In the left palm, Sylvie saw a woman with a gun, eyes blacked by shadows and rage, but a curling smile on her mouth. The face of a murderer. L’enfant du meurtrier.

Do you like what you see when you look in the mirror?

“Stop it,” Sylvie repeated, and Mnemosyne closed her hands. Sylvie felt heat in her own palms and realized she’d brought the gun into her dreams, had it pointed at the Muse. “Dunne sent you. Let’s leave the psych tests and parlor tricks behind and get down to business. I’ve found out who’s behind this. Lilith, the Lilith. If he wants to lend a hand, maybe prove his ability to find anyone he’s laid eyes on, he could drop by.”

“Dunne’s busy,” Mnemosyne said.

“I’ve reached a dead end,” Sylvie said. “I need his help. If you’re all about history, you know I don’t say that often or easily.” Her hand tightened on the table edge; a crack ran from side to side, widening. Sylvie tucked her hands in her lap, like a chastened child. Her dream. Her temper.

“Dunne is trusting you to do what he cannot, while he defends your world and himself. Dunne is not a loved god.”

“No one loves a cop,” Sylvie said. Some of her temper faded. History, huh. Mnemosyne might be able to give her some of the answers that eluded her, questions about Dunne.

“Especially not petty-minded greater gods,” Mnemosyne said. “Whose wives were turned inside out and drained to fuel Dunne. Zeus hates him, and he has never been the most rational of gods. When Dunne first came to power, Zeus had to be coaxed into accepting him, and he laid in a caveat: As it was love that allowed Dunne’s ascension, it was love that kept him there. Should love ever leave Dunne, then he was fair game to be destroyed, the power reclaimed, Hera restored.”

“And now his love’s left him, not by choice, but gone all the same,” Sylvie said. “I don’t suppose Zeus had a hand in arranging that with Lilith.”

“No,” Mnemosyne said. “Zeus would rather concentrate on their rivalry than admit any threat could be poised by a human. It’s shortsighted. If Lilith gains power because Dunne is weakened fighting Zeus, the results will be wars across the multiple heavens.”

“Better than on earth,” Sylvie said. “Look, I’m doing my job. Don’t expect me to care or cry for gods. I like Dunne—sort of—but it’s the man he was, the glimpse I get of that, that I like. Not his opinionated justice-freak god act. And I’m hunting Bran because he’s an innocent, and I’m hunting Lilith because I—”

Beneath her hand, the crack in the table widened, and scales rose to touch her fingers, the faint flicker of a tongue. “Fuck!” She threw herself back and watched the snake slip free, a beautiful, deadly swath of red, gold, and black that poured itself over the edge of the table and vanished.

“Do you see that?” she cried.

“It’s a curse come searching,” Mnemosyne said. “You do make enemies, don’t you?” She reached down and collected the serpent. The coral snake coiled and thrashed in her grip. The eyes along her arm opened to better look at it.

Another sleek head began to protrude from the table crack, and Sylvie said, “So what do I do?”

“Nothing,” Mnemosyne said, and dropped the snake. It curled and hissed, tongue flickering. Sylvie aimed the gun, but hesitated; Mnemosyne didn’t seem concerned, and while gods couldn’t be trusted to care about human lives, they needed her.

“Nothing?”

“It’s questing. It can’t see you. Not cloaked as you are in the scents of others, splashed with inhumanity, and dreaming under my aegis. It’ll vanish with the dawn. A limited sort of curse, all spite and petty arrogance. Borrowed power fuels it.”

Sylvie watched the snakes slipping around her ankles and growled. “A curse on me.” The satanists, she thought, scavenging Dunne’s bleed-off in Miami. The curse alert going active, and Alex on the run. “Can I shoot them?”

“They’re not real to you, as you’re not real to them.”

“I want to hurt them,” she said. They’d made a mistake. Their being human had kept Sylvie from her guns, but now, by stealing power, they’d forfeited that status. She killed monsters.

Mnemosyne shook her head. “Better to elude—”

“No,” Sylvie said. “I’m not going to wait around for them to try again. I want them to see me, feel me, fear me.” At her feet, the coral snakes merged and melded, doubling, tripling, growing in size, until it rivaled the mass of an alligator. Her heart pounded in her ears, panic and rage mingled together.

“Do as you will.”

“I always do.”

The snake suddenly rose and struck, and she dodged on pure nervous reaction. She leveled the gun, and the snake raised itself again like a cobra, and hissed her name, “Shadows.”

“Go away. I’m too much for you to handle,” she said, and pulled the trigger. The bullet blew its head into spatter, and it dissolved back into a dozen or more regular coral snakes, all retreating through the cracked table. “What, giving up so soon?”

Mnemosyne said, “Many people throughout history have taunted their enemies. Many learned to regret it.”

“Shove off,” Sylvie said. “You’ve delivered your message; I’ve given you mine. So the sooner you go, the sooner I can wake up and get back to work.”

Mnemosyne raised her hands, and Sylvie turned her head. “No. No more pretty pictures. Just go. It’s my dream. I don’t want you in it.”

When she looked back, the Muse was gone. Sylvie propped her feet up on the table and noticed that the window to the beach had returned, though the girls were long gone, and night had fallen. Phosphorescent waves curled lazily across the sea, and Sylvie leaned back and watched the sun rise over the water.

Maybe, when all this was done, she’d take a vacation. Make it a long weekend, and pull Zoe out of school. Take Alex, too. They could lie out, watch the tourists burn, and count license plates from around the country. Alex could teach her to parasail, and Zoe could whine when Sylvie wouldn’t let her trot off after cute lifeguards. Maybe it wouldn’t be the carefree time of her childhood, but it wouldn’t be bad at all. Hell, maybe she’d even invite Demalion, if he could be convinced to give up his suits for board shorts.

Sylvie woke to noise with the sensation of having been smiling in her sleep; before she could enjoy it, the ringing phone was answered, and Demalion’s voice, first sharp, went quiet and furtive.

Maybe I won’t invite him, Sylvie thought. ISI, secretive, son of a bitch. She never even considered that he might be keeping quiet out of basic courtesy; he knew the phone would have woken her, hair-triggered as she was.

She ghosted to the door, leaned into the dim hallway, and heard, “. . . condition?” He listened for a long moment, and the answer didn’t please him. He swore into the phone, still at a whisper, then said, “I told you to watch her. What about the other?”

Watch who? Sylvie wondered, though the prickling heat of her resurgent anger suggested a name or two. You trusted him, the dark voice gloated. You thought you and yours were safe with him.

“No, no, there’s no help for it. Bring her in. But discreetly! And be careful with her, she’s an innocent. She’ll be scared.”

“Then maybe you shouldn’t send men to scare her.”

Demalion jerked; his eyes widened, and he looked away despite himself. Guilty, Sylvie judged. But of what?

“Got to go,” Demalion said, and set the phone down.

“Why do I think that I’m involved in that conversation? Why do I know I’m not going to like it?” She crossed her arms across her chest, tucked her hands away when he reached for her.

“Sylvie,” Demalion said. He licked his lips. “I—”

“What did you do?” Sylvie asked. “Bring her in. Who’s her?”

“Zoe,” Demalion said. “Your parents are on vacation, and she’s not safe where she is. Her school was canceled on account of snakes in the lockers—”