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Before she’d gone to bed, she’d pressed the cool scar on her palm against his own. She showed him the horrid fate that had befallen Cecil. Her empathy and compassion for the Shrike nearly broke him.

“And you saw what happened to Marchos,” she’d said. “Why would you trust someone who does that to people?”

Once she slept, his hazy, blood-filled eye lay across the dark fields and manifested a steaming cup of coffee, hoping the bitter beans would keep him mindful and awake. He gazed at the milky galaxias spiraling in his cup with a frown. It was nothing near Norah’s coffee. His coffee bubbles were stiff and firm with the viscosity of dish soap. Nor frothed hers until it was creamy like velvet, stacking her brew like a tall crown.

A chilling whine then screamed through his skull.

His hands gripped his ears but the alarm would not relinquish.

He knew that scream, he realized. And his eyes flew open.

Not here. Not now.

The fear of having such a beast at Norah’s door made his throat tighten. He leaned against the brick chimney, fingers clinging to his clavicle, feeling as though his heart would flop out of his chest in panic. His breastbone swelled with heat and his ribs were sore as though they’d crack and split him at the seams.

The atmosphere shifted as though a blanket of sleet had fallen upon Corvid. Vapors left his lips.

It was too late.

“Dexxxxterrrrrassss,” the blackness hissed like a writhing adder. “Come homeeeeeeee.”

The gorgeous Solus stepped into the light of the white moon, wearing a red suit dripping in vermilion and gold. For an instant, Dex desired to suck on their copper throat. But in another, he craved to squeeze the life from it.

They could entice anyone to grope for trout in a peculiar river.

“Get on with it,” Dex snarled, standing between Solus and Norah’s window. His bloodied eye inspected the metal grate embedded in their chest. “If she wakes before you’re gone, I’ll rip what’s left of your heart out.”