Sam took the long way back to the police station, because it was nearly eight, and he wanted to catch one of the few auspicious sights in the city. It was just turning the corner onto St. Aldates as he approached, and he could already feel his pulse slowing, his eyes half-closing at the sight.

Every morning, on this street, he passed a woman with a perambulator, walking the other way. He had never spoken to her, or even made eye-contact with her, but if she was there, then he was on time, and he could make himself believe everything would be all right.

There was nothing particularly soothing about her, except her regular appearance at this time and place. She didn't hurry. She didn't meet his eye. She didn't bend down to soothe the baby when it cried, although it didn't cry often. Perhaps it, too, was lulled into a lovely stupor by her presence.

At any rate, the perambulator-woman had only just turned the corner onto St. Aldates, so he wasn't late. It never occurred to him that she might be late. It didn't happen that way. She was a force of nature. She didn't get things wrong.

He passed her without comment and went into the police station, fronted by its familiar blue glass lamp, which was still lit because the day was so murky.

The prisoner had arrived in his absence. Sam tried to give her no more than a cursory glance as he walked past. She was sitting in the shadow of the duty officer's desk, with its large, forbidding ledger for entering in the arrests of the day. Nobody had invited her to remove her bonnet and shawl.

Someone had brought her tea in a cup and saucer, and she had already worked out the technicalities of drinking it with a pair of handcuffs on. She was holding both cup and saucer very close to her mouth, so that the chain between her wrists didn't overextend when she lifted the cup to take a sip.

Sam was impressed. He was even more impressed by the stupidity of the officer who had tried to put her in handcuffs, and was not at all surprised, on consulting the duty log, to learn that it was Hawthorne.

"Where is Hawthorne?" he said, hardly bothering to glance up at the young man behind the duty-officer's desk. Sam was not in the habit of saying 'good morning' or remembering his officers' names.

"He's on his tea break, sir."

"Tell him I want him in my office."

Hawthorne turned up with his cup of tea in hand, as though to underscore the injustice of being called in on his tea break.

"You put her in handcuffs," said Sam lightly. "Did I tell you to do that?"

Hawthorne stared at him as if he'd taken leave of his senses. "She's a fem fatal, sir."

"That's not how it's pronounced!"

Sam took a deep breath and glanced at the book on his desktop. It was called Helen of Camden, and he'd checked it out of the library as soon as he knew for sure that the prisoner was coming to Oxford. It had been written about her and her... unusual demonic symptom. Hawthorne had probably been reading it—or worse, hearing it summarized in the pub.

"I explained the situation to you, Hawthorne," said Sam. "We're her escort, not her gaolers. She was in prison because she asked to be. She hasn't committed any crime. And she's only here because she volunteered to help a distinguished Professor with his research. The least we can do is be polite."

"Sir," said Hawthorne noncommittally.

Sam gave up. "Any luck finding the identity of our dead girl?"

Hawthorne spread his hands, making the cup of tea clink in its saucer. "Might be worth asking her," he said, nodding in the prisoner's direction.

"Hawthorne, throwing around wild accusations is no substitute for doing our jobs. There's no evidence to link her to the murder—"

"Yet."

Sam clenched his lips together for a moment, then opened them just wide enough to say, "Please take the cuffs off and bring her in."

He watched from the doorway of his office while Hawthorne released her. It was not done with good grace.

"All right, lift up your 'ands, new brat."

Ellini Syal lifted her hands meekly and gave him a smile.

"What are you smilin' at?" Hawthorne growled.

"I just didn't know you were still allowed to call me new brat," she said mildly.

"I can call you anything I want to, love. I'm human."

She gave him another civil little smile. "By some definitions, I suppose."

She allowed Hawthorne to prod her in the direction of the office without protest. And in motion, she seemed even less of a 'fem fatal'. She had the kind of long, thin limbs that are usually called 'gangly' in men and 'willowy' in women—simply because it's hard for long limbs to look bad on a woman, with those hips and heels to help them sway. But on her, they were gangly. She had the female hips, but she must have learned how to walk without swinging them. Every impulse towards grace in her had been suppressed.

Sam motioned for her to sit down, and she plonked herself into the seat in front of his desk like an awkward schoolgirl.

"I just need to ask you a few questions, Miss Syal, before we escort you to the Faculty."

"Yes, sir," she said.

Sam winced and gave her a look, trying in vain to decide whether she was making fun of him. She seemed perfectly serious. There were no raised eyebrows or sly smiles. In fact, she was radiating inoffensiveness—cheerful, helpful inoffensiveness—like a blast furnace. There was something desperate about it, as though she was saying, 'Oh, do let's be friends—just for a moment. Let's not start shouting and bickering quite yet.'

"I apologize for the handcuffs," he said at last.

"It's all right," said the woman, quite cheerfully. "I was expecting the handcuffs far more than the tea."

He saw her glancing hungrily at the books on the shelves behind him, and—with a certain wariness—at the one on his desk. Sam realized, with a sinking feeling, that he probably should have put it away before she came in. Apart from the fact that it wasn't very complimentary about her, he didn't like admitting that he got his information from such sensationalist sources.

He got out a sheet of paper and took refuge in procedure. "I just need to ask you a few standard questions. They might seem a bit strange, but they're essential for the security of our citizens."

"Yes, sir."

Sam cleared his throat. "Did you inherit any demonic symptoms from your ancestors?"

They were always called 'demonic symptoms'—as though the new-breed's heritage was a mysterious disease. There had recently been some discussion in the papers about whether or not this was fair, but, in Miss Syal's case, a disease was probably the nicest thing you could call it.

She looked again at the book on his desk, and gave him a puzzled smile, as though she couldn't decide whether he was joking.

"I suppose so," she said at last.

"Let's start with that, shall we?" said Sam, poising his pen above the paper. "Describe them to me. In your own words."

She tapped her gloved fingers on her knee a few times, as if she was tapping out a little tune, or counting in her head. "I—uh—I bring out the worst in men."

This time, it was Sam who glanced at the book. If it could have got up and denounced her for criminal understatement, it would have done.

"And—can you refrain from doing this?"

Miss Syal smiled. "Is that a request, or just a question?"

"It's both."

"No, I can't refrain. I'm sorry. I've tried." She went back to the absent-minded tapping for a moment, and then said, "You know, people are quite willing to believe that it's an inconvenience but, when I tell them I try not to do it, they're sceptical."

Sam didn't say anything. He knew. The reactions of his staff—even his own gut reaction when he'd first heard about her—confirmed the scepticism.

And despite the fact that he shuddered to think like Hawthorne, there was something about her exaggerated innocence—the way she wouldn't meet your eyes, the fiercely awkward body language—which made you think she was planning something.

She was terrified, all right. That wasn't an act. But she was also, somehow, calculating.

Sam finally yielded to temptation and shut up the book in his desk drawer. He was starting to feel as though it was a troublesome third party in the conversation that had been whispering to them both the whole time.

"And do you have this effect on all men?" he went on.

Miss Syal shook her head. "No, not all. Only about two-thirds, in my experience."

"Is there any way to tell in advance who's at risk?"

"Oh, yes. Men who, you know, prefer the company of other men? They're quite safe. And men who are in love with someone else already."

She gave him the lightest of glances as she said this, but Sam felt it hit his skull like a hammer-blow. He was annoyed with her for giving him that look—and even more annoyed with himself for not being able to think of a quick, scornful reply. In the end, he just glared at her and said, "Thank you, Miss Syal. I'll make a note of it."

For a moment, the only sound was the scratching of his fountainpen, and then Ellini—perhaps as a form of apology—started talking. "Do you mind if I ask an impertinent question? Do you dislike new-breeds?"

"I don't have any strong feelings about them one way or the other," said Sam, without glancing up from his writing. "Why do you ask?"

"Well, I read about your..." She trailed off, and then changed tack. "And your officer put me in handcuffs and called me a new brat. I mean, don't misunderstand me, I've been called worse things, and tied up with much nastier restraints, but—"

"Miss Syal," Sam interrupted desperately. "I don't need to know all this, do I?"

She looked as though she was very sorry that she'd created an awkward situation by mentioning her years of abuse. She really did.

"I just wondered whether—"

"Whether it was safe to be a new-breed in this city," said Sam bluntly. "Yes, it is. And I resent the insinuation." He went back to the paper, even though he wasn't quite sure what he'd just written down. "Do you have any other demonic symptoms? Do you grow fangs or claws when you're angry?"

"It's never happened so far."

"And what about your parents? Did they ever have any trouble with that kind of thing?"

"Not that they told me. Before they died."

There was another grisly silence. This time, Sam couldn't even fill it with the scratching of his pen.

"Oh, while we're talking about parents," said Miss Syal, as though she wanted to dispel the awkwardness, "would it be all right if I saw the Little Mother before we go?"

***

Seeing the Little Mother was a civil right for new-breeds. Denying that kind of request would be like depriving her of food or sleep, although it looked as if she had been depriving herself of both already.

Still, he made up his mind to escort her there himself. Because she was up to something. You could be terrified and up to something at the same time. In fact, he suspected she could be terrified and up to something quite complicated at the same time, because you couldn't live through a life like hers without learning to compartmentalize terror.

As they walked down St. Aldates to Christchurch meadow, he watched her work her unfortunate magic.

All around them were the stares. One man in five stopped in his tracks to gape at her. There were no leers or wolf-whistles or inappropriate remarks—just a hungry silence that gnawed at Sam's ears.

After a while, he began to realize that the silence wasn't reverence, but expectation. It was the hush of a cat before it pounces, or of a bowstring being drawn back—not so much, perhaps, as if people were planning what they might do to her, but as if they were watching and listening for what others might do, because it was palpably obvious that somebody was going to do something.

Sam tried to glare at everyone who gaped at her, but it had little effect. The stares followed them through the city. But at the grave of the Little Mother, everything was peaceful.

'Grave' wasn't entirely accurate. It was a glass case standing between two blasted trees. The trees had been bare since the sixteenth century, but some flimsy imitation of life still flourished on them, because little scraps of coloured card, in the shapes of leaves, had been tied to the branches. They were wishes, prayers and petitions for the Little Mother. You were supposed to write your heart's desire on the leaf-shaped card, kiss it, and then tie it to the branches and watch it flutter about, in mockery of life.

The mockery of life continued when you turned your eyes to the figure in the glass case—but not in such a nice way.

The Little Mother—or 'Eve', as she was known by everyone who didn't have demon blood in their veins—looked like a life-sized China doll in a glass case, except that her hair and fingers were splayed, and her mouth was stretched wide in a snarl. She had been embalmed like that as an everlasting humiliation by people who thought she was the root of all evil. And yet there was a kind of gentleness in her eyes—or rather, in the glass stones they had put in to replace her eyeballs. You just sensed somehow—despite her ferocity—that she had been a victim.

There was a table to the side of the dead trees, on which was arrayed a beautiful selection of cardboard leaves in red, green, and butterscotch-yellow.

Sam watched Ellini's hands hover over them for a few seconds, before she selected a sycamore leaf in a red-brown shade that matched her shawl. Without taking off her gloves, she scribbled something onto the leaf, and then turned back to the Little Mother.

She didn't curtsy or kiss the glass like some of them did. She just gazed at Eve with those black, inscrutable eyes, and tied her message to a branch of the dead tree. She didn't take off her gloves to do this either, even though she seemed to be having difficulty. Sam didn't offer to help her, though. He knew it was unwise to interrupt a new-breed when they were at the Little Mother's grave. They didn't have much in the way of religion, but they had devotion, and all the raw, lovely touchiness that entailed.

Eve was the only demon who hadn't abandoned them. She had been the first one summoned to the city of Oxford by Chancellor Faustus, who had thought he'd only been conjuring a succubus to share his bed.

When she had appeared in his study—a beautiful female form, but one who was bursting with questions instead of caresses—he had originally intended to keep her talking until the sun came up and burned her alive. But he had found her questions so stimulating that, when he saw the sun inching up over the window frame, he shut the curtains and kept on talking.

Despite the rumours, they had probably never been lovers. He was enamoured of her intellectual worth. And, to everybody's surprise, the city responded in the same way.

Because she was clever, Oxford took her in. Not into the university itself. That would have been silly—she was a woman, after all. But they didn't chase her out of the city walls. They didn't send her back to hell.

And more demons came because the atmosphere of the place was captivating. The idea of finding things out was addictive. Nobody knew what they had been doing with themselves before. Tormenting sinners, perhaps, or comparing the length of their claws. But when they came to Oxford, they discovered things like books, and answers, and the heady thrill of academic achievement, which—as any first-year undergraduate could tell you—was more addictive than opiates.

Then the church found out—or stopped tolerating the situation—and the demons had to run. But by then, they'd already mated with human women, not always by force. There were children who looked human enough until they were backed into a corner—until they were scared and hounded and starved.

And because people were afraid of the things they did when they were scared and hounded and starved, they scared and hounded and starved them. It had genuinely taken two hundred years for it to occur to anyone that that was moronic. Even the famous dons of Oxford hadn't seen it. Oh, they had offered to take the new-breeds in, but not for humanitarian reasons. It was just because they wanted to dissect them, learn about them, use their unusual brains for solving unusual problems.

At any rate, the new-breeds had survived, and chosen Eve as their mother goddess. She was the only demon who hadn't fled—although no one knew whether she had stayed in Oxford because she loved them, or because she just hadn't had long enough to run away.

That was why Sam knew they were just like humans. He didn't trust ideals or noble rhetoric, but he knew failings, vulnerabilities, and flaws like the back of his hand. They were solid. You could touch them.

And quite apart from the fact that several members of his staff were new-breeds, and he knew them to be every bit as incompetent as their human colleagues, it was their reaction to Eve which really confirmed their human-like status, in Sam's mind.

The new-breeds had been hounded, lonely, abandoned and friendless. They'd had no reason in the world to venerate anyone or anything. And yet they had turned Eve into an all-loving mother and credited her with virtues they'd only ever heard about.

That kind of reckless hope—that kind of dumb, endearing, infuriating optimism—was so very human.

***

They took a hansom cab back to the town hall because Sam couldn't face running the gauntlet of stares again.

Miss Syal had hardly stepped down onto the pavement when Jack Cade came bounding up to them, causing her to jump backwards and slam her back against the side of the coach.

Ah yes, thought Sam. The other security risk he'd been saddled with.