The Fox Hunt

by Caitlin Breeze

Genres: Dark Fantasy; Literary Fiction

Synopsis

Behind closed doors at England’s most ancient university, a circle of privileged students enter into a dark pagan ritual—one that holds tantalizing power and comes at a terrible price.

When practical, unassuming second-year student Emma Curran wins an exciting research fellowship, she is ushered into the glittering debauchery of the University elite. There, she falls for the devastating, aristocratic Jasper Balfour, leader of the all-male Turnbull Club: a shadowy secret society that has created centuries of Britain’s leaders, power brokers and history-makers.
 
One night, the Turnbulls propose a sinister little game: a fox hunt. The women run. The men chase. And Emma finds herself fleeing for her life through the streets, hunted by the boy she loves. 

Torn from her ordinary life and trapped in a dangerous, otherworldly realm, Emma awakens transformed. No longer mortal, she's become something beastly. And now she must summon every ounce of cunning and ferocity to save herself.

Release date: February 24, 2026

Publisher: Little, Brown and Company

Print pages: 400

Sample

There had never been such a flood. Not in living memory, at least. It came up silently. A dark tide clawed from the river, finger by finger, into the sleeping city. Under the cold gaze of the hunter’s moon, it eased past the windows of students and academics, porters and librarians. It brushed their tangled dreams, lapping higher.

In the span of one nightfall, the waters claimed the University.

At sunset, the cobblestones had rattled with book-laden bicycles. The medieval mouths of the great college gates had gaped wide to welcome their gowned undergraduates and threadbare lecturers, to cradle the ancient dons tottering to their places at High Table. Bells rang out from myriad spires, and evensong silvered the air around Gabriel Tower.

By morning, all was drowned. Slick black ropes of water fingered the college foundations. Ankle-deep, knee-deep, waist-deep. Beneath its touch, gold stone weathered green. In the gray dawn, rows of bicycles bobbed at their moorings, as though lifted by ghostly hands. The straight march of the High Street turned wavering and sly.

And then the rain started.

It would become the tale of decades. The students passing precious paintings up to safety, bracing against waters that curled around hips and thighs. The lectures canceled, the tutorials postponed. In Persian-carpeted studies, professors settled in with their decanters. Underpaid lecturers huddled closer to their space heaters, submerging themselves deeper in Aramaic love poetry to stave off thoughts of the damp. The few cars that attempted to drive through the flood sputtered and died, bonnet-deep in swirling pondweed. Wading the streets was a task for only the bravest or the most desperate. For three days, the tourists had to stay out. The students had to stay in.

And in their absence, the other lives in the city rejoiced.

As the waters triumphed, dark fish swam up the steps of the Senate House. A shifting sheet of pewter covered the formal gardens, where eels wrestled in ecstatic knots among the drowning rosebushes. Spiders danced in the vaulted stone cathedral of St. Dunstan’s College.

Then, on the third day, the flood receded. The river drew back its reaches from the modern outskirts first. Within a few hours, even the water at the ancient heart of the city stood less than knee-deep. The mortal world began its inevitable process of reclaiming and forgetting. Waterlogged college gates were pushed open again. An army of college servants swept river silt from the courtyards.

And high in Gabriel Tower, Emma Curran woke from a troubled nap with a start. Mist had laid moist fingers on her windowpane, clouding the city outside. She listened for the sound that had woken her and heard nothing. But something had changed. She was sure of it. It took her a moment to realize.

The rain had finally stopped.

She had listened to it through the three long days of her confinement. So long, the tapping water had begun to sound like whispers beyond the windowpane. They had seeped into her dreams. She rubbed at the window with her sleeve and peered out. At last, a few gleams of paving stone showed through the murk in the lane below. After three days of nothing but deep black currents, it felt like an omen of good luck, just for her. She laid aside the work on her lap and stretched limbs grown stiff from hours curled into the window seat.

A jolt pierced her heart. The rain was gone, and so was her last excuse. If she was going, it was nearly time. Everything she needed had been laid out on her bed in the morning, just in case. With hands she couldn’t stop from shaking a little, she buttoned the crisp shirt, smoothed out one last imaginary crease in her good trousers. The chime of her phone distracted her for a moment only. Barely pausing to read the message, she dashed off a reply and went back to muttering under her breath. She’d memorized the facts. Only the opening still troubled her. Some people introduced themselves so easily. As though talking about themselves wasn’t an insurmountable obstacle.

Her eyes strayed back to her phone. With a groan, she dropped the half-packed bag on her bed. Slipping from the room, she tapped on the door next to hers. They were the only two on the floor: Gabriel College had only recently converted the tower’s crumbling cells into accommodations. It was not a popular option, thanks to the deafening cycle of bells from the belfry above. The monks who had first built Gabriel College had been dead six centuries, but still the bell tower rang out the joyful and thunderous pattern of their days, matins to compline. But for two second-year students who cared more about being close to the dining hall than the sanctity of sleep, the rooms were perfect.

“Come in.”

Emma pushed open the door without ceremony.

Nat’s bedroom was a collage of old film posters and flyers for upcoming plays. While the desk was buried under enough layers of books to qualify as an archaeological site, the area around the state-of-the-art sound system on the opposite wall was spotless. It was best not to consider how far the contents of that wall outstripped the value of her student loans, she’d found. Before the University, Emma had never imagined anyone her age with their own cinema-grade sound system. That had changed the day she’d arrived at Gabriel, a year earlier, when she’d seen fifteen unloaded with the new freshers from tasteful Range Rovers and Tesla SUVs.

The figure stretched on the bed grinned at her. Emma looked at the phone in his hand and sighed.

“Can it be?” Nat Oluwole threw his head back, gesturing to the heavens. “Can my own Emma Curran be abandoning me?”

He was the best boy alive, but he did like to declaim.

“I’m sorry,” Emma said, but there was a smile in it. There always was when Nat decided to make her laugh. “I really don’t want to let you down.”

“Now that sounds likely,” he said gravely. “You, the most faithful friend in history, a letdown? Well, of course. I mean, who would not have spent their last gods-given, lecture-free day pricking holes in their fingers to make me a costume—for no other reason than I mentioned it last week—and all for a party they now refuse to go to?”

“I tried to explain in my message. Nat, surely you can see? I won’t know anyone, I don’t know how to act at these things, and I’ll go home feeling terrible about myself.”

Nat shook his head. “I mention a party, and you start wailing like it’s the last act of Tosca. But I make you hot-glue bottlecaps to a sleeping bag all night long—”

Emma’s brow crinkled. “I really didn’t mean to set off the fire alarm. I hope that lecturer above was all right. The burnt smell definitely reached his floor. And the alarm was so loud—”

“It was barely three a.m.,” Nat went on with a dismissive flap of his hand. “And he chose to live in a bell tower. He’ll be fine. But you, treasure among friends? You’ve glued and stitched away, and not complained or even questioned my sanity—”

“When you said this costume was for a party, I thought it was one of your theatre parties,” Emma said. “I’ve done much madder things for those. Like when you had me sew you up in an actual shroud for the Macbeth cast party last year? You had to get the director to guide you around by the hand all night, to stop you tripping over chairs.”

“I,” said Nat with lofty dignity, “was the ghost of Banquo. You logical minds cannot understand the exigencies of art. Or parties.”

“We logical minds are also covered in glue burns from last night’s ‘exigencies of art.’ And we are not going to the party. There will be too many people, and I’m tired, and—” Emma flopped onto the bed. Nat shifted to make room. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about. I sent you that message, and then of course I started worrying that you’d hate me—”

“Which I don’t,” Nat interposed.

“And that you’d be angry with me—”

“Which I never have been.”

“—because it was lovely of you to invite me. But I actually have something else this afternoon. And I don’t know how late I’ll be.”

Nat propped himself up on one arm. “Do tell.”

“It’s—it’s the Colefax-Lee Foundation program. The interviews are today.”

Nat whistled. “Big stuff. Are you sure they’ll be happening, though? Flood, and all that?”

“The waters are going down.” Emma bounced, her body athrill with excitement again. “And it’s not far. I have to try.”

“Going down is not gone.”

“Oh, I don’t need to worry about that. Look—”

Emma dashed from the room. The sound of rubbery squeaking and a few choice profanities emerged from her bedroom. A few moments later, she pushed open Nat’s door and stood framed in the doorway in all her glory.

“Good God,” Nat said blankly.

A pair of voluminous, violently green rubber waders enclosed Emma from toe to chest. “I kept them from that time at the field station in Senegal.” She beamed. “I thought they might come in handy if I ever wanted to do a survey of the caddis fly larvae in the river here. A colleague of my mother’s in the US is writing a paper on how they might be linked to otter populations. Wouldn’t it be amazing to actually find out if the same is true here?”

“Indeed,” Nat agreed weakly. “Just what anyone would think. Now, take the hideous things off.”

Emma wriggled obediently out of the offending articles. “Anyway, they’re perfect for today. I’ll be as dry as can be. Oh!” She dashed from the room a second time. “How could I forget? It’s finished. Your costume.” She dropped her armful of fabric into Nat’s lap. Her friend let out a joyful squawk she was sure he would die rather than let his theatre friends hear. “I hope you make an excellent caterpillar,” Emma laughed.

“I will,” said Nat, with absolute confidence.

“And I hope you impress whoever all this is meant for.”

“It’s no one. Nothing. Just a friend.” His neck had flushed bright red.

Emma fought a smile. She wasn’t sure which boy had attracted Nat’s attention this time. His many loves were legend. Unlike Emma, who dated seldom and with a scientist’s detachment, Nat had a way of truly believing every time that at last, this one was true love.

“Lewis Carroll would be proud,” her friend was muttering now, spinning in front of the mirror with the costume draped over his long form. The interminable hours she’d spent in the window seat—listening to the rain and sewing the hundreds of legs—had been worth it. He looked spectacular.

“But, Emma—”

Nat had stopped twirling.

“After the interviews. You could still come to the party, right? It won’t matter if you’re late. Just throw on that blue dress you have, and I’ll say you’re Alice in Wonderland. To go with me. It’ll be fun. They’ll love you.”

Emma pulled a face.

“Em—” The caterpillar hugged her around the shoulders. “You’re one of my favorite people. Truly. But you need more friends than just me. Let the world get to know you. You might be surprised.”

Emma shook her head and busied herself with picking up her waders. “I don’t know if I’ll feel like it.”

“I’m not going to press you if you don’t want to go. You know that. And I love this newfound firmness.” He raised one eyebrow at her, a trick she’d never been able to copy. “It suits you. I’m just tickled that, after all of the idiotic requests I’ve seen you give in to, this party is the one that broke the, er”—Nat eyed her long frame and grinned—“giraffe’s back?”

Emma reached out and swatted him, without any real heat. “Giraffe yourself.”

Then, as an afterthought: “It suits me?”

“Yes, Emma.” Nat could go from theatrical to sincere in the time it took for Emma’s voice to wobble. “And so does your height, for that matter.”

Emma rolled her eyes at that.

“Go on.” He grinned, herding her out of his room. “Go get the millionaire funding of your dreams. And see how you feel afterward.”

Firm. Emma found herself repeating the word in her head. Firm.

It did suit her.

Among the tourists buying University sweatshirts, among the scramble of bicycles in its arteries and the punts gliding along its veins, the City sensed the life in one small square. Within the embrace of Gabriel College, a girl was hurrying across a flood-silvered lawn.

Women—as recently added to the intellectual life of the University as they were—were always thinking or reading or walking the City’s paths now. The sight was no surprise to it. Nevertheless, it paused a moment before its attention rolled onward to the river.

For a girl whose posture did not betray an obvious longing for the spotlight, Emma Curran possessed features that demanded to take up space. She was built on taller lines than the average, with sharp shoulders and long, sturdy legs. Her nose and brows were striking rather than delicate. The strength of her features added a character to her little moon-circle face that time had not yet given. Everything else about her looked bare and fresh.

And, at the moment, a little damp. The last spatters of rain were blowing off the river, straight into her face. But at least her feet were dry. The waders were perfect. She splashed on across the marshland that had once been Gabriel’s croquet lawn. A stray sunbeam lit the turrets above, striking gold from the weathered stone. And Emma’s heart swelled, as it always did when she looked at her home. Gabriel College, crumbling and magnificent. Low of coffer but great of heart: its tapestries moldering, but its ducks the best fed in the city. It was where Emma’s soul came to roost and had done since the day she arrived.

The college was the northmost of those lining the river. Beyond its august walls lay only the University Meadows and the Guilder Wood. Their paths were her favorite haunts. Curlews stalked the grasses; shadowy copses hid the elusive Guilder deer. Emma had even glimpsed a pair of otters at the bend in the river by the North Gate.

But she had no time to watch now. Emma checked the zip of her bag again, convinced it might have opened itself while she wasn’t looking. It was tightly fastened. Not a drop could leak onto the papers inside. She tugged down her hood and slipped out of the North Gate. The floodwater in Gabriel Passage was only ankle-deep. Another good omen. The High Street was bound to be passable.

As Emma waded on, she saw signs that the colleges, so tightly shut during the flood, were coming back to life. Portly Granville College, lounging across two blocks of the city. Lady Margaret’s, with its eerie twisted towers. Cheerful Sussex and austere Wessex. This place was like nowhere else. It called to her, an enchanting song of beauty and history and something beyond that, something she’d never been able to name. Everywhere, doors opening, college bedders sneaking cigarettes in the archways, the chatter of students piping among the chimneys.

Water was sluicing down the High Street, draining down cobbled lanes that sloped to the river. A procession of porters waded through the churn, bearing spadefuls of frogs. The floodwater rippled up around their calves and ankles like a preening cat, throwing out bewitching glints. It was almost mesmeric, watching it. Emma felt her breathing slow, her nerves drift.

Then the porters flipped their spades. Frogs splashed into the tide and were swept, croaking, back to the river. Startled from her daze, Emma jerked up. She’d been leaning toward the water, her hand almost brushing the surface. She didn’t remember why. A porter tipped his bowler hat to Emma, and she waded on.

Her bag started ringing. Emma rummaged inside for her phone. She saw the caller and smiled. Madagascar was three hours ahead. Her mother would be having lunch in the research station canteen.

“Have I caught you before the interview?” Her mother sounded cheerful, as always.

Something in Emma’s chest loosened. “On my way now.”

“Oh, good. Sorry, we’ve had a mare’s nest of a morning. First the water in the lab backed up, then we found a lemur nibbling the power cables outside.”

Emma’s mother was an academic. “A fertility expert,” she liked to say at parties. “Only for plants, not people.” And people laughed. They usually did, when she was around. Dr. Diana Curran was a square-set, petite woman with strong hands, often covered in soil. Thanks to her mother’s trailblazing research career, Emma had grown up in six cities, four field stations, and eight different countries. She’d been told she didn’t sound properly English, as a result. Her mother had always said that was a good thing.

For now, her mother was heading up a research station in Madagascar. Emma had been promised a rainforest trip for the Christmas holidays, so she was a fan of this latest posting.

“How’s things at Gabriel? Still flooded in?”

“Just going down. People have gone mad, though, being shut inside. Everyone is talking about the fuss in the kitchen. One of the chefs is threatening to quit. Apparently, someone’s been sneaking the desserts from the fridge overnight and leaving a crock of petals in their place. So Nat says, anyway.”

Her mother chuckled. “Must be the students, surely. I’ve seen enough practical jokes in my time. And how is Nat doing? Did it go well, telling his parents? You never said.”

“Turns out he didn’t do it. Spent the whole summer working up to it, too. He says his family have just about come to terms with him dating boys, but him throwing over a decent career for a life on the stage would be, in his words, ‘like hurling a grenade into a cage of poodles.’ It’s all a bit weird still with the traditional parts of his family, anyway.”

“Oh, that’s tough. But what does his father think he’s doing all this time, outside of class?”

“Volunteering at the church, like he was supposed to.”

“Well, tell him from me that it’s best to be honest. Now, back to you, ladybug. Nervous?”

“A little.”

“You don’t need to be. You can do anything you set your mind to, and don’t forget it.”

Emma hung up, feeling a warmth in her chest. Not for the first time, she wished she had the assurance that came so naturally to her mother. Her fierce mother, whose only lapse in insight had been a brief, careless liaison with a man of more charm than principle. Who had brought forth her unplanned baby a week before her PhD viva, with no father in sight. The only thing that man had ever given Emma, she liked to say, was the surname on her birth certificate. Emma Pelham. And even that they never used. She had been Emma Curran to the world from the day her mother brought her home.

Diana Curran had marched in front of a panel of academics alone, baby Emma strapped to her chest, and delivered a blistering PhD defense. She had left destined for one of the brightest careers in her field. She would not have been afraid of a few questions at an interview.

Nerves thrummed in Emma’s belly. By the time she turned into the forecourt of the Science Department, she felt her pulse in every part of her body. Emma followed the signs to a corridor lined with plastic chairs, and shed the waders. A single poster stuck to a glass door read “Colefax-Lee Foundation Interviews: Wait Here.”

The lines of seats were empty. The other candidates were running late, she supposed. Emma chose the chair nearest the door, hid the waders underneath, and waited.

Purposeful steps echoed down the corridor. Emma’s head jerked up.

The cool, oval face was one Emma knew well. At least by sight.

Julia Colefax-Lee’s eighteenth birthday had been captured in lavish detail in Tatler. Her mother, it was rumored, was a paternal cousin to Princess Diana. Her godmother was a former lady-in-waiting to the queen. She had emerged from Swiss boarding school with the expected poise and accomplishments. She had also acquired a gracious smile that made those in its path feel included and special—however quickly its giver hurried away afterward.

Like Emma, Julia belonged to Gabriel College. Emma had seen her returning to her room, surrounded always by a cloud of girls with hand-painted highlights and whippety torsos. They had never spoken.

The cool gaze took her in with a hint of surprise. “You’re not here for the foundation, are you?”

“Th-the interview?” Emma stammered. “Yes.”

“Mmm.” Julia’s gaze was dancing somewhere above Emma’s shoulder. “Well. I’m sure the rest will be here soon. The other interviewers are running a little late too.”

Emma couldn’t coax her eyes away from Julia’s dress, an exquisitely tailored confection of cream silk. It looked as though it had been designed for the boardroom of a California tech company. Emma darted a look down at her own plain white shirt and sole pair of smart trousers. They had seemed lovely in her room.

A redhead charged into the corridor, a sodden umbrella streaming in her wake.

“Jules! Bloody nightmare getting here. And Venetia nowhere to be seen, of course.”

Julia sighed. “I’d wanted to wait for her, but—there! Beautiful girl!”

The object of her raptures stalked down the corridor, not visibly moved. She had a perfectly symmetrical face, delicately pointed chin, and long blond Alice in Wonderland hair. Not a drop of water clung to her skintight leather dress or the red bottoms of her boots.

“God, the taxi driver took forever. Well, if we’re doing this, let’s get it done.”

Centuries of boredom oozed from that one small voice.

“Of course, darling. Let’s set up. We’ll leave some time for the candidates to arrive.”

The door swung shut, leaving Emma alone in the corridor. She unclenched her fingers and muttered her way through her opening paragraph once more.

But before she reached the second sentence, she realized the glass door was not soundproof. She could hear every syllable of the girls’ conversation. And—if she twisted in her chair at just the right angle—she could see them.

On the other side of the door, Julia sat in the central interviewer’s chair, sipping a sparkling water. Venetia had propped her feet on the table. Imogen Baldock was pacing in front of them, red curls bouncing, breathless with news.

“You will not believe who’s here.”

“Who?”

“Three clues. St. Dunstan’s College. Supposed to be racing his family’s yacht around the world this year. Most beautiful boy in the University. Come on, darlings.”

“Not Jasper Balfour?” Julia sat bolt upright. “Back?”

Imogen chuckled. “Oh, he’ll be sure to scandalize half the University before term’s out. But you have to admit, things would have been dull without the divine Jasper.” She perched on the table and swung her legs. “Perhaps I’ll have a crack at him myself this year.”

She added, under Julia’s wry glance, “Well, the demigod will have to fall in love one day. And why not with me?” She grinned. “Or the thousand others in the queue, yes.”

“That’s old news, surely.” Venetia half closed her eyes. “Apparently, his father wasn’t overjoyed about his only son taking a year off from the University to go yachting around the world—”

“—or maybe he wanted the yacht for himself,” Imogen cut in, “to impress that film actress he’s been seeing on the side. My dad’s friends with him. He let that slip.”

Venetia Kent rolled her eyes. Imogen’s father owned a stable of the country’s most slanderous scandal sheets. Gossip ran in the family.

“Don’t try to be clever, Imogen dearest,” she purred. “It doesn’t suit you.”

“So, Jasper’s back at St. Dunstan’s?”

“Yes, he seemed very disappointed when I spoke to him.” Venetia shook back her moonlight hair.

“You’ve seen him already?”

“Did he say anything about you-know-what?”

“Oh, about”—Venetia looked up, the tiniest smile playing across her doll features—“being president of the Society?”

Julia spat a mouthful of water into her cream silk lap.

“What?” Venetia crossed one long, leather-clad leg over the other luxuriantly. Some people only feel truly at ease surrounded by discomfort. Particularly other people’s. Venetia Kent was one such. “We’re not five years old. This supersecret society nonsense is idiotic. But Jasper did tell me, actually. Now he’s back—”

At this point, Emma’s chair let out a loud scraping noise. She hastily rearranged herself. By the time Julia opened the door, she was facing innocently to the front, her hands clasped over the folder in her lap.

“Oh.” The disappointment in Julia’s voice was hard to miss. She was looking over Emma’s head to the row of empty chairs. “Well—why don’t you come in.”

Emma scurried past her to the seat facing the panel.

“But aren’t we seeing Arabella Lennox and that girl from Jules’ dressage club?”

“They were supposed to be here,” Julia murmured fretfully. “I suppose the rain—”

“What, Tilly Harper-Graveney?” Imogen added. “Or that other one? Daughter of the Sotheby’s chairman. Came to Eddie’s birthday in Antibes—”

“Daisy Cadogan,” muttered Julia, shuffling the papers in front of her.

“That’s the one,” said Imogen. “I thought it was all sorted that she’d get the Natural Sciences Fellowship and Arabella would—”

Julia had the grace to look embarrassed. “Nothing’s decided. That’s why we’re interviewing candidates like, er—”

“Emma. Emma Curran.”

Julia dove back through her pile of papers. “That’s right, I saw my father’s assistant had added an application. I hadn’t read it yet. For the Science and Environment endowment? Let’s see.”

Emma knotted her fingers in her lap. Julia’s delicate nose was buried deep in her binder.

“Application—conserving and renewing river habitats,” she muttered. “Tracking population balances, find where to invest to make the most difference versus climate change—two-year trial here in the city. This is—” She looked up, a little wrinkle of surprise between her brows. “Well, it’s exactly what we were looking for. Practical and academic. Local, but the end product is a model that could be applied anywhere.”

She tapped her forefingers together, lost in thought. Then her gaze snapped back to Emma. “But it says here that you study law. Not natural sciences. An odd fit for a science endowment, surely?”

“Technically. But I’ve spent a lot of time around field research. I’ve had hands-on experience. There’s a summary in my proposal—”

Emma slid it across the table. The shaking in her hands eased as she opened to the page on her methodology. The hours she had spent working on the tables and figures showed. What did it matter if her last three law essays had been handed in late?

“Emma, the Colefax-Lee Foundation Fellowships will support ten female students,” Julia said. “With projects that will change the world, from the arts to the sciences. It is a significant investment in significant women.” Her voice was beautiful, low and modulated. Emma couldn’t imagine speaking with such poise. “So. Why do you think you deserve one of those ten fellowships?” Julia asked.

Firm, Emma reminded herself. Firmness suits me.

She began her rehearsed speech. “Rivers. They are key—”

“What year is she in?” Venetia rocked back in her chair. “You can’t have another fresher, Jules. The first one was ghastly.”

“Well, I’m a second-year,” Emma answered. “Undergraduate, at Gabriel College.”

“Second-year at Gabriel?” Julia leaned forward. “But that’s the same as me. How have I never seen you before?”

“I’m not… out much.” Emma hurried on. “But it is that dedication I would apply to this project, which could bring significant insight into the wildlife of—”

“Did you go to a state school?” Imogen broke in.

“Well—yes, when we were in England—”

“There.” Imogen grinned at Julia. “She’s diversity. You needed one of those.”

Julia opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out.

“It’s not as though you have any other options.” Venetia lunged to her feet. “For once, I agree with Imogen. Why waste our time? If Arabella or Daisy had really wanted it, they should have shown up.”

She swept past Emma to the door, Imogen jostling behind her.

“Come on, Jules.” Venetia tossed her hair over one shoulder. “Pick-me-up at Boddington’s? I kept the taxi waiting.”

“You go ahead.”

The footsteps faded away. Julia stayed in her chair, cool gaze appraising Emma.

“This foundation is important to my family, and to me. Do you know why?”

Perplexed at this turn in the conversation, Emma shook her head.

“My father started it, back when the University wasn’t so sure that someone who looked like him belonged here. The Lees are as old money as any family in England, don’t get me wrong. But their currency was still a little too—Chinese—for the University.” Her voice turned sharp. “For the college servants that refused to work for him. For certain lecturers and tutors. And now our name is on their buildings. The Colefax-Lee Foundation funds their key research. The University can no longer politely pretend that we don’t exist, not when we’re so important to its survival.”

She wasn’t meeting Emma’s eyes. She was looking at something in her binder. Emma’s heart sank. “This program for female students was my idea. My part of our legacy. Its success means more to me than you can know.”

The silence stretched.