Somehow, Jack recovered his senses. Perhaps it was the thought of the little girl who was behind him somewhere, in that bright, beguiling meadow, waiting to be brought home. 

He didn't think too hard about the fact that her home was gone – pulled down to make room for a warehouse – or that everyone she loved was dead, apart from her sister. He thought about the snub-nose and the awkward arm-swings, until he could almost see her before him, and almost forget about all that fascinating black lace.

He smiled and bowed, facing slightly towards the Queen, so that Robin didn't get as much of the bow as she did.

"Your Majesty-"

"What can you do to entertain me?" said the Queen. She inched forwards to the front of her throne, and leant down to him, making the black lace over her breasts shift.

Jack looked down quickly, but was afraid it hadn't been quickly enough. "W-would you like to know who I am first?"

"I'll know who you are when I know what you can do."

He risked a look at her face – definitely her face – and saw a curious expression there, half-hungry and half-scornful. She motioned to his left, and said, "You play, yes?"

Jack's muscles had seized up with dread and longing, but he managed to turn his head, and look in the direction she was indicating. A piano had materialized beside him.

"Ah – no," he said, a little breathlessly. "In fact, I don't, your Majesty, but-"

She gave a short, scornful giggle. It seemed to burst out of her before her queenly instincts could suppress it. Then she cleared her throat, smoothed her gown on her knees, and went on in a more elevated strain: "Are you afraid of the piano, interloper? Does it make a sound too harsh for your delicate ears?"

Jack could hardly answer her. He was too busy thinking about the giggle. It had somehow put him in mind of Myrrha, Alice Darwin, and Baby Jane at the same time. And he realized that there were composite elements of all three women in the Queen.

She had Ellini's body, of course, because what could torment him more than that? But there was a childish whine to her voice that was all Myrrha's, and a simpering scowl that was Baby Jane's, and her breasts were too large to be Ellini's. They must have been Alice Darwin's – or what he imagined to be Alice Darwin's, because she was the only one whose breasts he hadn't seen.

The Queen was an amalgamation of every woman he'd ever wanted. She was lust incarnate. And she wanted him to play the piano. If she had ordered him to drop his trousers, she couldn't have made him feel more vulnerable.

She laughed at his silence, and Robin joined in – rather late, but with added malice.

Still, the sound of his laughter killed hers, and Jack was pleased to see her roll her eyes, as if she was surrounded by idiots and nobody knew what she suffered. That was Alice Darwin too.

"You are here to take my little Sita from me?" she prompted. "Fair is fair, interloper, I must have some entertainment in exchange."

"If I play for you," said Jack slowly, "I can take Sita home?"

"If you please me with your playing, you can take Sita home."

"Ah."

He turned to the piano with a kind of stiff, heavy-limbed despair. Even approaching it was like climbing a mountain. He could hear his breathing quickening, and knew that she could hear it too.

There was no stool, but he had often played standing-up. He had found the tricky parts easier that way, although this seemed incomprehensible to him now.

He reached towards the keys, and suddenly wondered what it would be like to die from a botched, back-alley abortion, full of hatred for the man who'd sent you there.

He woke up on the floor, with the sound of laughter in his ears. For a moment, he thought he'd passed out during one of his concerts – at the Alhambra, or the Crystal Palace – and they were laughing to see Spring-heeled Jack faint like a woman in a tight-laced corset.

Then it came back to him. Only two people were laughing, but they were worse than a whole auditorium. They were worse than the whole world.

He told himself he had to keep his temper, but, in truth, he wasn't tempted to lose it. He felt too cold and stupid for that. He thought of the dull, spiritless versions of Joel and Alim, and wondered whether it was catching. Perhaps everyone became blank and deadened if they spent too long down here. Perhaps the Underworld claimed you an inch at a time.

Slowly and mechanically, he got to his feet. The Queen was pouting with fake sympathy. "Poor interloper," she crooned. "Are you unwell? Can we get you a glass of wine to steady your nerves?"

Jack kept his eyes trained on the floor. "Is there – something else I can do to entertain you, ma'am?"

She raised her eyebrows and glanced at her husband. "What do you say, my love? How can this man satisfy me?"

When Robin just laughed stupidly, she got down from her throne, sashayed closer, and ran a single, long-nailed finger down Jack's torso. He felt as though he was going to pass out again.

"It takes a man of substance to satisfy me," she whispered. "I don't think you're up to the job."

Jack seized on his last, floundering hope. "Fighting," he burst out. "I'm very good at fighting. Your Majesty. Let me fight some kind of monster for Sita – I mean, for your entertainment, in exchange for Sita."

The Queen rolled her eyes and turned back to Robin. "Fighting again. We've seen it before, interloper, and it can scarcely be more impressive than the last man we had down here."

"You mean Hercules?" said Jack, in a wild burst of inspiration. "But he was half-god. I'm entirely mortal, so the contests will last longer. I'll suffer more – it will be more exciting."

She ran that long-nailed finger down his cheek. "You do look as though you would suffer beautifully..."

"Let him fight, my dear," said Robin, examining his belt of skulls. "Perhaps he could run the gauntlet. You know you love it when they run the gauntlet. And this one has stamina, if not skill."

"Stamina," said Jack, who was feeling a stupid, salesman-like urge to boast to this beautiful woman. "He's right, your Majesty, I'm relentless. You said so yourself – I mean, the lady whose appearance you seem to have-"

"Very well," she said, in a resigned voice. "Let him run the gauntlet. It may amuse me yet."

She gave another vague, languorous wave of her hand – he recognized the motion from Baby Jane – and the King stood up with more enthusiasm than Jack had seen in him before. He put a hand on Jack's shoulder and walked him back up the great staircase, explaining the minutiae of the gauntlet.

Jack was starting to realize that this king was as unlike the real Robin as the Queen was unlike the real Ellini. Every once in a while, he would give a slow, vicious smile, or squeeze Jack's shoulder a little too tightly, as if he'd just remembered that he was supposed to be intimidating. But, for the most part, he was hen-pecked and uncertain, and seemed to be looking forward to the gauntlet the way a put-upon husband might look forward to the weekend's football. It was probably his only escape.

"The gauntlet is a series of rooms with challenges inside them," said the king. "Beasts, thoughts, memories, riddles – you'll have to best them all. And you will only have one hour in which to do so."

"I'll try and make it forty-five minutes," said Jack, thinking of the time he had already wasted here.

The king chuckled at his confidence, but Jack ignored him. He was feeling rejuvenated. Whatever the gauntlet consisted of, it had to be better than the piano.

"You'll be allowed a familiar," said the king. "An advisor, really. It helps the contestants stay sane."

Even this couldn't dampen Jack's spirits. He quite liked the idea of having a demonic familiar. "Will it be one of your subjects?" he asked.

"Usually, yes, but in this case, I thought you'd prefer to have Sita. While she's cut off from her body, she can do most of the things a demon familiar could. And she's an incentive." Here, he gave a very Robin-like smile. "You'll need one, if you're to get through the red room."

"What's the red room?" said Jack, thinking of the haunted room where Jane Eyre had fainted.

"Oh, it varies, from person to person," said the king, with a wave of his hand. "Usually very colourful, though. That's why we call it the red room."

Jack suddenly understood that this man was only being helpful because he wanted to extract the maximum amount of entertainment from the gauntlet. The further Jack got, the longer it lasted. And the longer it lasted, the more prolonged the king's escape from his matrimonial duties. Jack felt a gloomy kind of sympathy. "I'll have Sita, then."

The king beamed. "I thought you would say that, so I'm taking you to see her. My – that is, her Majesty – is watching her answer riddles by Vassago's canyon."

"Do you... know anything about Prince Seere?" Jack asked, feeling foolish.

The king blinked benignly. It was so odd, to see Robin's vicious green eyes doing anything benign. "Who's that?"

"Uh... one of the seventy-two potentates of hell. As described in the Ars Goetia?"

"Never heard of him," said the king. "The demon realms are vast and, frankly, not very communicative."

"But Vassago's one of them," Jack insisted. "Who's Vassago?"

"My wife's great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandfather," said the king, counting off eight 'greats' on his fingers.

"Ellini's descended from him," said Jack thoughtfully. "Sita, too, I suppose."

"Probably why my wife wants to keep her."

Jack stopped abruptly and turned to the king. "Is there any way I could get through this gauntlet alive? After all, the further I get, the more entertaining I am, yes?"

"Yes. And I suspect there will be more entertainments if you win."

"You mean she'll break her word? She won't let me have Sita?"

"Oh, she will, yes. Of course. But she'll make you do what Orpheus did."

Jack frowned at him. "Which part... of what Orpheus did?"

"Lead your loved one out of the underworld without looking back at her."

"Why should that be so – so entertaining?"

"You have no idea," said the king.

Jack nearly seized hold of the man's tunic. He suppressed the impulse, remembering that this was Robin – to a greater or lesser extent – and you never made any assumptions with Robin. "I can help you," he said, in a low, significant voice. "If you help me."

The king smiled. It was one of Robin's new smiles – full of mocking bitterness and self-hatred. Full of bite. For that moment, he was so completely Robin that Jack took a step backwards, expecting an attack. But he only shook his head sadly, the way a befuddled and put-upon husband might.

"Nobody can help me," he said.