A combination of the early hour and the efforts of Rai’s new best friend Liyu managed to keep the news of Triad suppressed, for a few blissful hours. Rai had to give some credit to the company under the bridge too. He wasn’t seeing any nighttime photos of the dredging cropping up on Neocam.

Even the weather had pitched in, he realized. With the roads iced up Saki couldn’t have gotten too far. She might even have been laying low in town, thinking she had gotten away with the hasty disposal.

But the sun rose and the ice melted. The snow lightened into a fine powder.

No more than an hour into the morning shift, someone at the station squealed, and then there was no stopping the wave. Local reporters circled the police station, hiding behind the theater waiting to pounce. Rai pulled the Neocam app off his phone because of the sudden influx of online friends and their questions.

“Slow fucking Sunday, huh?” Rai barked at a particularly sleepy-looking reporter folded into one of the lobby armchairs.

“Rai, leave them alone,” Sao said. His coat had undergone a rough washing at the hotel that had unraveled the wool and ripped out all the silver yarn it had left. He was fluffed up like a sheep.

They navigated their way behind the counter to meet Jin in one of the interview rooms.

“I asked Tinsel to come, but I think she’s still sleeping,” Jin said when they were seated. “What happened to Triad?”

Rai scowled. “You were the one who called. I thought you had something to tell us. Didn’t realize I was coming to be interrogated.”

Jin tried to look sorry, but his eyes kept flickering face to face, hungry for hints. “I heard his body was found.”

“You heard right.”

Someone had given Jin a navy blue hooded sweatshirt of a more flattering fit than his usual black sacks. He was fairly large, and in a garment he could actually fill out, almost intimidating.

Almost. Ayer arrived before Tinsel did, with a box of donuts and Jin was suddenly blubbering and couldn’t look anyone in the eye.

“Can’t offer you any, Investigator, sorry. The cops just gave us two. Supposed to be our breakfast.” Ayer slapped the box on the table and licked his fingers. “So Triad was found in the river.”

“How much do you know?”

“He was in pieces. Plastic wrap or trash bags. Dumped like a bunch of leftovers. Fuck. But that’s about all I heard. Guess it was Saki?”

Jin drooped over his plain donut. “It had to have been. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. This is all because of me.”

Ayer ignored him. “Her restaurant was raided last night. Is that where she did it? Is that where she cut him up? Disgusting, they have to shut the place down, right? It’s contaminated.”

Apparently, the interrogation had picked up again. Ayer was on his feet, stalking and yapping like an antsy terrier. Rai wanted to shove him back down and tell him to wipe the powdered sugar off his face.

“Actually, most of Triad’s body was intact,” Sao said softly. “Attempts to dismember him appear to have failed. But part of one arm was removed. We suspect…”

Of course, he was letting Rai pick that one up. “We have proof from the hospital: she mixed part of Triad into the burger meat served at the Valentine's brunch.”

Ayer almost fell over backward. “No fucking way. D-d-did Tinsel know?”

“Judging by Saki’s behavior yesterday, I don’t think so. But it’s hard to tell.”

“Valentine’s.” Ayer breathed the word like a curse. “I should have been there.”

“Then you would probably have eaten the tampered meat,” Rai said.

“In a way, I feel like I should have.” Ayer let out a long groan and slumped against the table. “What was she thinking? A guy who helped so many people all over the world just turned into cheap meat and thrown in the trash. What a nightmare. And she had to go and involve all the people there.”

Jin looked desperate to reach out to him, but instead grabbed at his borrowed hood and continued to fail to look at anyone. “Sorry. I was the one who stabbed him. Saki would never have been involved if not for me.”

“She didn’t go this far for you,” Ayer spat. “Anyone who would do this for any reason was a crazy bitch from the beginning.”

A retort almost crawled its way out of Jin’s throat but Ayer looked him in the eye and he crumbled.

“At least it was just one arm. Couldn’t have made that many burgers out of that.” Ayer rubbed his eyes.

Rai thought about the length of Triad’s arms and failed to see the comfort.

“At least there’s a body to bury.”

Sao cleared his throat. “Jin, did you happen to hit Triad on the head at any point? Did he hit his head hard when he fell, maybe?”

“What? He was way too tall, I couldn’t have reached. He did fall down, but I remember it being on the carpet. The corner, though, so I guess he could have hit… why?” Jin lit up. “Was he not stabbed after all?”

“He was definitely stabbed,” Rai said. “The preliminary report says it was something pointed but not particularly sharp or blade-like. You said you grabbed something off the desk - I’ll bet it was a paperweight. Saki swept that away with the body.”

“But you’re asking about the head.” Jin hadn’t given up hope yet. “Did he die of a head injury, and not from being stabbed?”

He tried to smile at a completely rigid Ayer.

“It’s hard to tell,” Rai said, “because half of his head was destroyed.”

“Destroyed?” Ayer echoed.

Ayer’s echo seemed to echo on itself, filling the room with the word, with a stifling pressure. Rai wished he had chosen something more clinical to describe it, a blander descriptor. Like ‘removed’. But being removed and being destroyed were completely different things.

Had Triad’s head been removed?

A knock at the door burst the bubble of tension, and a pile of winterwear was shown in. Tinsel pulled off her hat and scarf, circled first to Jin and gave him a hug around the shoulders. “You look better today.”

“Tin,” Jin said. “They said Triad might not have died from what I did to him.”

“Oh, that’s…” She studied him for a second. “That’s a relief.”

“But then, when Saki took him away - you don’t know where, do you?”

“She wouldn’t tell me what happened. I mean - I could tell she wasn’t going to talk about it. But she was on edge the whole time - what did happen?”

“The cops found his body. It looks like she cut him up and–” With a nervous glance at Ayer. “You didn’t eat the burgers yesterday, did you?”

“No. She wouldn’t let me.”

“Of course she didn’t.” Jin grasped her by the elbows. “She wouldn’t have let you - she put Triad into the burgers. His arm.” He turned to Ayer again. “I’m sorry.”

Ayer didn’t appear to acknowledge him, but this time, it wasn’t him forcing an act of deafness. He had barely reacted to Tinsel’s entry either. Rai frowned. “We’re looking to arrest Saki, of course. We’ve got a death on our hands - plus food tampering and desecration of a body. This one doesn’t need anyone to file a formal complaint.”

Tinsel shook Jin off and backed against the wall, squeezing one hand in the other. “But why would she even do that? There were so many people there.”

“You know her. That was probably the point. It might have been revenge.” Again, Jin looked at Ayer.

And on the magic word, Ayer exhaled sharply. Rai had him cornered. “You know something. What’s on your mind?”

Ayer squinted like there were headlights in his face. “I- I shouldn’t say. Not here. Not in front of–” He jutted his jaw at Jin, or Tinsel.

“Then they’ll go,” Rai said.

But Tinsel claimed a seat and pulled up beside Jin and that was when Rai knew he didn’t have a say in the matter after all. “Ayer, I don’t know what you think but remember, you don’t know me as well as you think you do. I’m not a fragile baby,” she chided with a small smile. Or smirk, but to Ayer it was a blessing either way.

“Oh, yeah. Of course. I didn’t mean it like that.” Ayer beamed back, forgetting himself for a moment. “I just mean, she’s your friend. And this could make the charges worse.”

“Don’t get me wrong. I do think she needs to be caught.” Tinsel put her intertwined hands on the table. “But whatever she’s done - I won’t let you talk about one of my friends behind my back.”

Ayer watched her fingers rub over each other, and his smile vaporized. There was a fear in him not even his devotion to Tinsel could hold off. “The Professor told me not to go spreading this around, but since he’s not around to revoke my scholarship, or get framed for stalking or anything anymore, I’ll just tell you.” Ayer brought his own hands onto the table and began to grasp at his own fingers, one after the other. “You probably know the basics. Triad contracted some kind of neurological problem on his trip last year, and it was getting worse and worse. He couldn’t work anymore.”

Slow nods all around. It didn’t seem appropriate to speak.

“When he was first trying to get diagnosed last fall, Triad told me he was pretty sure he knew how he got it. The last trip he took was the grand opening of a clinic in South Plateau, Highland. A little west of Arena, where he was born. More peaceful. You know - big, wide-open cattle country. Cows are the primary business there. But you know what happened around the time of his trip?”

“The beef market fell through,” Jin said. “Something like that.”

“Do you know why?”

Strangely, Rai did. He tried to recall - something recent had served as a reminder - Nuts. Right. A chain of food import-exporters had declared bankruptcy the year before, and the reasoning had come up repeatedly in the court documents. “There was an outbreak of something in the farms and they had to kill most of their livestock.”

“It was a nice enough place. But drowning in poverty; even at their best the numbers were nothing compared to Saki’s family business. Just people doing whatever they can to stay afloat, so not a whole lot of regulation. Triad always targeted those kinds of places for his philanthropy.” Ayer gritted his teeth. “There was an infection. The spread got out of control because they were feeding the remains of their cows to the other cows to save cash. And the dead cows, you can guess, passed on what killed them. A variation of BSE - you might know the original by the name mad cow.”

“A prion disease.” Rai’s stomach dropped.

“And it’s brutal stuff. The brain just… degenerates. The cells themselves are fucked. Your mind basically rots away while you’re alive. There’s total disorientation, loss of coordination, fatigue, then loss of memory and full blown dementia–”

Rai thought of the dark room. “Oversensitivity to light and sound.”

“Yeah. Triad actually finished up in Plateau before the international news even broke, but the local culling had already started. He bought a full crate of mixed meat off a desperate farmer somewhere by the airport in Arena because he felt bad for the guy. Drove the meat all the way to the site of the finished clinic and set up a grill.” Ayer shrugged, in a somewhat painful motion. “He didn’t think about it until it was too late. Well, he actually identified the specifics of his problem pretty early on, but…”

“Those diseases are just about always fatal.” Rai found he was squeezing his hands together now, too. “So he knew he was terminal.”

“Right,” Ayer said. “He could have just checked himself into a hospital and passed on safely. With dignity, that’s what I meant to say. That was the eventual plan. But I guess what happened is Saki got a hold of him.” He began to chew a thumbnail. “Her family deals in farms, they own more cows than any other corporation on the planet, she would have been taught to look out for BSE, for their stock price’s sake if nothing else. I don’t know if she specifically linked Triad to the outbreak in Plateau, but it doesn’t matter. She would have seen the symptoms and at least had suspicions. So, do you know one of the most effective vectors for prion disease, from person to person?”

“Cannibalism,” Sao murmured. “Especially when it comes to the brain.”

Rai turned in his seat so fast he almost slid off.

Sao inclined his head, almost ashamed. “I heard that’s why animal brains aren’t sold for meat. Saki would have known that.”

“Yeah. The brain’s got the most prions.” The tip of Ayer’s fingernail cracked against his teeth. He set the spit-stained hand down. “You said that there were a lot of students in the hospital, and their stomachs were tested for Triad’s remains. Are they checking for more than his arm?.”

“Shit.” Rai got to his feet. He already had his phone out. “It might already be too late.”

“Was this her plan?” Jin was whimpering to himself. “This was it?”

“Those in the hospital were made sick by Triad’s medications, not rapid onset of brain disease. Besides, it’s not a guarantee to contract it from eating…” Sao dropped off and did not finish.

“This was her plan.” They all went quiet. Tinsel was poised still as a statue. Her hands were laid lightly over one another and, Rai noticed, no longer crawling around, searching for an anchor. There was a sketch of a smile on her face; but when Rai looked closer, it was gone. “I guess you’ll be needing the list of attendees at the brunch? I wonder what you’ll say to them, though.”

For the first time, she was utterly calm. And for the first time, there was something diabolical about her. She might not have eaten Triad’s arm or brain, but she was satiated, bloated even, with what she’d been given in its place.

Revenge.

That had been what set Ayer off on his bloodthirsty campaign. Saki had done what he could not; she had successfully avenged Tinsel.

Tinsel chained Rai in place with a completely tranquil stare, ocean green.

The door clicked and Liyu entered with an unlabelled bottle of his mysterious juice. Jumping, Tinsel glanced up at him and Rai almost threw himself at the guy’s feet in gratitude. “I thought you went home,” he said.

“I was going to. I was waiting to saying goodbye but…” The sergeant had the guts to take on Tinsel’s stare for him, and didn’t even flinch. “I heard you talking. So Triad’s body is being used to spread a disease.”

“Seems like that was Saki’s goal. It’s not a guarantee…” Rai offered lamely, even lamer as it was an echo of Sao’s earlier delivery.

“But even if it’s just a few who caught it...” There was something freakishly serene about the officer’s musings. He was meditative. “It could spread from there by… carnal methods. The starting point was a romantic gathering, I heard.”

Rai wondered if his face was turning red. Jin’s was. Ayer, meanwhile, had lost all color. Tinsel just looked amused. “You’re really calm. So I guess you weren’t there.”

“I don’t get to do much in daylight hours.” Liyu seemed to ponder his cup. “Our priority is to find this Saki woman.”

Rai stood. “Are you trying to track her phone? Jin and Tinsel can keep trying to get in touch with her. Maybe the boyfriend, too. And are we blocking roads out of the town?”

Liyu’s slightly curved reddish brows lowered slowly, like a disapproving teacher. Rai realized he was getting the same treatment from Jin and Ayer, and a subtler yet all the more withering version from Tinsel. Over in his corner, Sao was the only one who was not wearing a look like Rai was something scraped off the bottom of a shoe.

He looked dizzy, like he might fall over. Some reassurance.

So what were they expecting? Rai knew he was missing something obvious.

Go figure. The curse of Murnau; inverted skies and Valentine’s hysteria and the pathways of good and evil so blindingly simple to everybody except himself. And Sao. He wasn’t totally alone. Although, two people stumbling over each other in the dark (one with a cold) were not going to be achieving much.

Once again, Liyu took pity on him. But not before taking a long cold swig of his mystery liquid to give him strength. And Rai remembered that the officer was, in fact, his superior and had been all along, and was one of the many members of authority in Murnau who must have at least heard of troubles on campus and done nothing until the whole chain of revenges had come crashing down around them all in one disastrous, diseased avalanche.

“At this stage,” the sergeant said slowly, “it seems easier to have her come to us instead of chasing, doesn’t it?”

—

Sao’s head ached. He had the television in his hotel room on so he wouldn’t have to see his reflection in it. The local news was playing Tinsel’s statement for the fourth time that hour.

It hadn’t gone well.

“I was made aware that yesterday’s Valentine’s event had some contaminated food. If you ate any of the, um, stuff there, please see a doctor as soon as possible.”

She had been eager enough to help. Rai had her read the script twice in front of them before releasing her to the ravenous camera crews. The news footage showed her floating over a dozen or so microphones, bunched up like a bouquet to fit on the small wooden podium. She’d gone from riding a gold cloud to a black one.

“I haven’t been formally charged for my involvement…”

Considering what had happened the last time a picture of hers was circulated, it could have been the cameras that caused her to unravel. Before winding down with a subtle nod to Saki, an apology to all of her friends (of which she had few, she reminded them before they let her go), she abandoned the script and threw both hands over the nearest microphone.

“I’m scared,” she cried, “you’ve all heard what happened to the professor. I’m not safe. I’m not–”

Out of some inane sense of courtesy, Sao waited until she was removed from the stage to change the channel. He landed on the financial ticker, something nice and dull. The Core stock market was down. He had no idea if the beef industry had anything to do with that.

Sao turned the volume low and lay on the unmade bed, something he’d done each time he’d managed to find his way to another channel replaying Tinsel’s broadcast, telling himself it was time for a nap. His bones were lead; his head felt submerged in deep water. Every movement was sluggish. But he couldn’t sleep.

It must have been all the coffee and tea he’d ingested with Rai in the lobby. It was a mistake for any public place to give Rai unlimited refills of his favored caffeine. It was Rai who had cut him off too, taking his cup from him and saying he looked like he needed a break; he was falling asleep standing up. That he could take the bus or train back to Mainline if he wasn’t feeling well.

He hadn’t given the additional reason, which was that Sao no longer had a free place to spend the nights in Murnau.

A daytime train ride had some appeal. But first, a nap.

His phone buzzed. Sao dug it out from behind the pillow and mumbled, “Yeah, anything new?”

“You sound comfortable.”

Sao sat up, scars prickling with the heat of embarrassment. “Skogul. I’m sorry, that was rude of me. How are you?”

“Just fine.” Her voice was singsong. So, not so fine. “I’m in a hotel.”

“So am I.”

“Not in Murnau, though. I thought I’d get out of there for a while, though I do need to go back and get my things eventually.” She took in his hitched breathing. “Don’t worry, I’ve actually got good news regarding Marsh. What happened turned out to be to his benefit. I’ll let you know more when I’m back. But I wanted to at least tell you now how impressed I am - you pulled Rai on board in less than a day. Is he with you now?”

“I wouldn’t be so comfortable on this call if he was. But he’s always been more cooperative than he’d like to appear. Besides, once Triad’s body turned up of its own accord, he would have inferred it all on his own.”

“Hm.” A completely ambiguous utterance. He couldn’t quite read her next move, either. “And I’ll admit I was shocked about Tinsel - you’ve got her cornered, haven’t you?”

Sao tensed. “I know, the announcement went badly. But it’s Saki we’re looking for, and the hope is Tinsel’s appearance would draw her out.”

“I know you two must have some kind of plan in place. But how did you talk her into that? Was there nothing else?” The voice on the other end had become almost dizzyingly melodic, and it occurred to Sao that Skogul was upset with him. Perhaps even furious. What had really happened with Marsh?

“Rai had a script prepared. But the pressure overwhelmed her; she started talking about Triad in a panic. Next, we’re waiting to see if the police can track Saki’s phone–”

“Script?” The flames settled, just slightly. “I don’t mean her news interview. Right, I forgot - you don’t spend much time on Neocam, do you? Though I would have pegged Rai as an online type. I guess he just hasn’t logged in for the last hour or two.”

“He shut out the app because so many students were trying to message him for insider info.”

“Ask him to open it back up again.”

Sao could almost smell the blood in the air.

“And make sure you get a good look too.”

—

KILLER

The nightmare had returned, recreated with new ferocity. Tinsel with her head thrown back, hair fanned out like spillage over a flecked brown carpet; eyes wide and rolled back, but not all the way, giving her a strange look of conscious suffering. She was completely nude with the single word inked over her bony chest, the first L cut through with a river of blood from her neck. Her arms were stiff, as if still in resistance. In the original, she had looked drugged, vulnerable but unaware. In the new photo, she was mangled and feeling it.

Sao tried hard not to look at her neck. The scars of her first attack were still visible on the left side of her pale throat, making the carnage on the right all the more stomach churning. There was no discernable set of teeth marks, plastic or otherwise, but a large red bloom of flesh, like something had burst from under the skin.

They did not need Jin and Ayer’s bombardment of messages to identify the carpet as the top floor of the eastern dormitory. The same floor shared by most of the Investment Club’s council.

Rai hauled Sao over immediately. Their old friend Ace was not in (at the hospital, perhaps) but Happy was. His door was already open and they found him seated on the now-familiar carpet, in the corner with a jug of bleach and several paper towels, stacked slapdash over a large black stain. From his fingers dangled another strong-smelling bottle; this one glass.

“What do you know,” he jeered, though Sao noted a strange shrillness to his voice. “She was right.”

Happy had an east-facing room. Strong sunlight filtered in - revealing little of anything. Except for the school-supplied furniture and a few scraps of clothing - a solitary hat on the desk, a scarf in the middle of the bed - his room was largely empty. He had his sunglasses on. They came askew when Rai hauled him up and threw him onto his chair.

“So, what was it, revenge?”

“You’ll have to ask Tinsel.” Happy grimaced. “Man, of course she would step out at this exact moment.” He tried to stand, but Rai pressed him back down. Slow and deliberate; which was not the norm for Rai.

The room was like an oven. Sao, shifted in his coat that had somehow doubled in volume in the hotel washing machine; he was beginning to sweat. He scratched at one of the scars on his own neck, presently hidden of course, and thought of Tinsel's upturned face. The eyes, the force with which they were rolled, but still not all the way. There was too much force involved. The tensed arms, the explosive bite.

The floppy hat with the yarn-puff topper on the desk looked awfully familiar.

“Rai,” Sao said. “Let him explain.”

“Yeah, enough with the police brutality,” Happy muttered, rubbing his shoulder. He was wincing and rolling his arm as if testing for breakage, but it was all play-acting. His eyes were locked on the door behind them, the uncontrolled tremor in his voice had been in place before they’d entered.

On cue, Tinsel walked in, barely looking at them. “Oh, you’re here.”

“And you’re here too.” With Rai frozen mid-thought, Happy took his chance to weasel out of the chair. “You can explain all this to our friends. I’m going.”

“I think we want to hear your side of things too,” Sao said. He glanced at Tinsel, at the fresh bandage on her neck over her unbuttoned shirt. The shirt was sheer linen; he could see the letters KILLER over her breasts and felt like he’d been punched. He forced a smile. “The bite is on your right side this time. You’re right handed, aren’t you?”

“Yes. I was going to tell you.” She sat on the bed - claimed it.

“Dammit.” Rai fell onto the newly vacant chair and pressed a thumb to the bridge of his nose. “You set up the latest picture yourself. I can guess – this is some ploy to get Saki back in town. But I need to ask, why did you involve him?”

With three people positioned between him and the door, Happy returned to his sunlit, bloodstained corner to sulk. Tinsel looked upon him with something approaching fondness. “I thought it would be easiest if we knew where she would turn up.”

“Real ingenious of you.” Happy’s tone was almost a giggle. “And nice of you to tell me what happened to Triad only after you sent your pinup out.” He reached for his bottle again and took a swig.

“But you don’t have to worry. You weren’t really involved in the end.” Tinsel’s eyes were wide and innocent and mildly terrifying. “You just wrote the word. I could have asked Ace or one of the others, but I felt bad for you. Because you were always saying you were left out of the, um, excitement.”

“Stupid psycho bitch. Look, I can handle getting roofied…” Happy pressed a hand to his heart. “But go ahead and call me a pathetic little fag because I don’t want to take a cleaver to the head.”

“I never called you any names. I offered–”

“Don’t.”

“I offered to suc–”

“Don’t.”

“And I said you could take whatever you wanted, if it would help you along. I don’t know why you’re so upset over this.” Tinsel folded her hands together primly. “He was excited to begin with but we didn’t do much in the end. He says he prefers an audience as an excuse for anything, but I think he’s actually rather shy when it comes to intimacy. It’s too bad even a drink wouldn’t loosen him up...”

Happy released a sound not unlike the pistons of the Historic Rail and let his head fall with a crack against the wall.

“You can eat or smoke or drink all you want, but it wouldn’t make things any easier, would it?” Rai said. “I wondered when you bragged about your ‘immunities’ - do you have any Life Fountains in your–”

Happy snorted, hard.

“You haven’t done anything wrong in that respect,” Rai said. “And I kind of believe you know that. I got banned from a few sports clubs in my day. Hitting a guy hard enough to break bone and healing my hand up in a one-minute timeout - they called it an unfair advantage. But in an Investment Club, Life Fountain aura doesn’t give you much of an edge. You’re playing fair.” His eyes narrowed. “Father or mother’s side?”

“Don’t,” Happy said, far more firmly than he had to Tinsel.

“It’s okay,” Tinsel said.

Happy recoiled slightly.

Rai sighed and turned to her before she could deliver another blow. “Tinsel. The freakout in front of the cameras, that was also intentional, wasn’t it? If you had all these plans in mind, why didn’t you just let us know? Approaching the guys who attacked you before, and cutting up your neck… something could have gone wrong.”

“Then there would be even more of a chance that she’d rush back.” Tinsel pressed at her blotched bandage and smiled.

“That doesn’t answer the question.”

Over in the corner, Happy mustered the energy to slap his knee. “You don’t get it. She thinks you would have tried to stop her.”

“Which you didn’t,” Rai snapped.

“What’s happened has happened,” Sao said. “We should call security to watch this building.”

“If this attempt at bait even worked.” But Rai’s look cooled, and he stood.

“You talk like you know her better than I do.” Tinsel took her scarf and folded it, laid it under her hands. Hands that were statue-still; no longer grasping each other for support. “You two are so… cold. Dispassionate. Maybe it’s a good thing, since you’re allowed to make decisions for people, that you don’t let things like love or hate sway you.” She set her glassy eyes on Sao. “That woman you were with - you let her say all those things about you and threw you into the grill and you were just smiling. Saki said you deserved it.”

Sao felt as if now he were the one being cornered. Before he was aware he’d backed away, the doorknob was digging into his spine. “There was a misunderstanding. It was a private matter, we didn’t need us both broadcasting all the gory details in front of everyone.”

Tinsel stood and the knob pressed another inch into his skin. A thread of blood had come free from her bandage and was working its way down her throat. “But putting the message in front of everyone is what makes it strong. Stronger than screaming. The air in Murnau is so heavy, have you noticed? It muffles, nobody is ever listening, you have to… to catch their eyes.” She held her hands together, like in prayer. “You could have apologized then and there.”

“And you could have told us the truth about Jin, Saki and Triad.” The ache in his back had developed into a burning sting. He lurched forward. “What happened between me and Skogul didn’t kill anybody. It didn’t sneak a tainted corpse into people’s stomachs.”

A sudden weight against his side tore his attention from her moon faced stare, and he almost fell over. Finding his balance again against the desk, Sao swiveled, wildly. Rai was standing too close to where he had been just moments ago, hands in pockets. His elbow had been the culprit. Rai faced him with a strange coolness, without the usual red-faced muttering that happened with an accidental bump. It had been intentional. “That’s enough.”

“Sorry,” Tinsel said. She was patting the bandage again, eyes lowered, and she winced at the sight of the blood. “I just, I don’t know. I thought you and her looked good together. I was hoping you would figure things out right there. You, in particular, always seemed like you knew what you were doing.”

The waifish damsel had rematerialized before his eyes but Sao couldn’t trust it. He felt he was in the presence of some unknowable entity. A shapeshifter - but no, even shifters made for easier reads. He touched his forehead and some of his concealer came off on his gloves in a damp smudge.

The heat was making his head spin. His tongue felt like a dense slab.

Tinsel threw him a smile so sunny he wondered if the room might burst into flames. “I just want you to be able to get your girl back.”

“Like you’re going to lure Saki back?” With a snap of his wrist, Rai threw the door open. It hit the wall behind with a crack.

Which caused Happy to launch into another groan and kicked over the piled napkins on the bloodstained carpet. “Great, go ahead and put a hole in the room. As if my deposit isn’t already toast.”

“She will be back.” Tinsel crossed the room on tiptoe to see them out. “I made my message as clear as I could. She won’t have missed it.”

Sao’s tongue dislodged just long enough to retort. “But the picture was a lie. You’re not in any sort of real trouble. And you don’t need her help for anything anymore.”

“Well, she can only be mad if she comes back and finds out it was a lie. But the point this time is I’m trying to help you.” The door to the light-soaked room was closing so slowly Sao feared they would never be able to leave. Tinsel swayed in the shrinking space. “Remember what I said, will you?”

“Loud and proud. Got it.”

“No,” she said. “Not proud.”

There was a finality to their last exchange; a sort of pact made. Rai was the one to take hold of the knob and finally pull it closed.

The hallway was still stuffy, but darker and cooler, and quiet as a tomb. The rectangle of light at the very end seemed a gateway to somewhere even more sinister.

Before his imagination could make the place any graver, Rai scoffed loudly. “She’s a marketing major, all right.”