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Pup.”
    He looked away from the mirror, massaged his eyelids with thumb and forefinger. “She killed it?”
    “Garroted it with a wire from her laptop, then pumped it full of venom,” Lilith said, and laughed. Colin thought he detected a note of pride beneath it. “It’s not dead, though, just paralyzed. Michael teleported it to the holding cell at SI. Savi’s in the bathroom with Auntie; Hugh says Savi will wait until there’s no other choice before she lowers the symbols’ protection. But we’re going to have to deal with the mess, spin a story—there must be a lot of witnesses, and the body disappeared mid-flight. The plane lands in half an hour. Selah will bring them to our house then, so be there. We should arrive in New York just after that; we’re over Nebraska or some godforsaken place now.”
    He’d have Savi to himself for the entirety of the evening? A slow grin slipped over his mouth; Colin walked out of the flat, careful to turn the lock on the doorknob. He couldn’t engage the dead bolt from outside, but it wouldn’t have kept something like him out anyway. “You’re flying there with Michael; is he carrying you? How primitive, Agent Milton.”
    “Yeah, and I’m fucking freezing. A garrote!” She burst into laughter again.
    A masculine voice rumbled in the background. Lilith must have covered the mouthpiece with her hand; Colin could only hear the sharp tones of her reply. He stepped outside. The clouds had thinned into pale ribbons, and the moon hung round and heavy above the skyline. A block away, his Bentley sat by the curb; it’d take most of the half hour to drive across the city to Castleford’s house in Merced Manor. Much faster to run, but not half as stylish.
    “Michael says to tell you that he found something of yours by the fountain. What the hell does that mean?”
    He almost stumbled over the curb. Why hadn’t the Guardian killed him? Castleford would have. “It means that Savitri is going to have a very, very good time,” he finally managed.
    Ridiculous, to think of this as a second chance with Savi. A second chance for what? He’d only spoken at any length with her twice: fifteen minutes in her grandmother’s restaurant, and a few hours in Caelum. She was a bright young woman, certainly, but one he’d vowed not to pursue. His temporary obsession and their mutual enthrallment in Caelum was hardly reason to risk his friendship with Castleford and Lilith.
    The motor roared to life, but its growl was nothing to Lilith’s. “Colin, it’s not just Hugh anymore—she’s my sister now, too.”
    As if he could forget.

    The vibration of the engines stopped. Savi lifted her head from Nani’s silk-covered lap. Only two and a half hours had passed; the pilots must have continued on to New York instead of returning to England.
    A swipe of wet tissue across the symbols erased the blood. From outside, she heard orders to come out, threats of armed agents and lethal force.
    “Michael, Selah,” she said softly. “We’re ready.”
    Selah immediately appeared in front of her—all golden skin and blond hair. A white flowing gown. No wings, but they probably wouldn’t have fit in the bathroom.
    And then she and Nani were home.



CHAPTER 3

    I do not see any danger in telling P——the truth, but for the details regarding the sword. We should not let it become known our family harbored your Doyen’s dragon-tainted weapon from the time of the Crusades. It is not the curiosity of humans I fear, should the connection be discovered, but we ought not to risk the attention of the horned and winged set .
    —Colin to Ramsdell, 1814

    Somehow, Selah managed to avoid the piles of hardware and wiring materials littering Savi’s apartment. Despite the successful landing, Savi had to help steady her grandmother—though she wasn’t too steady herself; teleportation was disorienting.
    Their luggage appeared on the wooden floor next to them, along with her laptop, and Savi sighed in