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The lion awaits Claire in the clearing.

In the sky, there is a faint glimmer of light; it is the birthing moment of the morning, the moment before the sun first shows its face, and Claire’s skin and clothing is tinted pink and blue and gold.

It is not over until the sun no longer touches the horizon; she still has time. She must bid, and she must find Leander’s mother.

Claire does not hesitate. She clambers onto the lion’s back. She already knows where Lady Reverie is.

In the courtyard, all is silent. The birds do not sing, and the breeze has gentled to a curious stillness, leaving the air stagnant, the scent of flowers and sap cloying to the point of malevolence. Claire’s throat, her nose, fills with their sweetness until it feels difficult to breathe.

She has left her lion by its fountain. Now Claire stands before the golden statue on its podium, eyes raised towards the sky. Claire follows its gaze—it is watching the rising sun, peeking just above the horizon. Only a few minutes, she suspects, until it will be morning.

She hesitates at the base of the steps and wonders whether to climb them, but Claire finds she does not want to whisper.

‘I wish to bid,’ she says to the statue.

Nothing happens.

‘I wish to bid,’ she repeats, more loudly this time. ‘I will bid now, before sunrise, and I will win the auction by default. I will bid here in the witness of Lady Reverie and her Château, and I will bid freely and willingly, as according to the terms set by the Company.’

The breeze picks up slightly; there is a faint, mellifluous chime somewhere, as if the wind has blown over a glass to produce a note. Claire quells a little at the noise, but then she breathes deeply and straightens her spine.

She has been taught, from a young age, to speak softly and respectfully. A maid lets words emerge as a ripple on the surface of a pond, gentle and fading even as they arrive. Noise is the weapon of men, of warriors. And a lady’s voice must be a pristine instrument: the more it is used, the less value it has. Whether she is Genevieve or Claire, she is supposed to remain silent.

But now Claire feels a shout build in her throat. Instead of swallowing it down, she releases it into the air.

‘My name is Claire Marchand!’ she cries. ‘That is my secret. I was born to a lawyer and a physician’s daughter, and they died when I was only a child. I was raised in the convent Notre-Dame de Chalais near Grenoble, and I became lady’s maid to Genevieve de Vienne when I was twelve years old. I am an orphan and a coward. I am a thief and a liar. I stole another woman’s life, a woman I loved, and I lived it in her stead. But I am a guest of the Company and I have made my bid. I deserve to be listened to! I demand to be heard!’

Her voice rings out, rebounding off the columns and the jade-leafed trees, scattering to the grass in shards of sound. In its wake the silence returns, ceaseless and terrible, and Claire’s breath comes in desperate gasps.

‘I know you are there, my lady,’ she continues, now hoarse. ‘Will you not acknowledge me? After all this? I have given you three days. I feel you owe me, at least, some small portion of your time.’

For a moment, silence.

Then the statue rolls her neck and drops her head to look at her, golden eyes glinting.

‘I owe you nothing, Claire Marchand,’ Lady Reverie says, in contrapposto upon her pedestal. ‘But for your efforts I will reward you. I hear your bid, and I acknowledge your victory. My son’s sacrifice was worthy; you are the winner of the Auction of Secrets.’

There is no resemblance between Lady Reverie’s face and Leander’s, or Orestes’s—but why would there be? They were all collected by her, just as Saliha Sultan was, as Claire’s maidservants were. But this woman could never look even remotely human; her metallic perfection recalls a religious idol, gold and gleaming and numinous. Her eyes are spheres upon which are engraved only the barest impression of pupil and iris. Her hands, cupped around the metal lotus, have fingers that are four-knuckled and slender, so slender they resemble a skeleton’s more than a woman’s. Claire can see her own vague reflection in the Lady’s shining skin, a malformed haze of white and pink. It occurs to her that Lady Reverie is at a greater scale than her, like a Greek statue—her shoulders twice the width of Claire’s, her head the size of Claire’s torso.

Lady Reverie cocks her head. A beam of sunlight refracts upon her cheek, so brightly it makes Claire’s eyes sting. The Lady does not step down from her pedestal; Claire wonders if she is able to, or whether her feet are fused to the stone.

‘You do not smile, child,’ she says. Her voice is musical, each word half sung, lilting like the notes of a lyre. She does not shout, and yet she is so loud her speech is painful to hear, echoing through the courtyard. ‘You neither weep nor gasp to hear of your salvation. Are you not grateful for the gift I offer you?’

Claire feels the fear in her heart as a living thing, gnawing at her, pulling her away. She stands fast. ‘I am grateful,’ she says, bowing her head in respect. ‘Of course, my lady, always.’

‘Lies!’ the Lady shrieks, and the cry seems to shake the ground, such is its volume.

Claire gasps, flailing back, raising her hands instinctively to her ears. When she draws them away, there is a faint ringing left in their place.

‘Lies,’ the Lady says once more, only a fraction quieter. ‘You dare lie to me, Claire Marchand, in this palace, my altar to truth. You are not grateful. You wear the fear and the anger in your heart brazenly. I see it dripping from you, girl, and polluting this sacred place.’

‘Forgive me.’ A lifetime of practised deference settles over Claire’s shoulders. She has stood as a servant in the presence of tyrants; this is merely another queen to appease. ‘I was brought up in the presence of mere mortals, who do not understand the true value of honesty, or its practice. I am imperfect, my lady, and I shall endeavour to correct those imperfections.’

Lady Reverie’s anger melts at this, her face softening. There is something almost tangible about her sudden indulgence; it drapes over Claire, viscous as honey. ‘You do well to acknowledge your fault,’ she says sweetly. ‘Many of those who petition me cower in my presence, but they do not bow; to lower oneself out of fear is not to lower oneself out of respect, and I am glad, Claire Marchand, that you appear to know the difference. I have chosen well.’

Claire sweeps into a curtsey. ‘Chosen, my lady?’

Lady Reverie considers her. At the base of her pedestal, some of the jade grass begins to grow taller, lengthening and crawling up the side of the marble. One green shoot pierces through the soil and, within a matter of seconds, blooms a sunflower of tiger eye and amber. A pearlescent bee comes to hover at its leaves.