Chapters Twenty-five—Twenty-eight Summary

On their way back in Chapter Twenty-five, Ismae and Duval are met by a messenger who tells them that their prisoner, one of the men who attacked them, has escaped. They go to the cell where he is held and Duval asks how it happened. Ismae, however, realizes that the man was killed in the cell and did not escape alive. Duval asks for a list of names of the people who have visited the man in his cell, then he and Ismae go to tell the duchess what they have learned from Fredric. He advises his sister that her best course of action on other suitors is to claim that it is too soon after her father's death to think of marriage. Ismae is surprised that even though she is a duchess, Anne has little say...