Once upon a time, in a land long forgotten now, there lived a mighty king, feared by all and loved by none. His name was King Lockedheart….

—from King Lockedheart

LONDON

FEBRUARY 1737

A woman abroad in St. Giles at midnight was either very foolish or very desperate. Or, as in her own case, Temperance Dews reflected wryly, a combination of both.

“’Tis said the Ghost of St. Giles haunts on nights like this,” Nell Jones, Temperance’s maidservant, said chattily as she skirted a noxious puddle in the narrow alley.

Temperance glanced dubiously at her. Nell had spent three years in a traveling company of actors and sometimes had a tendency toward melodrama.

“There’s no ghost haunting St. Giles,” Temperance replied firmly. The cold winter night was frightening enough without the addition of specters.

“Oh, indeed, there is.” Nell hoisted the sleeping babe in her arms higher. “He wears a black mask and a harlequin’s motley and carries a wicked sword.”

Temperance frowned. “A harlequin’s motley? That doesn’t sound very ghostlike.”

“It’s ghostlike if he’s the dead spirit of a harlequin player come back to haunt the living.”

“For bad reviews?”

Nell sniffed. “And he’s disfigured.”

“How would anyone know that if he’s masked?”

They were coming to a turn in the alley, and Temperance thought she saw light up ahead. She held her lantern high and gripped the ancient pistol in her other hand a l...