Chapter 23
The sun was disappearing behind the rooftops when Esme and Lillian took their leave of Daniel, wandering through the arts quarter on their way to the palace plaza. It was quieter here than usual, like a ghost town compared with the frenzied atmosphere in which they had immersed themselves all day.
The many buskers who were normally a fixture of these streets had made themselves scarce. Only the moody notes of a wind instrument drifted toward them on the breeze. It had a mournful tone to it, and Esme half-expected a ghostly musician to float around the corner—one of the long-departed residents of the quarter, reclaiming the streets from the living for just a few hours.
Esme paused before a wreath of twigs hung on one house’s front door, threaded with shells, tiny tridents, bel
