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had a few minutes earlier. “I think we’ve got it covered out here for the time being.” She bent down to pick up the silver sickle that Daria Aristarchos had dropped and handed it to Roth, who gestured Daria through the doorway with it and followed her close behind. “And in spite of whatever that she-wolf in Prada might think? I’m betting that the one thing Fennrys needs right now, more than anything, is you. Go.”
    She gave Mason a brief hug and sent her through the door with a gentle shove. Another cry of rage and pain rent the air, and Mason turned and ran through the deserted hall in the direction of the Fennrys Wolf.
    Calum watched her go to him, and it took everything he had to not run after her and beg her not to. He almost gave in to the urge until he felt Heather’s eyes on him. Her stare was palpable, as if she’d laid a hand on his shoulder—steady, cool, unforgiving . . . but somehow not entirely unsympathetic. Typical, complicated Heather Palmerston. He went over to where she stood by the door, stopping before he walked straight past her and into the room where Mason was with Fennrys.
    â€œHey . . . ,” he said.
    Heather nodded silently in response. She stood there, arms crossed, no doubt waiting for him to say something else, but the words just seemed to ball up and stick in his throat.
    Heather sighed. Her eyes were ringed with dark circles. The dried tracks of the tears she’d shed that night marred her cheeks and her gaze raked Cal head to foot. Again he could almost feel it, only this time, it wasn’t cool. More like the heat of a harsh white searchlight.
    â€œSo,” she said eventually, shaking her head when it became painfully obvious that he couldn’t find anything else to say. Her stare flicked from Cal’s face to his fist—the one that had manifested the trident he’d stabbed Fennrys with—and Cal knew what she was thinking. He felt a surge of guilt. “What the hell, Cal?”
    â€œYeah . . .” He tried to unclench his fingers, but they seemed cemented. He could still feel the cool, smooth surface of the weapon he’d created with this mind. “I know. It’s . . .” He huffed in frustration. “I’m glad you’re okay, Heather.”
    â€œI could say the same thing about you, I suppose.” She lifted one shoulder in a shrug, and he noticed that she was shivering. “If I was sure that was actually the case.”
    Trust Heather to give it to you straight , he thought bitterly.
    Like the time she’d flat-out told him they were breaking up—because Cal didn’t love Heather. He’d always thought that he did, but it wasn’t until that very moment that he’d realized that she was right. She was always right.
    â€œYou know you killed a guy, right?” she asked, her voicewas low and uninflected. It cut like a sharp-edged knife.
    â€œHe’s not—”
    â€œHe would be. He’d be dead if it wasn’t for . . . what came next.”
    She closed her eyes for a moment as if seeing again the terrible instant when the dreadlocked young man Cal knew as Rafe had transformed into the huge black-furred wolf and sunk his teeth into Fennrys’s neck. When she opened them again, it was to look back at Cal, a deep wariness in her gaze.
    â€œI’m still having a bit of an issue mentally framing just what, exactly, it was that that guy did,” she said. “But you . . . I know what you did. Maybe not how, but I’ve got the what part down. I just can’t figure out why , you know?”
    â€œI didn’t mean to.”
    â€œYes you did, Cal.”
    â€œOkay. Yeah.” Cal shook his head and huffed in frustration. “I did. I thought he was going to hurt Mason.”
    â€œSo you . . . manifested, conjured, what ever you did and however you did it . . . you made the biggest, sharpest