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I thought about the red question mark inside a sealed box in the Archive. About a five-year-old girl retained by order of the Chair. About the words she didn't die.

"Not today," I agreed.

I rested my head against her shoulder and left it there.

Oda came to find me at dusk on the tower stairs.

By then Marion had been settled into a warm room off the infirmary. A card had already been placed on the door.

Mrs. M. Pike. Resident Matron, Lantern Tower.

Oda had appointed her that afternoon. It was a real position, not a title invented to satisfy the Charter. Marion would oversee the tower household and the welfare of any students assigned to it. For the moment, that meant me.

Only the Headmistress had the authority to appoint resident staff. Mr. Aske's countersignature recorded the appointment, but it did not authorize it. As long as Marion remained on Ironmoor, she was under Ironmoor's protection. No one could remove her without her consent, and I had known her long enough to be certain that consent would not be easy to obtain.

Oda climbed the two hundred and twelve stairs beside me at an unhurried pace, one small hand resting on the rope rail. She didn't speak until we reached the top.

On the landing outside my door, she stopped beside the cracked ninth step and looked down at it for a moment.

"The Council requires that you be registered to a House," she said. "Accurately. Mr. Aske has been particularly insistent on that point."

She reached into her gray robe and took out a small iron key. It was old and plain, its edges worn smooth from years of handling.

"So I have registered you to one."

She placed it in my bandaged hand.

"This tower was called Hart House for four hundred years," Oda said. "Before they plastered over its name, renamed it the Lantern Tower, and filled it with broken furniture." Her gold eyes stayed on mine. "It was usually a House of one. Its students were rare, but it had a key, a name, and a place at the table. I have kept that key in my desk for forty-one years." She glanced toward the stairs. "I suppose I was waiting for someone to need it again."

I stared at the key.

"They closed the House," she continued, "but they never lawfully dissolved it. Hart is still named in the original Charter. Removing a chartered House required the agreement of all nine seats, and they never had mine. As Headmistress, I have the authority to reopen it when an eligible student appears."

For a moment, I couldn't find anything to say.

"I read the records," I managed. "The vote. Eight to one."

"I know." She didn't sound surprised. "The Keeper of the Archive has never left a sealed box untied in his life. On Wednesday night he left four of them open on his table." Something dry passed through her expression. "I retied them before the morning staff arrived. I have always been reasonably good at noticing what people intend, even when they prefer not to say it aloud."

"You were the only one," I said. "The only one who tried to help us."

"I was." Oda looked down at the cracked step again. "And afterward, I convinced myself that keeping my seat on the Council and saying nothing was the safest way to protect what remained. For a long time, I accepted that explanation." Her gaze returned to me. "Last night made it difficult to keep accepting it."

Her voice softened. "You walked into that Pit knowing exactly who was watching you. I think I owe you more than silence."

She lifted one hand and gently touched my temple, where the white streak was beginning to show beneath the dye.

"Welcome home, Hart."

Then she turned and started down the stairs, stepping over the cracked ninth step without looking back.

I stayed on the landing for a while with the iron key in my hand, standing outside a door that was now, officially, mine.

I didn't go to the party right away.

Instead, I stood at the window as dusk settled over Ironmoor, turning the key between my fingers and looking north across the wall and the Hollow Wood toward the cliffs.

Kaelen was there.