Heartless Hunter

Gideon arrives at Oakhaven Park and remembers Nicholas, who helped Gideon through a rough time three years prior. Before the revolution, when Gideon was dating Cressida, he was the target of violent hatred from many people due to his reputation as a “witch’s whore” (180). Cressida’s treatment of Gideon made him feel worthless, and he entered boxing matches he was certain to lose just to feel something. Nicholas showed him kindness and taught him how to properly box.

Charlotte Gong interrupts Gideon’s search for Rune, who asks if things went smoothly. Her question confuses him, but he continues his search without inquiring further. Rune eventually approaches him and loudly asks about the transfer and admits to telling the entire luncheon party about it hours earlier. The new information causes Gideon to doubt Rune’s complicity enough to delay her arrest. Verity further increases his doubts when she claims that Alex brought Rune and Verity to the ball. Though Gideon doesn’t trust Rune to provide him with the truth, he trusts Alex. This gives him reason to believe Rune must have been at Oakhaven Park all night.

Alex escorts Verity and Rune home by carriage. When Verity leans in to peruse the prison maps, Rune lies across the carriage floor. While they have the prison maps, there is much information they still don’t have—where Seraphine is, how the gates work, how many guards are on duty, and when the purge is scheduled. Verity lets it slip that Rune is searching for a suitor. Alex is bothered by this and suggests they pry Noah Creed for information. Rune, however, suggests using a truth spell on Gideon. She plans to place the proper spell mark on an object that can be carried on Gideon’s person and draw the information from Gideon on the night of the Luminaries Dinner. Both Alex and Verity are against this idea, but Rune is set on following through. When she returns home, she sends a telegram to Gideon asking if he will be her date to the Luminaries Dinner.

Rune purchases a suit jacket for Gideon to replace the one she ruined with wine and plans to enchant it with Truth Teller. Two days after the ball at Oakhaven Park, Rune receives a package from Gideon while writing her Luminaries speech. Inside is the mint-green silk dress and shoes Gideon designed for her. Shortly after, Gideon arrives at Wintersea House and asks her to accompany him on a walk.

Rune’s casual appearance confuses Gideon—“She looked wild and raw and exposed out here. Not the girl he was used to seeing all done up at parties” (198). He notices the gash on her forearm, which raises his suspicions about the night at Seldom Harbor once again. However, Rune claims she sliced on a rock after falling while riding yesterday.

Gideon accepts Rune’s invitation to accompany her to the Luminaries Dinner. When he compliments the beauty of her property’s gardens, Rune speaks softly about her grandmother who used to tend to them. Gideon puts her at ease by speaking about his memories with his deceased mother. When Rune asks about his property in Old Town, Gideon becomes defensive, believing Rune thinks the place is far beneath her status. Gideon speaks passionately about the struggles the poor face in Old Town. Rune asks why he directs it toward her when he should direct it toward the Good Commander, who promised positive change after the revolution but has yet to enact it.

When Rune asks why Gideon thinks she believes he’s beneath her, he lists all the ways he cannot provide for a heiress like herself. He does not know the dances, doesn’t have the esteem of her friends, and cannot expand her inheritance. Rune partially drops her shallow facade and claims not to care about those trivial things. Rune implies that she does not believe herself above the other. Rather, it is he who believes he is too good for her. Rune returns to Wintersea House without Gideon. The calm way Rune handled the argument shocks Gideon, whose arguments with Cressida always came with cruel punishments. Gideon chases down Rune and decides “There are some things [she] need[s] to know […] So [she] can decide if this is what [she] want[s]. If [he] is what [she] want[s]” (205).

Gideon admits that the last girl he fell in love with was a witch: Cressida. Soon after the Rosebloods employed her, Gideon’s mother became unwell. She began accusing her family members of various things—her husband of being unfaithful, her daughter Tessa of poisoning her, and Gideon of abusing Tessa. Gideon could smell the witch’s spells on her and was certain the Sister Queens were torturing her. Gideon reveals that the sisters used the blood of their victims to cast, which shocks Rune as the information is proof the sisters were using forbidden Arcana spells that would corrupt them.

When Gideon attempted to break things off with Cressida, she punished him severely. She ordered him to make her 36 silk roses by sunrise or she’d kill Tessa. When Gideon was only able to sew 12, she spelled Tessa to succumb to a fatal sweating sickness. In the week after, his mother drowned herself and his father hung himself. Desperate to keep Alex from befalling the same fate, Gideon submitted to Cressida. Eventually, she branded him on the chest and called it a curse that she would activate if he ever betrayed her again. With the knowledge of this backstory, Rune finally understands why Gideon and Alex murdered the Sister Queens and supported the Republic’s anti-witch agenda.

Gideon remembers his mission to scan Rune’s entire body for casting scars and suggests they skinny dip. Rune notices the brand Cressida left on Gideon’s chest as they strip. She fully believes the horror stories he’s told her about the witch. In the water, Rune tells Gideon the truth about her grandmother: Nan was her best friend, and it was devastating to turn her in. Rather than judge her, Gideon understands how easy it is to love a witch as he first did with Cressida.

After being vulnerable with one another, Rune pulls Gideon in for a kiss. Gideon’s feelings of inadequacy, the chance that Rune is the Moth, and the betrayal of his brother who loves Rune cause him to pull back. Rune mistakes the action as a rejection and exits the water, intending to flee home.

Gideon dresses and catches up with Rune just in time to see several Penitent children—the descendants of witch sympathizers who have distinctive marks on their foreheads to clearly warn others what they had done—cross her property. Rune admits that she allows them to use her estate’s footpaths to fish for food. Since she doesn’t directly aid them, it isn’t against the law and Gideon admires her compassion.

Rune asks Gideon about the day they met a few years ago; Rune had been 13 and Gideon 15. Alex brought her cliff-jumping at Nameless Cove with his peers. Rune had been excited to meet the older brother Alex spoke so highly of, but Gideon insulted her dress and refused to shake her hand. Gideon’s recounting of the events brings a new perspective to their first interaction, however. Gideon claims he was hostile to Rune because of her wealth and the fact that she ventured into a poor sector of the city. The cost of her dress alone would have fed all the children in that cove. Gideon also reveals that shaking hands is an aristocratic practice in which many lower-class citizens never participate. Therefore, he didn’t understand the gesture.

Gideon apologizes for his behavior that day and admits that he found her “the most beautiful girl in the world” that day but is unavailable because of Alex (230). While flattered by Gideon’s compliment, his mention of Alex perplexes Rune. When Rune admits she found him impressive that day, Gideon kisses her. Rune invites him inside and upstairs to her bedroom, but Gideon declines because he wants to take things slow with her.

Just before the Luminaries Dinner, Gideon meets with Harlow while he dresses in the new suit jacket Rune delivered hours prior. Harlow delivers more information about Rune’s ship that supposedly transported the twin witches who escaped weeks prior. She has discovered that two barrels of wine were delivered by a male aristocrat with a plain silver ring on his pinky finger shortly before the ship left.

Harlow also reveals that people have been seeing casting marks clustered around town. The evidence suggests a group of witches is gathering. None of the signatures left behind match the distinct Crimson Moth, but Harlow believes the Moth could still be leading them. When Harlow questions Gideon about his progress with Rune, he speaks of the skinny dipping incident. Harlow isn’t satisfied with the circumstances of his latest search for Rune’s casting scars and urges him to sleep with Rune to make certain there are none. Gideon reluctantly agrees. He grows increasingly concerned he may fall in love with Rune, who is kinder and more compelling than he initially thought.

A Blood Guard soldier who comes to report that the Tasker Brothers are missing interrupts their meeting. Gideon believes they might be the latest victims in the string of murders across the city these past months. Gideon decides to check their apartment and sends a telegram to Wintersea House to inform Rune of his tardiness.

Rune readies herself for the Luminaries Dinner and informs Verity that she’s drawn the mark for Truth Teller in Gideon’s new suit jacket’s interior pocket. Rune receives Gideon’s telegram, which informs her that he will be late for the dinner due to undisclosed reasons. Verity decides to attend the dinner to help gather information about the prison from any guards in attendance.

When Rune enters her casting room to retrieve a vial of blood, she notices one of Nan’s rarer spell books full of powerful curses on the desk and becomes curious as to who has been snooping through it. Inside is a spell called Earth Sunderer with the power to cause an earthquake large enough to topple a city. Verity warns her against trying it, as it will require much more blood than she has. The statement reminds Rune of what Gideon told her about Cressida and her sisters. Rune shares this information with Verity who becomes defensive; Verity states that her parents villainized her older sisters for using each other’s blood with permission to cast spells. Hear more of Verity’s mysterious, troubled past saddens Rune.

Gideon and Harrow find the Tasker Brothers’ apartment empty. Upon searching the entertainment district of the city, they discover the brothers’ bodies in an alley outside a brothel with their throats slashed open. On an alley wall, written in their blood, is the message: “You’re next, Gideon” (251). Though infringing on the rights of the Republic’s citizens bothers Gideon, the ramping intensity of the murders and the threat to his life makes him inclined to resume the raids and curfew restrictions during the initial witch purge. The possibility that Rune might be capable of such carnage if she is the Crimson Moth sickens Gideon, but he is determined to discover the truth of her identity regardless.