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“I believe this is yours,” she said and extended the rock.

Those hate-filled eyes flicked from the gray lump of stone back to her face. He did not reach out to take it, so she dropped it at his feet.

Taly turned to go.

“Time mage cunt,” the man snarled and spat on the ground between them.

The crowd went silent as Taly turned back to face him. “Could you say that again?” she asked pleasantly. “I didn’t quite hear you.”

The man remained silent. He tried to hold her gaze, but Taly’s unrelenting stare bored into him until his eyes dropped.

That was the thing about baseless hate. When put under pressure, it cracked, revealing a foundation of fear. And that, as everyone knew, made for a flimsy cornerstone.

“That’s what I thought,” Taly said, a faint smirk playing on her mouth.

And then she did the worst thing one could ever do to a man like that.

Turning to rejoin her family, she immediately forgot him.

Thankfully, they didn’t have to go far. Down the street to the townhouse at the end, the guards in their light summer uniforms moved aside, letting them enter through a set of massive, overly grand carved wooden doors.

Inside, there wasn’t a single piece of furniture that wasn’t shattered. At least, none that Taly could see as they moved from the foyer into the long hallway that led straight through to the back of the house.

“He’s in the garden,” Eula said as she led them down the hall. Most of Kalahad’s household had disappeared after the festival, so Gate Watchers had stepped in to manage the current situation.

“How is he?” Ivain asked.

Eula glanced at the carnage around them, the pictures on the wall hanging askew. “More active, as you can see.”

“Talking?”

“No.”

“Damn,” Ivain muttered.

“I don’t understand,” Taly said from the back of the group. “I thought you said he asked for me.”

If that was a lie Ivain had made up to get her out of bed, well… it had worked. Without it, the pull of soft blankets and the comfort of oblivion started calling again.

“He did,” Eula said, and the pull vanished. “Once when he first woke up, and then not a word since. Well, none that make sense, anyway.”

In the end, Ivain didn’t defeat Aneirin. Taly wasn’t sure if there was a way to win against something like that. But he’d done enough to put him on the run. Kalahad had been leftbroken, barely breathing, but free—finally—of the thing that had been wearing him like a second skin.

“Do you have any idea why he wants to see you?” Sarina asked.

Taly shook her head. “None.”

But Taly knew exactly why she wanted to see him. If anyone would know where to find Bill—and perhaps, if they were very lucky, how tokillhim—it would be his original victim. The head in which he’d spent the most time.

“He’s in there,” Eula said, stopping in front of a large set of leaded glass doors. Turning to Taly, she said, “You don’t have to do this.”

“I’m aware,” Taly said with a patient smile. She wanted to. She needed it. “If there are no more objections?” she said, looking at each person in turn.

Ivain tried to come up with something. As did Sarina. Skye opened his mouth—probably to say something like, how did they know there weren’t more Sanctifiers waiting to spring out from behind that door. But one sharp look shut it again.

“Good,” Taly said brightly. “Wish me luck.”

The once lush and vibrant greenhouse was now a scene of devastation.