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Just for a little while.”
    Her arms tightened close to her sides, and I thought she was going to refuse. But Tupa cupped her near elbow with one small hand, rubbing the side of his face against her biceps. I couldn’t feel the specific tug of their magical bond, but I knew what Neko would have done in a similar situation. I wasn’t surprised when Cassie staggered to her feet.
    She sucked in her breath as she straightened. Bruises were already coming out on her pale arms. I was certain her back was mottled black and blue from where she’d writhed against the ground. But Tupa leaned close on one side, and Zach closed in on the other.
    “There you go,” I said. “Up the stairs. First room on the right. There’s a change of clothes in the closet.” Feeling helpless, I watched them shuffle toward the landing, supporting each other, step by painful step.
    “The rest of you,” I said when they’d completed their climb. “Eat. Drink. Take care of yourselves. I’ll be back in a moment.”
    I brushed past Teresa as I crossed to the stairs. I was grateful for David’s presence at my back, even when he pushed past me into our bedroom, barely waiting for me to close the door before he exploded. “You can’t let Teresa Alison Sidney claim a benefaction.”
    “Hush,” I said. “Cassie will hear you.” He paced three steps away as I continued. “What choice do I have?”
    He whirled and marked three paces back. “You realize what benefaction means, don’t you? She can take any magical possession of yours, anything equal in value to the assistance she lent.”
    I met David’s dark brown eyes, refusing to quail when I saw the green glints that meant he was furious. “What do you want me to do, David? She matched her powers to mine and we succeeded in a working I couldn’t complete alone. I admitted as much in front of witnesses.”
    “What if she claims me? If she demands Neko?”
    “She can’t,” I said flatly. “A witch can only lose her warder or familiar if her life was at stake. The satyr wasn’t after me.”
    “But Cassie is your student. She’s under your protection.”
    “I know that!” My exclamation was all the sharper for the fact that I couldn’t shout, couldn’t alarm Cassie down the hall. I hated when David acted like I was a child, like I was too young or naive to understand the consequences of my actions. I knew exactly what I’d done in that circle; I’d weighed everything to within a gram in the desperate heartbeat before I’d nodded to Teresa.
    David filled the spiky silence, backtracking to a subject where he knew he could prevail. “I want you to eat something.”
    “And I want you to get your ribs wrapped,” I countered. “Looks like we’ll both be disappointed until we get Teresa out of this house. And the fastest way to do that is to yield to her claim.”
    David’s face set in stone. I reached out a hand to his jaw, cupping the familiar stubborn line with my palm. “You’re right, of course. Cassie’s under my protection. But that’s not enough for Teresa to claim you. Or Neko.”
    “I don’t want her claiming anything at all,” David said, his voice barely registering above a sigh.
    “That makes two of us. But I won’t let her bring this before the Court. Not with…” Not with the Pitt inquest starting on Monday.
    I didn’t say it. I didn’t need to.
    David sighed. “Let’s get you out of that dress.”
    It took all our combined concentration to unfasten the rows of onyx buttons, to peel away the clinging bodice and wrestle the heavy folds of velvet into submission. I would have given a pretty substantial claim of benefaction to anyone who helped me slip into the soft fleece of a sweatshirt, into the warm flannel of pajama bottoms.
    But I was a magistrix. That was the crux of everything that had happened this Samhain night. And a magistrix didn’t retreat into comfort, not with an enemy on the premises. I forced myself to pull on a black pencil skirt, to