SIXTEEN
SAGE
There’s a line for the bathroom, even though the crowds are still thin. It’s early, and the nightlife in LA doesn’t usually get pulsing seriously until after eleven. I settle into formation behind a girl who’s sucking on a blue lollipop. Her lips and tongue are stained purple. The white-blond ponytails on either side of her head flick at the air when she bobs to the music. She glances at me and gives me a quick grin, then goes back to her lollipop.
It’s so weird to think that most of these people in here aren’t really people at all. Like, what’s this girl? A pixie? Her eyes seem teal, though, and her skin is sort of sparkly.
My babysitter, Freya, settles in beside me and leans against the wall. She shoots a sneer at the girl next to me. “Wow, the dregs are out tonight.”
Lollipop Girl tips her head in an endearing way. “And apparently so are the petri dishes,” she says in a giddy voice. “How is the bottom-feeding Shade Brigade these days?”
Freya looks like she’s about to scratch off Lollipop Girl’s face.
I clear my throat and try to divert her attention. I consider asking if she knows that the lead actor in that new superhero movie is drinking a cosmo at the bar, but I decide to focus my distraction on her super-red hair instead, since she seemed pretty obsessed with mine. “Hey, so, can you give me some tips on—”
Freya shoves me aside and gets in the other girl’s face. “You seem to be forgetting last solstice, little thief. We have video. You and your pet male amoeba are so going viral, selkie.” She sneers.
“Sure, Aelia clone. Whatever.” She tilts her head. “I hear you failed Cast finals, poor baby. Sucks not having a mind of your own.” She rubs her fingers together in front of Freya’s face, then flicks.
Small drops of water sprinkle Freya’s cheeks and forehead. She doesn’t seem to know what to say. She just blinks and makes weird noises as her mouth moves.
As much as I’m enjoying watching Lollipop Girl make Freya squirm, I decide to take the opportunity to find some sorely needed space.
I walk farther down a hall, away from the main room and the dance floor that’s beginning to fill up. Eventually, I pause in a corner. It’s just me and a tangled couple who are sucking face while leaning against the wall. Both have lit cigarettes between their fingers.
They don’t seem to know or care that I’m here. Which is nice. But the show they’re putting on, groping with their cig-free hands, isn’t super enjoyable. The craving for my own cigarette bubbles up as the trails of smoke slink around me, and I kick my traitorous brain when an ache follows; I miss Ziggy so much my chest hurts. How pathetic. I can’t believe I let my guard down with anyone. I should’ve known better.
I push the fake friendship out of my mind and head for the “Exit” sign.
The door swings open, and I take in a lungful of fresh air.
Scratch that, I take in a lungful of alley air. The rot and smog hit me, and I cough and cover my nose, surprised at how strong the smell is. The pounding music is a low drone in the background now, and the temperature is less smothering without all the bodies. It’s a huge relief to be away from the otherweirdly.
I step over an oily puddle and pause once I get to a spot where I can see the opening of the alley. I search the street, watching the cars pass. People walk by, laughing and twisted up in each other, totally oblivious to what’s inside the building they’re passing. I wish I was oblivious.
Maybe I should just walk away from this. I could run from these freaks right now, if I wanted to.
But I . . . I can’t run from myself. No matter how far away I get from Aelia or Faelan or any of this, I’ll still have this thing inside me. This thing that starts fires, a thing that can burn with a touch. Or kill. If I left, who knows what it might do. I have no idea how to control it.
I linger in the shadows, my stomach churning as I move to the wall and lean on a drainpipe. I’m completely stuck.
Out of the corner of my eye I spot a dark shape at the other end of the alley, and an odd sound, like water moving, slinks through the air.
The back of my neck prickles, a chill sliding down my spine.
But when I turn, I can’t see anything.
I need to calm down. I’m just on edge. My sanity’s been through a paper shredder the last twenty-four hours. I try to let the traffic humming in the background calm me, like the sound of the tide, as I focus on the light from a billboard reflecting in marbled blue and pink on the surface of an oily puddle beside my foot.
My God, these heels I’m wearing are ridiculous. Sequined, Aelia? Really? They probably cost more than the average person makes in a week.
A rustle of feathers comes from above, and I look up, spotting a small shadow flying overhead from one building to the other. Then the strange water sounds come again, like a slurp, echoing down the alley.
My gaze shifts quickly back to the darker shadows, tingles sliding up my legs as I step out and search the shapes around me. It’s probably just a rat—
It comes again. An odd slush and sloop. Louder. Closer.
Movement catches my eye again. And I see it, a shadow on the wall across the alley, shifting, sliding upward like a snake slinking from its coil, while the sound of something fighting to emerge from a drain fills the air.
My pulse jumps as I watch the dark shape glide across the wall.
I stumble sideways, pressing into the bricks at my back as the ground under me tilts.
And then I realize. The shadow is from something coming out of the ground.
Beside me.
Ice fills my veins as I look down at the puddle.
But what I see doesn’t make sense: a long tentacle of oily water is sliding up, like gravity is reversing in just that spot. Swirls of light reflect off the surface as it stretches out. But, no—I can’t be seeing it right. Because it’s impossible.
Suddenly the tentacle shifts, bending sideways, the tip growing claws, and a second tentacle emerges beside it. Both become arms. The sucking grows louder. The talons dig into the asphalt with a crunch as a skeletal face surfaces, a writhing body pulling free of an unseen trap.
I quake, rooted to the spot only a few feet away, watching a dark creature take shape, dripping oily water from its body: a hooded figure, black as pitch, bone thin, with overlong limbs.
The slurping shifts into a moan, and I realize the puddle down the alley is moving too, more shapes climbing from the water.
“Child,” comes a low growl. “Fire child.”
I stumble back, tripping over a pipe sticking out of the wall. My butt hits the ground, and I scramble along the asphalt to get away, my palms scraping against it. The black ooze creature breaks free of the puddle and crawls toward me, its eyes vacant, two silver voids ready to swallow me.
A claw reaches out and grabs for my ankle. “Mine,” the creature moans.
I kick with a scream, losing one of my shoes. A smear of goop stains the thousand-dollar heel.
The thing hisses in rage, mouth agape, revealing dripping fangs.
Every nerve in my body lights, and I lurch to my feet, stumbling toward the mouth of the alley, focused on the streetlights ahead and the cars buzzing past. Safety.
Something bursts into my path, wings flapping wildly, screeching at me, forcing me back into the shadows again. A raven. It caws and beats at the air between me and the road. But as I turn to get away, it flies past and dives for the oily creature.
The dripping shadow shrinks from the bird with a cry of fear. A second dark shape that’s scuttling along the wall pauses. Both watch the bird for a second, then bow their heads.
I retreat, shaking, muscles tensed to run again. But I freeze when my vision of the bird shifts. I stare in confusion as smoke begins to seep from the raven’s back, spilling out in plumes. It billows from the black body, growing with each quick beat of its wings, taking shape. Until the raven is gone and there’s a man standing in front of me. His back is only three feet away.
A man who was a bird a second ago.
Smoke still trails from his shoulders and down his sides.
He speaks—I don’t recognize the words, but the tone is commanding, and the two dripping black creatures respond by cowering more. They mew, hunkering down to settle a few feet in front of him as if they were seeking his approval.
The raven man turns, and his metallic eyes fall on me.
The world tips again. My breath falters. I know him . . . I—
Where have I seen him before?
His features are young, etched and severe in their beauty, hair blacker than night, skin so pale it almost appears lit from the inside. But it’s his eyes that cut into me—a sharp silver, inhuman, unreal. “You shouldn’t be alone, little doe.” His voice is a warning as he looks around, like he’s searching to see if anyone is nearby.
I can’t seem to form words. I still can’t process the dripping shadows behind him, their slick bodies, their hollow eyes. Eyes that turn to stare hungrily at me again.
“Don’t worry about the wraiths,” he says. “They belong to me. As do you, by rights.” His lips tilt in a slight grin.
The words jar me. I recoil, shivering, and glance at the waiting shadows. “Those creepy things are with you?”
The raven man steps toward me, taller than I realized, his movement sly like a cat’s.
I falter. “Don’t touch me.”
His hands lift in surrender. “Forgive my clumsy approach, but I wanted to see you up close, to speak to you. Before the water can be muddied too much by others.”
“Stay away.” I have no idea who or what he is, but it’s obvious he’s not Team Marius. I should’ve asked more questions at dinner. Marius said there was a danger, but I assumed he was talking about me being the threat to people, not nightmarish creatures like this guy.
“Who are you?” I ask, trying to sound demanding. As if I have any power here. Bluffing is my only weapon right now. I could try to run, but it’s clear that I wouldn’t make it very far.
He tilts his head like he’s surprised I don’t know him. “I am your protector, if you wish it. Second son of the Morrígan, Prince of Shadows. My name is Kieran, brother to the King of Ravens. My sister leads the House of Morrígan as the Princess of Bones. We wish to offer you shelter.” He bows in a regal way, as if we were in a castle instead of an alley.
Then it dawns on me: this is the dark prince Faelan was talking about. Holy shit.
I almost burst into hysterical giggles as the realization settles in. Because this has to be a joke. God is playing a joke on me, right? This guy totally fits the title, now that the dots in my head are connecting. The high cheekbones and proud chin, the oddly formal speech. And that thick dark hair shadowing his eyes. Those eyes . . . you could get lost in them . . . you could . . .
A foggy memory surfaces: a flash of those eyes over me, his hands gripping my naked hips, his body pressing me into the cool clover beneath us.
Heat fills me in a rush. Where the hell did that come from?
I have to focus on breathing as the images, vivid and overwhelming, filter through me. It can’t be real, it can’t. I swear on my life I’ve never met this freak before, let alone gotten naked with him. I think I’d remember if I had, especially with that raven trick. But his eyes are so familiar.
“You shouldn’t fear me,” he says, breaking through the images clouding my senses. “I can give you your heart’s desire.”
I step back again. “Right now I’d like a one-way ticket to Tahiti.”
Confusion fills his features. “We don’t rule in the south.”
“Sounds perfect, then.”
He studies me. “You’re not what I expected. Not at all.” He pauses and then adds, “I pictured dark stoicism. I pictured assurance. But you . . . you’re so different than she was. I find it . . . intriguing.”
Prickles of awareness crawl over my skin at his words. “Different than who?”
“Your sister, Queen Lily.”
I remember what Aelia said about Faelan hoping I wasn’t like the last female offspring from Brighid’s tree. Could she have been talking about the same person? A sister . . .
“You have a strange vibration in your spirit,” he continues, moving his gaze over my body. “Almost as if you were at war inside. Why has it taken you so long to surface in our world?”
I shake my head, not understanding.
His expression turns dark, his voice becoming unsettled when he adds, “And your power is . . . wrong.”
He knows something about me. And I have the feeling it’s something vital. It almost makes me blurt out the questions still crowding my head, but I bite my lip. I have no clue if I can trust this guy. Letting him know how ignorant I am could give him the upper hand. So I keep bluffing, pretending not to be completely freaked out.
“What can I say,” I mutter, “I’m a rebel.” I dare to turn away, feigning a casual air, and reach down to pick up the heel I lost when I stumbled. “And, uh . . . even though this has been invigorating and all, people are waiting for me, and I can’t—”
He re-forms in front of me again in a blink, blocking my path. He steps forward, forcing me to move away.
My back hits the brick wall of the building. And I’m trapped. Those silver eyes locked on mine.
My mind registers that he’s too close, that I should strike out and stop him, but I can’t seem to figure out how to squirm away. And then I feel his fingers slide over my neck, gripping it delicately. But I still can’t look away from those eyes.
His long thumbnail scrapes over my skin, and a shiver rakes through me.
“No, no, little doe,” he whispers. “You mustn’t rush off before our agreement can be made. I’m meant to protect you. To be your covering.”
“I told you not to touch me,” I say, breathless. My insides twist into knots. The barrage of emotions that fill my chest make me want to scream—confusion, fear, rage at my vulnerability.
He reaches up with his other hand and touches a strand of my hair that’s come loose. “But in this world, you’re mine, fire creature. And soon I will be yours.”
Raw terror rises to first place.
“Why are you shivering?” he asks, annoyance edging his voice. “What have they done to you?”
They? He’s the one pinning me to a wall. “Please don’t touch me” is still all I can manage to say.
“You plead with me? Are you really so weak? Where is your fire? I feel it in your spirit, why hold back?”
For the life of me, I have no response.
“I see the spell that was placed on you by the druid, Aelia—that is only a glamour, an illusion. You could pluck it away in an instant if you wished.” He searches my face. “And I know you can push past the blood magic on this torque. You have enough fire burning within you to raze our whole world if you willed it.” His hand presses against my throat, squeezing harder.
I feel the tip of his sharp thumbnail prick the skin on the side of my neck.
A small gasp of pain fills my throat, but his tightening fingers won’t let it escape.
“Let me see you, fire child.”
I can only shake my head as I begin to choke in his grip.
My pulse gallops faster, and pain throbs in my temples. Splotches of color dance across my vision. I can’t react. I can’t breathe. I can’t think.
Shock freezes my limbs. I should kick him in the nuts. I know how to defend myself. This isn’t the first time I’ve been pinned. But his eyes are all I see, and some traitorous part of me finds familiarity there. It wants full surrender.
Where are the flames I used to burn down the cottage? That I used to almost kill that vampire?
The power won’t come.
He presses closer, leaning in, the tip of his nose sliding over my cheek as he draws a breath. “Choose me,” he whispers. “I will show you the truth of your birthright.” When I stay frozen, he releases a disappointed sigh. “Well, I hate to mar the canvas, but a flower must be allowed to blossom. And it seems you need a little nudge.” He pulls back so he can meet my gaze again. “Forgive me for having to do this to you, my love. But I can’t bear to see you so trapped. You should be allowed to shine. To be free. Don’t you agree?”
I nod frantically.
His grip on my neck loosens.
I gasp, trying to find air, shifting my weight, about to run. At last, my arms lift in defense, ready to strike, to scratch and fight back.
But before I can do anything, his sharp thumbnail digs into the side of my neck.
In a slow, steady move, he slices into my artery.
Searing pain rakes across my skin. I gasp, staring in confusion as crimson sprays his pale features. Red freckles appear on his cheeks, his forehead. My blood? What just . . . what?
He keeps his fingers at my neck, sliding them over the wound like he’s slowing the bleeding a bit. “Come now, little doe, heal yourself. Open your spirit, release the fire.” His familiar silver eyes fill with anticipation.
Warm blood washes over my chest and my breasts, soaking my dress in seconds. I reach up with shaking hands and try to touch my neck. My head pounds with my crashing heartbeat, and my muscles throb, my own skin weighing a hundred pounds as everything blurs.
I open my mouth. But I can’t speak, I can’t . . .
A loud buzz fills my ears. My lungs tighten and stutter. Warmth seeps over my palm as I cover the gash, trying to hold myself together.
His fingers move to brush across my knuckles.
He steps back, a dark cloud moving over his features. “Where are you, Daughter of Fire? Why do you not heal?”
I fall to my knees. I stare at the oily ground, at my blood dripping onto the asphalt, smearing the reflection of the neon lights.
Faelan’s words the other night at the Halloween party echo in my head like a curse: the dark prince won’t be able to control you now . . .
There’s a loud click somewhere to my right. “Oh my gods.” A small screech of anger as a door slams. “What the fuck, Kieran? This is so unfair. You can’t just feed from her. Daddy will be enraged!”
Kieran bows to the approaching white blur. “Druid Aelia, I wasn’t feeding. Forgive me for rushing the process, but your people have her bound too tight. She needed to be nudged.”
“I bound her because she’s deadly, idiot. Shit! Look at the mess you’re making.” Someone grabs my arm and shakes me. “Heal yourself, dummy! My spell was totally lame. It only works because you bought in. So snap out of it!”
I fall limp on the ground, light dancing in front of my eyes. My cheek presses onto cool asphalt. Everything hurts. The air weighs too much.
Frantic voices blend with the buzz of the streetlamp. Somewhere in my head I understand that I’m pouring my life out in an alley that smells like an old lady’s feet. I know that in only minutes I’m about to stop existing. About to die. Forever.
And I can’t fight it. It’s not a fist or a nightmare. It’s not . . .
My heart slows to a crawl, the waning beat becoming a whooshing thud, the only sound, until I hear nothing at all. I see nothing. The pain is gone, and I just want to sleep.
I wonder if I’ll meet the real Sage now. I wonder if that other baby, the human one, is mad that I stole her life.
It was sort of a shitty life.
It won’t be mourned. And neither will I . . .
I watch the flames snapping in the hearth, wishing for a sign, but the golden fire remains silent.
Even now, after I’ve obeyed, Mother still shuns me. Three moons have passed since my Bonding to the King of Ravens, and my punishment is complete, my captivity in this bitterly cold place now etched into the annals. I would have thought the goddess would be pleased with my submission—it’s so unlike me. But, instead, I feel farther from her than ever before.
Perhaps it’s the dark energy in this place. The Morrígan’s powers are thick in the king’s shield house, a vast keep perched on the icy edge of Mount Na Ndeor, many leagues from the misty green trees of Caledonia.
And now I belong to the King of Ravens.
He has yet to claim my body since that first time during the Bonding ceremony—a quick joining in the clover to seal the Bond—but he is slowly trying to wear down my soul with each silver glance and attempt at a gift. Since the winter fox, he’s brought me many things: doves for my greenhouse, a black steed he calls Spark, and two nights ago ruby beads for the winter pixies to weave into my hair. His steady energy seems always close, a patient and watchful shadow. And his attentive manners are disarming when they surface.
He still frightens me, with his large form, his firm hands—a warrior’s hands—but he seems more familiar now. I don’t tense as much when he comes close, now that I know he won’t push me.
He says I’ll come to him in the night when I’m ready, that he’ll allow me my stubborn ways and eventually I will succumb. “Only a matter of time,” he says every night when we part outside my bedroom door. His battle-roughened fingers brush the line of my jaw. He kisses my cheek, whispering into my ear, “And we have an eternity.”
Last night, after his gift, I was weakened enough that I nearly gave in. He presented me with a white owl fledgling, and I was overcome by the beauty and innocence of the bird. I took the cage from him and almost turned my head, letting my lips brush his.
But it’s only because I’ve been lonely. So lonely . . .
Now I shiver and hug my woolen shawl around my shoulders at the memory. Wishing I could understand what’s happening to me. I am the Daughter of Fire, and I cannot get this cold to leave my bones. It’s been there since the Bonding ceremony. It won’t shake off.
My human watcher, Lailoken, says it’s the king’s energy lingering from the new connection, that it will pass and the worst is over. But it feels as if I’m being taken over. And I’m terrified of what this Bond is doing to me, who it’s making me become.
Perhaps I’m being foolish, still the silly girl who thought lust was more fun in secret, only worth pursuing if it was forbidden. And then a boy paid for my folly with his life. The only reason I’d pursued him was because he was the son of the human king in the south. I didn’t mean to fall in love. Or to kill him. And now I carry that with me. Always.
But for a time, just after the Bonding, I thought a miracle had happened and a piece of my love had returned to me.
My courses had been absent—each moon I waited, but there was no blood show. At first I thought nothing of it, then my bodice felt as if it were suffocating me, and my cheeks grew plump. My powers became unpredictable—I burned the curtains in the gallery on an afternoon when I accidentally spilled my wine. It was as if I’d become a novice again, in need of a torque. I’d seen this happen in women before. I knew I’d been blind. I denied the reality too long and needed to face it.
I was with child.
I didn’t speak of it to Lailoken, not even him. Certainly not to my king—he would surely have had the child ripped from my womb. He would have seen it as a betrayal, even though I would never be able to give him children, no matter how many times I came to his bed, our origins making such a thing impossible between us. But I don’t see him as a man to share his playthings. No, he’d wish for my womb to be as cold and dead as this icy keep.
It seems his wish has been granted.
“Where are you, Mother?” I ask the flames, my loneliness threatening to consume me now, thinking of the babe. “Tell me what I should do. I can’t let myself surrender to this place.” I put my palm to my belly, my throat aching.
Three nights ago, I began to bleed, and the child within me was lost. I feel as if my Bond with the son of death sealed the poor babe’s fate. I ensured its demise.
“You warned me of my foolishness,” I say to my mother, “how it would lead me to a broken heart. And I didn’t listen.” Tears fill my eyes. I let them come, as if my lover has died all over again. “But I’m listening now. You are the keeper of the hearth, the home. You know how to help me. Please, goddess, I wish for the child’s life to return to me. I wish for my heart to be mended. What should I do, Mother? I will obey you, I swear it. Just speak to me.”
I wait, expectantly. Still, I’m shocked when the embers shift, sparks rising up in a rush.
Surrender to him, the fire whispers, drawing out the sound with the sizzle of wood. The fire born within you shall bring rebirth. Surrender, child.
And then it fades. I listen intently but nothing else comes. I couldn’t have heard correctly, though. She can’t mean for me to give in to this. She’d wish for me to fight, to escape.
No, I couldn’t have heard right.
My stomach roils and I stand, wandering over to the cage where my new owl sits with watchful eyes. The bird hoots at my approach and ruffles its feathers. “Are you feeling smothered in there, little one?” I ask, understanding what it is to be caged. I open the latch and reach in, urging the bird onto my hand. “You should come with me to dinner tonight. Perhaps then I’ll have someone to talk to. The king barely says two words to me.”
It flaps its immature wings and hobbles its way over to perch on my wrist. My heart settles, looking into its wide black eyes. It baffles me that the king would give me a gift of such vulnerability and innocence.
I consider the words from the fire, but they don’t make any sense. I can’t understand why the goddess would wish for me to accept the darkness into myself. She must know that the king is far stronger than me. He’ll take me over. I’ll lose myself. Could she truly want to see my heart destroyed? Perhaps I should speak to Lailoken and see what his thoughts are. I’ll have to tell him of the child, but I think that would give me relief. I’ll go now, before dinner. If anyone asks, I’ll tell them I’m planning to show him the bird.
I settle the owl on the arm of my chair, then pull the cord for my ladies to come in. The three winter pixies enter, immediately getting to work dressing me for the evening, their thin fingers chilly against my skin. I ask to wear my sturdy boots and my good furs. None of them comment or ask why; they merely nod, their icy cheeks sparkling in the firelight. Once they’re done tying up my unwieldy hair, tucking the orange curls into the gold netting, they silently slip out, as if they were never here.
The owl wobbles back onto my wrist, and I lift my hand, urging him to perch on my shoulder. He grips the fur of my cloak with his talons and nestles into the crook of my neck.
“What should I name you, sweet one?” I ask. “You look like a Fionn. How does that sound?” The bird clicks its beak.
I leave my rooms and walk down the hallway, through the gallery, and down the back staircase. I’ll go through the kitchens and find the owl a piece of meat. This isn’t my usual time to visit Lailoken, but I’m sure he’ll be in his cave. As a monk, he spends his time focused on the solitary activities of prayer and reading, which keep his old legs weak and his eyes dim.
The goddess never seemed to approve of him, perhaps because he’s a human. Most of the underlings sneer at my dependence on him, a Christian monk, which is why he never comes to the keep. But when I was orphaned as a girl, he raised me as if he was my father. I asked him once if he was my human father. He claimed that he’d never been with a woman in that way. Then he kissed my head and said he loved me as much as any natural daughter.
“I see you’re enjoying my gift.” A deep voice echoes up from the bottom of the staircase. “He suits you.”
I pause on the stone and spot my Bonded looking up at me. His thick gray furs cover him like a cloak, a dusting of snow still on his broad shoulders. His raven, Bran, flies in the window and perches on the sill, tipping his head, giving the fledgling a curious look.
“I was taking him for a walk,” I say.
“A storm is moving in.” The king unhooks his heavy furs from his leathers and drops them to the floor. His shade servant, Eric, appears, picking them up and taking them away as the king starts up the stairs toward me.
My muscles clench instinctually, but I tell myself there’s no running.
“The gates are being closed,” he says. “You were off to your monk, no doubt?” I’m surprised—there’s no anger or disapproval in his voice.
“Yes,” I say, my pulse picking up speed as he comes closer. “I was going to show him the bird.”
His height matches mine even though he’s two steps down, his shoulders nearly blocking the passage. His black leathers are muddy, and there’s blood on the side of his neck. I realize he must’ve gone on his hunt early, feeling the storm coming in.
A glint of satisfaction lights his eyes. “I’m glad you’re pleased. You can show the old man the bird tomorrow, once the winds calm. I will have a servant clear the path for you.”
“Thank you,” I say, wondering why he’s helping me visit Lailoken. I assumed he felt the same way about my friend as everyone else in this place does.
He keeps his gaze locked on mine and continues his slow approach, up one step, then the last. When he’s on an even level with me he pauses, looking me over closely. His breath emerges in a quick mist as he leans close and kisses my cheek with his chilled lips. Then he whispers against my skin, “I’m truly sorry about the babe.”
My pulse stutters. Before I ask how he knew, he’s moved past, already disappearing into the shadows above, leaving me alone in the passage to wonder.