Shane followed Kit into the bathroom. Most on-campus were unisex, which spared her the initial awkwardness.
"Do you need to watch me pissing to make sure I'm doing it right?" the boy spat with venom she was not owed, but she was not its real target.
"You must keep me safe," Shane said evenly. "You can't do that from the bathroom."
"Do you need to pee?" he asked more softly.
"Not terribly," Shane said. "You?"
He sniffed, swallowing his bitter fear. Was it the violence itself, or the reminder of his own bloodshed? Or that his rescuer had so recently been his persecutor?
"I want to wash my hands," he admitted.
"So wash them," Shane said. "Don't leave me alone."
He searched her face again, and she kept neutral. She was not mocking him. Letting Kit project his fear on her was the most efficient way.
Shane listened to the rattle of the key in the front lock. She knew better than most what it sounded like when one was picking a lock, having done it more than she cared to count. Roselyn knew where all pertinent keys were hidden--more by cunning than magic.
Shane had not so much as dozed, though Huginn kept watch on her through the night, ensuring her consciousness did not slip.
Clive followed Roselyn into the safehouse. Before she could stop herself, she gave them a once-over. Their clothes were fresh, but they had the looser posture that comes with being slightly toasted or freshly laid. At this hour, and having come here together, Shane's every penny was on the latter.
Shane spared Roselyn the apologetic assurance that she didn't have to be here so early or at all. Roselyn did as she wished and as she felt was necessary, and Shane could only respect it.
"We all seem to be in one piece this morning," Clive said, "though that only counts for so much."
"No further bloodshed," Shane said. Kit had woken twenty minutes before, peed, saw Shane in the living room, and shut his door a decibel more loudly than necessary. Shane was not versed in teenage mores and had not been when she was so hormonally blighted. She suspected he wanted her to intrude so he could pretend annoyance that she had. She heard a muffled keening there, maybe from him crying into a pillow. Or maybe not.
She had given Clive what she could. He would dig. But that work would take time, and time was something Steven and his curse did not respect.
When Shane opened the door, Kit stood too close to Steven, who had put himself between the boy and the only exit. Roselyn watched Shane enter with clinical patience.
She had barely set foot back in before Arden said, "Just in time," and nodded for her to sit. Absent an immediate plan of her own, she was content to substitute being fed.
Arden slid bowls around the table, leaving a few on the kitchen island, since more people needed the food than could sit. Arden kept a dish for herself. It was a poor cook who didn't want a little of her meal--and a poor witch who didn't want any of her blessings.
The apartment warmed as if the thermostat had been adjusted from "Anxiety" to "Comfort."
"Everyone," Arden declared.
Steven, already stepping closer to the door, bristled. "I don't--"
Arden snapped her fingers.
"What the fucking fuck?" Kit's voice cracked upward, hitting a register Shane was sure violated zoning ordinances at this hour. His whole body followed the trajectory of the words--backpedaling, retreating, then fleeing into one of the bedrooms.
He slammed the door so hard the apartment shuddered. A small puff of plaster dust drifted from the ceiling. Teenagers, Shane thought. If they weren't such drama queens, we would exorcise fewer poltergeists.
There were days when the supernatural world was dignified, mythic, and awe-inspiring. Shane had never personally been blessed with one, but she had it on good authority that these did exist.
Shane looked to the others for commiseration. Steven feigned concentration in a bolt in the rig. Jian Yue looked at Shane with an attentive contentment, awaiting her next order, unbothered that the teenager he assumed to be a K-pop star was throwing a justified fit.
Shane hoped Clive had escaped into the other bedroom before the storm of the tantrum could crash into him.
Roselyn, leaning against the counter, arms folded, stared at Shane.
"You had me drive a werewolf here?" A raised eyebrow. A slow inhale. A posture that said: Go after him, dope.
The vehicle slowed at the river, the headlights on the dock, barely catching the three of them hiding at the edge of the woods. Shane tensed, ready to drag Kit into a river escape if it came to that--and order Pompadour to punch any grabby mermaid in her scaly cloaca.
The car crunched onto the gravel, and she recognized the dent in Clive's Jeep beside the bumper sticker reading My other ride is an honor student at your mom (who is lovely, and we are proud of you).
Shane let out a breath she hadn't meant to hold. She stood, dusting dirt from her knees, and smirked at Kit. "See? You thought it would be gangsters about to murder us, but it wasn't."
Kit's shoulders unknotted, just slightly. "You're insane."
"Yes, you keep telling me that--which is a bit ablist," Shane said, waving toward the parking car, "but you cannot deny that my people are punctual."
Pompadour danced over, holding a single Styrofoam takeout clamshell as though it were his partner in this samba.
He knelt beside Shane, dropping the hum long enough to whisper, "I got you sushi."
Would this be drugged? It hardly mattered. She would not be eating it.
Shane almost felt a pang of conscience, springing at him, hugging him to her, fingernails digging into the soft flesh of his neck.
Pompadour's thoughts glimmered like beach glass: control, superiority, the hunger to dominate and submit, women whose faces blended until they were nothing but cargo. She cracked his mind, splintering the edges. The thousand psychic shards sliced her, but she would not retreat.
The splinters of pain--rare, but not unprecedented--resolved into one searing stab, a blade slicing through her eye.
She choked Pompadour without meaning, fearing she would lose herself to another surge of the sword's thoughts.
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