne if she wanted to enter; it might not stop Charles, either. Maybe even slight, bulge-eyed Sofia could still get in. With a sigh, Jane pulled herself upright again and turned her attention toward an antique armoire in the corner, narrower than the bookcase but definitely more solid-looking.

By the time she felt safe, she couldn’t have opened her eyes if her life had depended on it, and she sank into a dreamless sleep.