She lifted the heavy fall of her hair and shoved the ruler down the back of her shirt. She closed her eyes, and as she reached the uppermost wing-lock on the left side of her back she gave a little cry. It felt so good.

She rubbed the end of the ruler back and forth over the swollen tissue. She couldn’t describe the relief she felt but her eyes rolled back in her head. She moved from one wing-lock to the next until she could no longer reach them from an upper stroke. She dropped the cashmere to the bed and pulled the blouse from the skirt.

She tilted the ruler and shoved it up under the hem of the blouse until she reached the first of the lower wing-locks. She performed the same ritual and winced and uttered little muffled cries the whole time.

She was getting her wings but it was not fun. The itching had gotten so bad that two weeks ago she’d seen one of the doctors who had tended her in the hospital five months earlier.

He’d spent a good half hour with her, asking her questions about the wing-locks: When had they appeared, did she ever experience any burning sensations, had she tried mounting her wings … all the usual.

The problem was, he’d been concerned because by all appearances she should have been able to mount her wings weeks earlier, maybe even the first week after she’d gone through her formal ascension ceremony with Madame Endelle, the Supreme High Administrator of Second Earth.

Now her back was wet. Of course. She removed her shirt and went into the bathroom to dry off with a towel. She returned to her closet and put on a new blouse similar in style and color.

As she tucked the shirt in, she wondered if Jean-Pierre would like this conservative look on her or if he preferred a looser style. She shouldn’t care, but she did. She had a very strong affection for the warrior, which didn’t help the situation at all.

An odd little vibration moved through her mind and suddenly, without warning, because she had been thinking of Jean-Pierre, now she could feel him, where he was, what he was doing. He was in Prescott, scoping the outdoor chapel where the christening would be held. She felt as though she stood right next to him, as though she could be inside him, inside his mind and his body, which made no sense. She knew, she knew, that with just a thought she could complete this process, be in his mind despite the fact that he was a powerful ascender and his shields nearly impenetrable. Yet she would have no difficulty, not even a little, pressing her mind inside his, as though he had no shields at all!

But then from the beginning, from her ascension all those decades ago, her primary gift was her telepathy. She had abilities that far surpassed most ascenders’.

Of course she would never intrude in Jean-Pierre’s mind, or anyone else’s, without their permission. On the other hand, knowing him, he would have welcomed the invasion.

She shook her head back and forth. What did this freakish sensation mean? He’d already told her he thought she had emerging preternatural powers, which in turn meant she could be in greater danger than ever of hitting Greaves’s radar, the last place any ascender wanted to be.

Great. This meant she needed Jean-Pierre more than ever and she didn’t want to need him, or anyone for that matter. She wanted a normal life on Second Earth, to have charge of her own home, to engage in work she enjoyed, and perhaps one day to fall in love in a normal way.

She really had come to despise the breh-hedden.

As she moved back to the mirror, her wing-locks eased for the moment, and she settled the light blue cashmere once more around her shoulders.

She had only one thing left to do. On the table beside the mirror sat the gold locket her long-deceased husband had given to her on their eleventh wedding anniversary. She had kept it with her all through her years as a blood slave in Burma and even in Toulouse until Rith had moved his slaves unexpectedly. She’d been in a drugged, mindless state, unaware that the precious necklace was being left behind.

Yet somehow, miraculously, Jean-Pierre had discovered the locket behind an antique armoire in Toulouse when the warriors had stormed the facility. Later, he had returned it to her, at the palace, the same night as the rescue.

Yes, a small miracle.

The locket had helped keep her sanity all those decades. She fingered the chain now, running it over and over her fingers.

Colonel Seriffe was her protector in the off-hours when Jean-Pierre wasn’t pinned to her side. Seriffe had several squads of Militia Warriors constantly patrolling his property even though Endelle had covered the house in a dome of mist—that extraordinary cloak, invisible to most ascenders, that confused the mind and made even huge buildings seem not to exist.

“Mother, may I come in?”

Carolyn’s voice still had the power to undo her and tears rushed to her eyes. She was back in Boston in 1886, Carolyn was a girl of ten, and she was combing out her light brown curls. Another miracle that Carolyn had actually ascended, then eventually married Colonel Seriffe.

“Mother?”

The sound of her daughter’s voice pushed her heart around in her chest and she smiled. How she loved her.

She blinked back the usual tears and strove to calm herself. These past few months had been hard on Carolyn as well. She’d had to adjust to a mother, long thought dead and now risen. No, nothing about her rescue from blood slavery had been simple.

When she could breathe again, she called out, “I’m decent, sweetheart. Come in.”

As she looked into the mirror and settled the gold locket between the lapels of the shirt, she watched the door open behind her, and a moment later her daughter’s adult face emerged. She remembered the child’s face with the same shy smile. Carolyn’s hair was still honey-and-brown in color, with streaks of blond, not so different from Jean-Pierre. Of course, the color now came from a salon in Scottsdale Two. Carolyn was a beautiful young mother of three, even if she was 115.

Ah, Second Earth. Time had a different meaning here. Carolyn could be her sister.

She moved to stand behind Fiona. They were tall women, the Gaines women.

“The cashmere is beautiful,” Carolyn said, “and you should always wear this icy shade of blue. It’s a lovely contrast for your chestnut hair and the silver-blue of your eyes. I think Jean-Pierre will like it.”

She met her daughter’s gaze in the mirror. “Now, why would you say something so provoking?” But she laughed.

“Because you’re being ridiculous. He loves you and you love him and you should be together. You should at least let him date you once a week. At least throw him that bone.”

Yes … that bone. She had restricted their dating to once every two weeks. So for the past five months, every two weeks, Jean-Pierre took her someplace special, and the whole time Fiona worked to keep her hands off him.

Fiona’s gaze fell away, drifting lower and lower and falling swiftly into the past, into being strapped to gurneys once a month, drained of her blood, then brought back to life with defibrillators. She didn’t know how to explain to Carolyn that she didn’t want a relationship, she didn’t even want to date Jean-Pierre, and she certainly didn’t want the terrible breh-hedden. She didn’t want to be tied down again. Ever.

She’d reached an impasse and she knew it. She couldn’t go back but she didn’t know how to go forward. She pushed Jean-Pierre away but she kept dating him, kept longing for him, for his presence, his touch, his kisses. Oh, God … his kisses.

Her gaze traveled back to Carolyn, and there were tears in her daughter’s eyes. “I shouldn’t have teased you, Mother. I’m sorry.” Her arms traveled around Fiona.

Fiona caught them hard over her chest and gave her daughter an awkward hug, a back-to-front squeeze. “I’m lost,” she whispered.

“I know. And it’s only been five months. I don’t know why I keep pushing you.”

Fiona nodded. She took another breath. “Are Seriffe and the children ready?”

“Yes.”

“We should go.”

Carolyn pulled back and Fiona turned toward her. Carolyn smiled suddenly. “I made Seriffe a bet.”

“About what?”

“Well, I am convinced that Warrior Kerrick will weep at his daughter’s christening. My husband said, Not a chance.”

“He’s a man,” Fiona said. “He has to say that on principle. So what did you wager?”

“That if Kerrick sheds even a single tear, Seriffe will have to take me to Dark Spectacle Phantasmagoria.”

“No,” Fiona cried. Seriffe was adamant in refusing to buy tickets to an event that he insisted was all smoke and mirrors though it was billed as a preternatural experience.

Seriffe appeared in the doorway. He was as tall as Jean-Pierre—just a few inches shy of the top of the doorjamb. Certainly his shoulders filled the space. “Are we ready?” His deep warm voice boomed into the room.

“Yes,” Fiona said.

“I just received a call from Central. Endelle has given permission for Carla to give us a fold as a group to Prescott.”

Fiona’s brows rose. “Endelle is letting Central help out? Has she gone soft or something?” Madame Endelle had a python’s temperament: Circle, squeeze, devour, ask questions later. That she was permitting Central Command to fold groups to baby Helena’s baptism was, well, unusual to say the least, which only made Fiona worry more. Was Endelle expecting trouble or just being cautious?

Seriffe chuckled. “The day Endelle goes soft is the day we all buy ice skates and take a dozen turns around a frozen rink you-know-where. Apparently Endelle has some security concerns and frankly, I’m with her on this one. Did you know the sisters are holding the service in that really shitty—I mean in that really awful—outdoor chapel?” He glanced behind himself. Young ears were listening and he tried really hard, though often unsuccessfully, to curb warrior-speak.

“No,” Carolyn cried. “The one with the graffiti on half the benches?”

“Bingo.”

“Don’t they have a chapel inside that could pay for a small country?”

“Yep.”

“Well … shi … I mean, that’s really too bad.” This time Carolyn looked down the hall. Her boys could be heard calling to each other. Carolyn, too, had picked up some of her husband’s bad habits. Fiona hadn’t exactly been exempt herself.