London, shrouded in fog, was a beast with breath thick as wool. The air carried the damp scent of wet stone and horse dung, the ceaseless clip-clop of hooves echoing against cobblestones slick with last night's rain. Gaslights flickered feebly against the gray, their glow swallowed whole by the morning gloom.

Sonya walked with purpose, gloved hands clasped before her, boots tapping a steady rhythm along the pavement. Behind her, Hook followed—a silent shadow, his presence as much a fixture of her life as the ink stains on her fingers or the whispered reputation of Madam de Vere.

Her thoughts drifted. Castor, the devil, had teased her again.

"But tell me, dear lady, do you picture them first or do they come to you in the dead of night?" His voice had been laced with mirth, wine swirling in his glass, the devilish glint in his eye unmistakable.

She had scoffed, dismissing him with a wave of her hand, but the question had lingered.

Do I picture them first?

The woman in her latest manuscript had begun as a shadow—an outline, a whisper of an idea. A smirk, a certain tilt of the head, a pair of knowing eyes that beckoned the reader closer, only to ensnare them in a slow-burning undoing.

No, she was never real. Not before the ink touched the page.

And yet—

A body collided with hers. A sharp gasp. A sudden jolt.

Sonya staggered back, her heart slamming against her ribs as her gloved fingers curled into her skirts. The moment stretched, suspended in the hush of the fog.

She blinked. Impossible.

For a fleeting second, she could not breathe. The woman at her feet—she was the very image of the character she had imagined, conjured in the privacy of her study, the one Castor had pressed her about over brandy and laughter.

Sonya exhaled slowly, quelling the ridiculous notion. Coincidence. Nothing more.

With practiced grace, she extended a hand. A picture of aristocratic poise, her voice smooth, unshaken.

"My sincerest apologies," she said, gray-blue eyes sharp, searching. "Are you hurt?"