Lillyanne Plume mopped the last hallway of the university's grandest building at two in the morning, and she was already bored. The columns outside Prestige Hall looked important. The floors she cleaned did not. She was twenty-two, a scholarship kid without the scholarship, and she paid rent by pushing a mop through a building full of students who slept while she worked. The mop was job one. Job two started in ten minutes, in the basement, and it paid better. She wrung the mop, killed the lights, and took the service stairs down three floors. A boiler room sat behind an unmarked door. Six students waited inside on folding chairs. She knew their tells before she knew their names. The pre-med bit his lip when he bluffed. The frat boy tapped his chip twice on a good hand. The girl in the red coat only looked at Lillyanne when she was lying. "Deal me in," the frat boy said, already reaching for chips. "Buy-in first," Lillyanne said. She held out her palm. Cash landed in it. She counted without looking. She dealt Texas Hold'em for two hours and won enough to cover rent and the electric. She won because poker was easy. She read faces the way other people read street signs. By the third hand she wanted to scream. She wanted a game she could not solve in an afternoon. She wanted something that would make her think for once. Instead she raked in another pot and smiled like it mattered. At four in the morning she walked home. Her apartment was three flights up over a laundromat. The lock stuck. The radiator clanged. She dropped her keys on the counter, kicked off her shoes, and went to the bedroom to fall face-first into sleep. An envelope sat on her pillow. It was black on one side and white on the other, thick as a wedding invitation, sealed with wax the color of dried blood. Her name was written across the front in silver ink. No stamp. No address. No smudge from a bag or a pocket. Someone had been inside her apartment. She stood very still and listened. The radiator clanged. The fridge hummed. Nothing else. She checked the closet. Empty. She checked behind the shower curtain. Empty. She checked the window. Locked from the inside. She came back to the bed and picked up the envelope. It was heavier than paper should be. Whoever left it wanted her to open it. That alone was enough to make her not want to. She walked to the kitchen and dropped it in the trash. Coffee grounds. Eggshell. Envelope. She tied the bag shut, set it by the door, and went back to bed. Her last thought before sleep was that no one, in twenty-two boring years, had ever bothered to break into her apartment to leave her a gift. Someone had picked her. She hated that a small, awake part of her was already curious.

Saturday morning at the coffee shop, Lillyanne worked the espresso bar with a headache and a bad mood. The envelope from her pillow was two days in the trash and she had almost stopped thinking about it. Then she cleared table four and found another one waiting under a saucer. Black on one side. White on the other. Red wax seal. Her name in silver ink. She stared at it for a long moment, then walked it back to the counter. Her boss was pulling shots. She held it up. "Did you see who sat at four?" He glanced over. "Nobody's sat at four all morning." She dropped it in the trash under the register and went back to work. At noon she reached into her bag for her wallet and pulled out an envelope instead. Same weight. Same seal. She threw that one in the trash too, harder than she needed to. By Wednesday she had thrown away six. One in her apron pocket. One inside the sugar canister. One tucked between the pages of the paperback she kept behind the counter. One folded into her scarf. She stopped asking who put them there. Nobody ever saw anything. Thursday afternoon the postwoman came through with the shop's mail. Lillyanne knew her by her white braid and the snow crusted on her boots. She delivered to every door on the block and remembered every name. "Anything for me today?" Lillyanne asked, half joking. Margarie set a stack of bills on the counter and shook her head. "Not from me, dear." Her rosy face pinched. She lowered her voice. "Whoever's leaving those for you isn't using the mail. I'd know." Lillyanne's stomach dropped. "You've seen them." "I've seen the seal. Once, a long time ago. If they've picked you, they don't stop." Mrs. Boddy adjusted her satchel and pushed out into the cold before Lillyanne could ask another question. Lillyanne finished her shift at nine. She walked home in a state she refused to name. She climbed three flights, worked her stuck lock, and pushed the door open. Her apartment was covered in envelopes. They were on the couch. On the counter. In the sink. Fanned across the floor like a dealer had thrown a deck. Hundreds of them, black and white, each stamped with red wax, each with her name in silver. Something in her chest broke loose. Not fear. Fury. She grabbed a garbage bag from under the sink and started sweeping them in by the armful. She filled one bag. She filled another. She dragged both down three flights and threw them in the dumpster behind the laundromat. She went back up and did it again. And again. At two in the morning she stood in her cleaned apartment, breathing hard, hands shaking. On the kitchen counter, where she had just wiped it bare, sat a single new envelope. She screamed inside and set that one on fire.

Lillyanne slept four hours and woke to a clean counter. No envelope. She checked the sink, the couch, the pillow, the inside of her boots. Nothing. She let herself breathe. She walked to campus under a gray sky and felt eyes on the back of her neck the whole way. She turned twice. A woman at the bus stop. A man reading a paper. Neither looked up. She climbed the wide steps of the university's main hall, passed under the tall columns, and pushed through the heavy doors. Class went by. No envelope in her bag. No envelope in her locker. No envelope tucked into her notebook when she opened it. By the time she clocked in for her janitor shift, she almost believed it was over. She mopped the science wing whistling. She ate a granola bar on the loading dock and watched the snow fall. Whoever they were, they had given up. She had won by throwing everything away. The basement game started at eleven. Six regulars around a folding table under a bare bulb. Lillyanne dealt. She took a pot on the third hand and another on the fifth. The pile of bills by her elbow grew the way it always did. The door opened at midnight and a stranger walked down the steps. She was tall. White suit, cut close. Pale hair pulled into a tight bun. Black lipstick, black liner, one silver earring shaped like a lightning bolt. She moved through the smoke like she owned the lease. The regulars went quiet. Dijon slid his chair back an inch without meaning to. "Deal me in," the woman said. She set cash on the felt without counting it. Lillyanne dealt her in. She played twelve hands. She won nine. She did not blink when she bluffed. She did not smile when she hit. Lillyanne studied her over the cards and found nothing to study. No twitch. No breath change. No pattern. Lillyanne's chest went hot. She pushed harder. She raised on garbage to bait her. The woman called every time and turned over the better hand. On the last hand Lillyanne shoved her whole night's take into the middle. The woman matched it and laid down a straight. Lillyanne had two pair. The table did not speak. Emmy stared at her hands. Someone coughed. The woman stacked the bills, tapped them square, and walked out. Lillyanne left ten minutes later. The woman was leaning against Lillyanne's car in the lot, one ankle crossed over the other. She held out an envelope. Black and white. Red wax. Silver ink. "She's determined to have you there," the woman said. "I see why." Lillyanne took it. Her fingers closed on the wax before she decided to. The woman walked off into the snow. Lillyanne stood by her car with the envelope in her hand and, for the first time, wanted to open it.

Lillyanne sat in her car with the envelope on her knee. The lot was empty. Snow ticked against the windshield. She broke the wax with her thumbnail. The paper inside was heavy. The letters were written in something dark and wet that had dried in ridges. Blood, or something meant to look like it. She tilted the page under the dome light and read. Miss Lillyanne Plume is invited to play. Bring one guest. This year's prize is one you will not want to miss. No date. No address. No name of a game. No instructions for how to answer. She turned the page over. Blank. She held it up to the light. Nothing hidden. She read it three more times and learned nothing new. She drove home and did not sleep. By six she was at the corner where the postwoman started her route. She knew the route because the woman had told her once, over a cup of coffee, in a voice that suggested she wanted to be known. Marjorie came around the hedge with her satchel dragging one shoulder down. Snow crusted her boots to the ankle. Her white braid hung over her scarf. When she saw Lillyanne standing on the curb, her rosy face went flat. "No," Marjorie said. She kept walking. Lillyanne fell in beside her. "You knew the seal. You told me you knew it. I opened one." "Then you're a fool." Marjorie shoved a flyer into a mailbox without stopping. "I signed a paper. I don't talk about it. Not to you, not to anyone." "Please." Lillyanne stepped in front of her. "I don't know what I said yes to." Marjorie stopped. She looked up the street, then down it. Her hand went into the satchel and gripped something for balance. Her mouth worked before words came. "It's a place of dreams," she said. "Real magic. Things you won't believe until you're in the room with them." Her voice dropped. "It's also a place of nightmares. Some come to play. Some come to kill. Some come to watch. Every year someone dies. Every year." Lillyanne's throat closed. "Who runs it?" "Don't ask me that here." Marjorie's eyes were shining. "Girl, listen. Throw the letter in a fire. Leave town. If you go, you'll wish you hadn't. And if you go alone, you won't come back at all. You bring someone. You hear me? Someone who can fight, or lie, or both. Do not walk in that door by yourself." She pushed past. Her boots crunched away up the block. Lillyanne stood in the snow with her hands in her pockets. The envelope was in her coat. So was the plus one line. She had until she found her partner to decide if she was brave or stupid, and she already knew which one she was.

Lillyanne went looking for answers before she looked for a partner. She spent the morning at a library computer inside Prestige Hall, the columns and arched windows throwing bars of light across her keyboard. She searched every phrase she could think of. Blood-wax seals. Invitation games. The spyglass shape pressed into the wax. She found puzzle forums, magic tricks, and one dead blog from 2004. Nothing real. She moved to the stacks and pulled anything on secret societies, old carnivals, private tournaments. She read until her eyes burned. By closing time she had a headache and a page of notes worth throwing away. She walked the two miles to the postal depot in the dark. Marjorie was loading her satchel at the back dock, white braid over one shoulder, boots wet to the ankle. When she saw Lillyanne her rosy face closed up like a shutter. "I told you I was done," Marjorie said. "I need one name." Lillyanne stepped into the loading light. "I searched everywhere. There's nothing to find. You're it." "Then there's a reason for that." Marjorie hoisted the satchel. "Go home." "Be my partner." Marjorie stopped moving. Her hand went to the strap and stayed there. She looked at Lillyanne for a long moment, and something old and tired moved behind her eyes. "You think I haven't been?" she said. "Girl, I've been. I came back. I don't go back." "Then give me someone who will." "No." "I'm going." Lillyanne's voice cracked and she let it. "With a partner or without one. You said alone means dead. So if you don't give me a name, you're the one who killed me. Sit with that on your route tomorrow." Marjorie's mouth opened, closed. She set the satchel down on the concrete. She looked past Lillyanne at the empty lot, then back. "Scott Silrose," she said. "They call him Scott the Scarlet. He's won it twice. Tall, near-white hair, silver eyes. You'll know him. He lives in Charloton. Ask for him by the color." Lillyanne wrote it in her notebook. Her hand was steady. "Thank you." "Don't." Marjorie picked the satchel back up. "Hear me. His last partner didn't come home. Word is he killed her himself. Nobody agrees why. Some say she cheated him. Some say his heart made him do it. He's got a bad one now, from something that happened in there." She jabbed a finger at Lillyanne's chest. "You watch his hands. You watch his moods. You don't turn your back." "Understood." "No, you don't." Marjorie shouldered past. "But you will." Lillyanne stood alone on the dock with a name in her notebook. She had a partner to find. She just wasn't sure yet whether finding him was better than dying without him.

The train dropped Lillyanne in Charloton at midmorning. The town sat against a black harbor. Ice crusted the pilings and the ropes. Boats knocked against the docks like slow drums. She had a name, a face to look for, and no idea where in the town to start. She had four days before the game. Wandering would eat them. She picked the busiest street and worked it door to door. She asked at the fish counter, at the ferry office, at a bait shop that smelled like blood and salt. She used the color, the way the postwoman told her to. Have you seen a man they call the Scarlet. Tall, hair almost white. Silver eyes. Most people looked at her and moved on. A dockhand spat and walked away. A woman at a chowder window shook her head too fast. Lillyanne started to feel the name itself as the problem. By afternoon her feet hurt and the sky had gone iron. She stopped at the end of a pier to think. She had one more hour before she'd have to buy a room and lose a day. She turned back toward the taverns. Halfway up the street, through a fogged bar window, she caught a flash of white. Hair, slicked back, one strand loose over the brow. She crossed the street. The bar was warm and low. A fire cracked in a stone hearth. He sat at the far end with a whiskey and a deck of cards, shuffling one-handed. Red jacket. White shirt open at the collar. When he looked up, his eyes hit her like cold water. "You've been asking for me," Scott said. He smiled. The smile was perfect and a little too easy. "Sit. Let me buy you something warm. You look half frozen and twice as stubborn." She sat. He poured. He asked her name and made a joke about it and let his knee brush hers under the bar. He was charming in a practiced way, like a man reading from a page he had read many times. Something under the charm did not match. His hands were steady but his eyes tracked everything, the door, her purse, her throat. His gaze stopped on her bag. The corner of the envelope showed, black and white, the red wax just visible. His smile did not fall. It simply left. "Out," he said. He did not raise his voice. "All of you. Now." The bartender set down a glass and walked to the back. Two men at a table stood without looking at each other and left their drinks. A woman by the fire pulled her coat on and went. In under a minute the room was empty except for the two of them and the sound of the fire. He turned to her. The silver eyes had gone dark. "Show me," he said. "Slowly." Lillyanne had found him. She was not sure anymore that finding him counted as winning.

Lillyanne set the envelope on the bar between them. The wax caught the firelight. Scott looked at it the way a man looks at an old scar. He did not touch it at first. He drank instead, set the glass down, and slid the envelope toward himself with two fingers. He read. His mouth stayed flat. Under his cuff, a black band circled his wrist. A small light on its face pulsed with his pulse. She watched the light dim, steady, then dim again. He folded the paper along its old creases and pushed the envelope back to her. "You read it," she said. "Good. Be my partner." "No." "Why." "Because the place nearly killed me." He tapped the band on his wrist. The light blinked once. "This is what it left me. I don't go back." "How," she said. "How did it nearly kill you." He looked at her a long moment. When he spoke, his voice dropped and flattened. It was not the bar voice. It was a voice that had been waiting under the other one. "Walk away, Lillyanne. Get on the train. Burn the letter. Move cities. Don't say the word game out loud again." The warning was clean. She felt it in her stomach. She stayed on the stool. "How," she said again. He almost laughed. "You don't scare." "I'm asking." "And I'm not telling." He pulled the whiskey closer. "Not to a stranger. Tell me why you're so hungry to die, and I might tell you what it costs." She thought about lying. She thought about the practiced answer, the sympathy answer. She gave him the real one. "The world bores me," she said. "I win every game I sit down to. I mop floors at night because the days are the same. My father loved puzzles. He taught me. He's gone. Nothing since him has been hard." Scott watched her. The band on his wrist blinked. "And the game?" he said. "The game isn't the puzzle I want." She tapped the envelope. "This is. Someone picked me. They flooded my apartment with these. They sent a woman in a white suit to beat me at cards and hand me one in a parking lot. I want to know why they want me. That's the puzzle. The game is just the room where I get to ask." He was quiet. The fire moved. He turned the glass on the wood, once, twice. Something she said changed in his eyes. She could see it. He drank. He set the glass down and grabbed a deck of cards, but with a light chuckle he set them back down. “You like games? What about a riddle?” She met his grin. “Only if it comes with a prize.” “Answer this riddle correctly, and I’ll be your partner. Don’t, and you’re on your own.”

Scott leaned in on his elbows. The strand of near-white hair fell across his brow. His silver eyes caught the bar light and held her there. "I have two hands," he said. "I move without legs. I show you the truth and I lie every day. What am I?" He smiled a little. Flirty. Watching her mouth, not her eyes. Lillyanne turned the words over. Two hands. No legs. Truth and lies. Her brain reached for the obvious shape and grabbed it. "A clock," she said. He sat back. The smile went flat. "No," he said. "No partner." "Wait—" "Go home." He stood, dropped bills on the bar, and walked out. She grabbed her coat and chased. The cold hit her in the teeth. He walked fast for a man with a bad heart. She half-ran beside him. "One more," she said. "Give me one more. Please." "That isn't how riddles work." "I came a long way. I have no one else. Marjorie said you were the only one who'd lived through it twice." He didn't slow. She kept talking. She said she'd pay. She said she'd do the dangerous parts. She said please again and hated the sound of it. He stopped at a tall iron gate set in a stone wall. A house sat back behind it, dark windows, one lamp burning over the door. He stepped through and pulled the gate shut. The lock clicked. "Go home, Lillyanne." He walked up the path and didn't look back. She stood at the bars until her fingers went numb. Then she found a motel two streets over with a buzzing sign and a stained carpet. She paid cash. She lay on top of the covers in her coat. Two hands. No legs. Shows the truth and lies every day. Not a clock. A clock doesn't lie. A clock is right or broken. What has two hands and lies— She sat up. A person lies. A person shows the truth and lies every day. Two hands. No legs, because legs don't matter to the trick. It wasn't a riddle about an object. She threw on her coat over the coat and ran. The street was empty. Her breath came out white. She found the gate, found the buzzer beside it, and pressed it. Pressed it again. Held it down. Pressed it in bursts until a light came on upstairs. His voice came through the speaker, rough with sleep. "I told you to go home." "A liar," she said. "A person. The answer is a person. You. Me. Whoever sits across the table. Two hands. No legs that matter. Shows the truth and lies every day." The speaker hissed. She waited. The lock clicked. The gate swung an inch inward on its own. "Come inside," he said. "Before you freeze."

The house was warmer than she expected. Scott led her down a hall lined with dark wood and closed doors. He didn't ask if she wanted anything. He walked into a study, dropped into a leather chair, and gestured at the one across from him. A low fire ticked in the grate. Lillyanne sat. Her fingers still burned from the gate. "You have questions," he said. "Ask them fast, sweetheart. I’m tired." She had a list she'd been building since the train. She started at the top. "What is the game? What do they make you do? How many rounds. What are the rules?” He held up a hand. The strand of near-white hair fell forward and he didn't push it back. "I can't tell you the rules. Not because I won't. Because I can't. You'll understand when you're inside." He watched her face. "I can tell you that someone dies. Every year. Sometimes more than one. It isn't a metaphor and it isn't a story they tell to scare guests." He tapped his chest, once, over the heart. "And you never leave the way you came.” She kept her hands still on her knees. She had known. Marjorie had said it. Reading it in a warm room from a man who'd lived it made it heavier. "There are three ways to join," he said. "You can be a victim. You can be a watcher. You can be a player. Decide now. Before you leave this chair." "A victim isn't a choice." A quick grin flashed on his lips. "It is if you walk in without already choosing." She opened her mouth to answer. He lifted his hand again. "Before you speak. If you say player, know there is no undoing it once we enter the game. You don't get to change your mind halfway through. There is no guarantee you live. There is no guarantee you win. Most people do neither." He leaned closer. “It doesn’t matter how beautiful you are.” She waited to be sure he was done. "And what happens if we lose?" He shook his head, one short motion. "That's not an option." The fire ticked. She thought about her apartment and the hundreds of envelopes. She thought about the poker table where every hand ended the same and bored her by the third card. She thought about a woman in a white suit who'd taken her money without breaking a sweat. "Player," she said. He didn't smile. He nodded once, like she'd signed something. "Then we leave tomorrow morning. If I’m your partner, you'll do what I say when I say it. I won’t watch you die, so you can get angry, you can get tired of me, but you will not quit on me." She nodded, nerves running in her chest. Maybe this wasn’t a good idea, but she couldn’t say no. It was too enticing. “I need you to say it,” he said softly. Lillyanne nodded again. “I won’t quit.” "Good." He stood. "There's a spare room upstairs. Take it. You don't go back to the motel. From tonight, you're mine to keep alive."

Morning came gray. Scott handed her a ticket at the platform and said nothing about the spare room or the fire the night before. The train pulled inland, away from the coast, past fields still stiff with frost. Lillyanne sat across from him and watched the strand of white hair fall over his eye. He didn't push it back. He hadn't eaten. His hand rested flat on his thigh, and she saw the small tremor in his fingers he was trying to hide. "You look tired," she said. “Is it your heart?” He smiled without warmth. “It’s cute you’re worried about me.” She leaned forward, elbows on her knees. "Scott. If you drop dead in the middle of this game, I need to know before it happens, not after." She kept her voice low. The car was almost empty. "You said I do what you say when you say it. Fine. But I'm not walking in blind about my partner." He stared out the window for a long moment. Then he pulled his collar down an inch. A pale scar ran across his sternum. "Bad heart," he said. "Since my last game. Stress sets it off. Loud rooms. Fear. Anything that spikes it." He let the collar go. "If I go quiet on you inside, or grab a wall, don't touch me and don't shout. Sit me down. Count to sixty. It passes or it doesn't." She swallowed. "And if it doesn't." "Then you finish without me." She sat back. Her stomach turned once, hard. She had chosen a partner who could die from a slammed door. She had also chosen the only living person who had won twice. She held both facts and didn't speak. The train stopped in a city she didn't know. Scott walked ahead through streets thick with pigeons and led her up the wide steps of a library that took a full block. Inside, the ceilings climbed four stories. He moved past the desk without a glance and up a spiral stair to a back room where the light was yellow and the air smelled of old glue. He pulled a book off a low shelf. The cover was cracked leather, blank. "Letter," he said. She took the envelope from her bag. He opened the book to its middle. She laid the envelope on the page. He closed the cover and pressed his palm flat. A soft glow ran along the seam and faded. He opened the book. The envelope was gone. In the hollow of the pages sat a small brass key. Scott lifted it. He walked to a door marked STAFF, slid the key in, and turned. The door opened onto a broom closet. At the back of the closet stood another door. No handle. No hinges she could see. Just wood, and a keyhole waiting. He held the key out to her. "Your game," he said. "You open it."

The brass key shook in Lillyanne's palm. She couldn't tell if the tremor came from her hand or the metal itself. Scott stood behind her in the broom closet, close enough that she could hear him breathe. He said nothing. He had handed her the key and stepped back, and now the choice sat with her. "If I turn it wrong," she said, "does it kill us." "It doesn't turn wrong," Scott said. "It turns or it doesn't." She pressed her thumb against the bit to steady it. The shaking slowed. She slid the key into the door. It fit like it had been cut for the lock that morning. She turned it. The bolt gave with a soft, clean click. The door swung inward on its own. Warm air rolled over her, sweet with sugar and smoke. She stepped through. She stood on a small balcony. Velvet lounges. A low table with candied fruit and a bottle sweating in ice. She gripped the rail and looked out, and her breath left her. A circus tent rose around her, taller than any building she had ever stood inside. The fabric was deep purple, lit from within by ribbons of soft blue light that drifted across the cloth like slow water. Gold lanterns hung from the seams. The center pole vanished up into a haze she couldn't see the top of. Dozens of balconies ringed the inside of the tent, stacked in tiers. Every one was full. On some, people in bright coats and long gowns laughed with drinks in their hands. On others, small groups leaned close and spoke low, heads almost touching. A woman in red threw back her head and laughed at something a man in a hood said to her. A heavyset girl in green glasses wrote in a notebook without looking up. A few balconies held people like her. Standing at the rail. Staring. Mouths a little open. One boy across the ring gripped his rail so hard his knuckles had gone white. Scott stepped up beside her. He didn't look at the tent. He looked at her, heart steady and watch green. "This is where it starts," he said. "Every year. They bring the players here first. They let you drink. They let you look. They let you see who else came." He nodded at the tiers. "Watchers up top. Victims on the low rings. Players in the middle. That's us." She counted balconies until she lost track. Her chest felt tight in a new way. Not fear. Something closer to hunger. "When does it begin," she said. "When the lights go down." Behind them, the door she had come through closed on its own. She heard the bolt slide. She turned the key in her hand. It had gone still. Cold. Ordinary. She put it in her pocket.

Lillyanne kept her hand on the rail and tried to breathe like Scott breathed. Slow. Even. He stood beside her with his drink untouched, watching the tiers the way a mechanic watches an engine. He wasn't nervous. That was the strangest part. Every other new player she could see was pale, or shaking, or drinking too fast. Scott looked bored. She followed his eyes and saw why he couldn't be. Half the tent was looking at him. A man two balconies over pointed with his chin and said something to the woman next to him. On a higher tier, a small group leaned in and stared without pretending not to. One balcony up and to the left, someone hadn't moved in a full minute. She could feel that one on her skin. A watcher, alone, elbows on the rail, face in shadow under the gold lanterns. Waiting for her to notice. "Scott," she said. "They know you." "They know my face." "Then they know mine now. Who do I need to worry about." He set his glass down. He didn't point. He tipped his head a fraction toward the woman in red across the ring, the one who had laughed earlier. "Whitney Herring. Won last year. She'll do anything and she means anything." His eyes moved. "Tall man, gray coat, two tiers up. He killed his partner the last time he played because she lost him a round." "Killed her here?" "Here counts." His eyes moved again, lower. "Short one. Round face. Looks like somebody's uncle. He took out three teams the year I won. Nobody proved it. Nobody had to." Lillyanne's mouth was dry. She made herself look at each one and hold it long enough to remember. Whitney felt her stare and smiled at her like they were already friends. "And the one above us," Lillyanne said. "Left side. Alone." Scott glanced up. His face didn't change, but the strand of hair at his forehead moved as he exhaled. "Watcher. Can't tell you which kind yet." "Which kinds are there." "Ones who bet on you. Ones who bet against you and sabotage. And one who sponsor to feed clues." He looked at her. "You want that one. A sponsor makes a world of a difference." "How do we get it?” "Impress them. Now. Before the lights go." She turned toward the watcher. Pulling her aged card deck from her back pocket, she shuffle bowed them and lifted her chin. She let them see her face, freckles and all, and then she smiled the way she smiled at a table she was about to clean out. Small. Certain. The watcher lifted a gloved hand off the rail and touched two fingers to their brow. A nod. A mark. Scott saw it. The corner of his mouth moved. "Congratulations, sweetheart. You just got us a sponsor," he said. Above them, the blue ribbons of light in the tent fabric began, one by one, to dim.

The blue ribbons of light died out one by one until the tent went black. Lillyanne felt Scott's shoulder brush hers. She kept her hand on the rail and made herself count her breaths. If she panicked, he might too. If he panicked, his heart would answer for both of them. A spotlight snapped on above the ring. It caught a platform rising out of the floor, slow and clean. The platform stopped level with their balcony. Two women stood on it. The first was tall, pale as paper under a wide black hat. Her dress was black and red, cut close. She smiled like a hostess who had already decided which guest would not be leaving. Behind her stood a shorter girl in a white suit, hair pulled back tight, black lipstick, hands folded at her waist. Lillyanne's breath stopped. She knew that white suit. She knew the mouth. This was the woman who had cleaned her out at the poker table and handed her the envelope in the parking lot. The one who had tracked her down. "Scott," she whispered. "The one in white. She's the one who found me." Scott went a shade paler. The band on his wrist blinked red, once, then steady. He didn't look at the light. He looked at Lillyanne. "You're sure." "I'm sure." The woman in the hat lifted her arms like she was greeting family. "Welcome," she said. Her voice carried without effort. "I am Carmella Black. I run these games. My butler you may already know." She let the pause sit. Her dark eyes moved along the players' tier and landed on Lillyanne. She held the look. Then she smiled wider and looked away, as if Lillyanne were a card she had already counted. Beside her, the butler winked at Lillyanne. Small. Private. A dealer's wink across a table. Carmella spread her hand toward the ring. "Three night," she said. "First team to win leaves with the prize. The rest leave in whatever condition the game leaves them." She let another pause build. "The prize this year," she said, "is one-million dollars, OR…a gift like no other." The crowd broke. Watchers leaned forward. A woman two tiers up laughed once, sharp. Someone below them swore. The player in the gray coat didn't move at all. Lillyanne looked at Scott. His jaw was tight. His hand had found the rail beside hers. The wristband on him still burned red, but his breathing was steady. He had held. He was holding now. She didn't have his limit yet. She had something better. She had proof he could stand in the same room as the woman who nearly killed him and not fall. Carmella lifted one gloved hand. "Players," she said. "Let the games begin." Lillyanne pushed off the rail. Scott moved with her, upright, alive, and watching.

Scott caught her hand before the applause finished. He pulled her off the balcony at a run. Lillyanne stumbled once and caught her stride. She didn't ask where. His grip said there wasn't time. They came out of the tent into cold air and gold lamplight. A tall building leaned over the path, purple and cream, windows stacked at odd angles like someone had shuffled the floors. Scott shoved through the double doors without slowing. People crowded behind them, but they made it to the counter first. A woman stood behind the front desk. Her face didn't quite settle. Every time Lillyanne looked, the features moved a fraction. The woman slid a brass key across the wood. "Room 103," she said. "One room?" Lillyanne asked. "One," Scott said, and took the key. He pulled her toward the stairs. She counted landings. One. Two. Three. He stopped on the third floor. "This is the third," she said. "The key says one." "Stay close to me." His voice had dropped. "Nothing here is what it says." She kept a step behind him down a hallway that curved where it shouldn't. Doors with mismatched numbers. A, 47 next to a 12, L5. Their door read 103 in gold paint. "Scott. I don't know the rules." She hated saying it. "I don't know what tonight brings. If I walk in blind, I'll get us killed." He stopped with his hand on the knob. His eyes moved down the hall, then back to her. "Two hundred teams," he said. "Fifty victims hidden across the grounds. First team to find a victim, solve the clues, and bring the murderer back to the tent wins. Teams will kill each other to get there first. You don't trust anyone in a hallway. You don't open a door someone else opened. You stay behind me until I say." She made herself breathe. "Murder?" "I told you someone always dies." He watched her face. "We need to get in our room and find the clue. That will lead us to the victim.” "Okay." She readied herself. He turned the key. The room smelled like copper. A lamp burned low on a side table. The bed was made. On the rug between the bed and the window, a woman lay on her back. Red dress. Silver hair. Her eyes were open and fixed on nothing. A clean line ran across her throat. Lillyanne knew the face. Her throat bobbed and her stomach dropped. Marjorie. The postal worker she blackmailed for information. “I guess the victim found us.” Scott closed the door behind them without a sound. He locked it. The wristband on his arm settled to green, then held. He grabbed Lilly’s arm but she pulled away. Tears brimmed her eyes. She crouched. The blood on the rug was still bright at the edges. Minutes, not hours. Whoever did it had been in this room before them, and had left knowing which door they'd been given. She looked up at Scott. His jaw was tight. He was already listening at the door. "I know her, Scott.” She swallowed and looked back down at Marjorie. “This is my fault.”

Lillyanne stayed on her knees beside the body. The rug felt warm through her jeans. Marjorie's braid had come loose. A smear of red crossed the white hair like a mark someone left on purpose. Lillyanne's hands would not stop shaking. "Who did this?" Her voice came out thin. She looked up at Scott. "Who?" Scott crouched by the body. He lifted Marjorie's wrist, then set it down. He checked the pockets of the red dress. He tilted the head to see the cut. He worked fast and clean, like a man reading a hand of cards. "Doesn't matter," he said. "Whoever it was did us a favor." "A favor." "We have a victim. No other team can claim her. No fight for the body. No race to the tent." He pointed at the throat. "Clean cut. One stroke. They knew what they were doing." He stood and brushed his hands on his pants. "We find the clues. We hide the body so no one else can find it. Then we win this game." Lillyanne stood up. Her legs felt far away. "They weren't doing us a favor." "Lilly." "They did this on purpose." Her voice climbed. "They knew our room. They knew our victim. They picked her." "You don't know that." "I do know that." She stepped over Marjorie's arm and got close to him. "She's the postwoman who told me about this place. She warned me. Someone was watching. Someone killed her to punish her for talking. To punish me." Scott's jaw tightened. The strand of hair fell across his forehead. "She knew better than to talk." "She's dead on our floor and that's what you say?" “Don’t,” he snapped. “Do not accuse me of being cold, sweetheart. You knew someone would die and you entered the game anyway. But now that it’s someone you know, you want to get all emotional.” He stepped closer, his warmth against her skin. His breath brushed her lips as he whispered, “They are all somebody’s postwoman. Somebody’s mother or father or sister.” His voice dipped at the word ‘sister’, “You’re smart enough to have known that.” His silver eyes did not move from hers. "Everyone here knows the cost. You knew and decided to quench your boredom anyway." Lillyanne stared at him. Something behind her ribs went cold. She had come to him for a partner and he was already turning against her. He already had her pegged as a selfish, cold-hearted woman. But she hadn’t known this would happen. She thought death had been a metaphor or a cause of the game. She hadn’t know the victim would be unwilling. She turned back to Marjorie. She knelt and closed the woman's eyes with two fingers. The lids were still soft. She fixed the braid the best she could and tucked it against the red dress. "I'm sorry," she said, low. "I did this to you." Scott was already at the side table, tipping the lamp, checking under the base. "There's a clue in this room. Help me find it, or we lose the night and it's all for nothing." Lillyanne wiped her face on her sleeve. She stood. She would move the body. She would follow the clues. She would win the game. And when she found out who left this gift in her room, she would make them pay for it. She picked up the lamp on the other table and started looking.

Lillyanne set the lamp down and gripped the edge of the side table. Marjorie's body still lay on the rug behind her. Any minute, another team could try the door. If they found the postwoman here, the win belonged to whoever found the killer first. She had to hide the body and find the clue before that happened. Her fingers caught on a seam beneath the table's lip. She crouched. A shallow drawer sat tucked under the wood, hidden by the trim. Three wooden tabs stuck out from its face. She pulled the first. It slid, then clicked. Each tab showed a single carved number that turned when she pushed it. One through nine. "Scott." She kept her voice low. "I need three numbers." He was already back at the body. He rolled Marjorie onto her side. The braid fell away from the neck. He pushed the collar of the red coat down. "Here," he said. Lillyanne came over. Three shallow cuts sat at the base of Marjorie's neck, above the spine. Not deep. Made after the throat, from the look of the clean edges. Three. Nine. Five. Her stomach turned. Someone had carved a combination into the postwoman like a label on a package. The rosy-cheeked woman who used to hand her mail at the door. Who had warned her. Who had given her Scott's name and then begged her not to go. "They used her as the key," Lillyanne said. "They used her for a lot of things." Scott laid the body back down. "Open it." She went back to the drawer. Three. Click. Nine. Click. Five. Click. The drawer slid free in her hand. Inside sat one folded page. The writing was brown-red and cracked where it had dried. She read it out. "You've discovered the death of Miss Boddy. Isn't she pretty? But her outfit is missing an accessory. Find it, and you find the clue." Scott took the note from her. He read it twice. "Hide her," he said. "Now. Under the bed. Pull the skirt down." He crossed to the closet and yanked the door. Inside, a second door stood behind the hanging coats, painted the same purple and gold as the inn's twisted halls. He tried the handle. It opened. Beyond it, a narrow crawl space smelled of dust and cold. "In here," he said. "The inn shifts. If we're lucky it won't shift back." Lillyanne took Marjorie's shoulders. Scott took the ankles. They fit her into the crawl space and pulled the coats back across the closet door. Lillyanne tugged the rug under the bed, eager to hide the blood stain. She stood in the middle of the room, breathing hard. The body was gone. The claim was theirs. She looked down at the note in her palm. “What was missing?” she whispered. A purse? No. She was stuck. “Think,” Scott said, more to himself than to her. “Whimsy. Think whimsy.” Lilly’s brows furrowed before they lifted. “A hat!” she shouted before quieting. “She’s missing a hat like the masters.” Scott grinned. “Great. Let’s go fetch us a hat.”

Scott shook a small leather bag at his hip. He’d found it hidden in a coat in the closet. Coins clinked inside it. He tied it to his belt and cracked the door of Room 103. The hall outside had already changed. The purple runner now ran the other direction. He stepped out. Lillyanne followed and pulled the door shut behind her. She kept her face blank the way she did at the poker table. Scott didn't bother. His mouth pulled into a grin. His eyes moved fast over every door, every seam in the wallpaper. He wanted this. He had missed it. "Left," he said. Then, three steps later, "No. Right." The hall bent. A staircase peeled up from the floor where a rug had been. Scott took the steps two at a time. Lillyanne kept close. At the landing, the boards ended in open air. She didn't see it. Scott caught her arm and yanked her back against him. Her chest hit his. His hand stayed on her waist. She felt his heart under the red jacket. Fast for only the second time tonight. He looked down at her, silver eyes bright, and for a moment he wasn't grinning. "Watch your feet, sweetheart,” he said. “Wouldn’t want the game to end too soon, would we?” She stepped back first. Clearing his throat and offering a wink, led her through three more halls. Doors slid past on tracks she couldn't see. A staircase folded flat and became a floor. He tracked it all like it was a card count. And one day she’d ask him how. But for now that had a hat to track down. At the last door he paused, listened, then pushed through. The street hit her with cold air and lamplight. Purple tile roofs. Gold trim. People in coats moving both ways. She felt eyes on her before she saw them. A woman in red watched from a doorway, arms folded, smile small and mean. Whitney. Last year's winner. Two men near a fountain turned their heads together. Farther down, a dark-skinned man in a gray hoodie leaned against a lamppost, hands in his pockets. His green eyes tracked her without moving his face. Not jealous. Not curious. Measuring. "Don't stop," Scott said. "Don't look at any of them twice." She fixed her eyes on the sign ahead. Gold letters on purple wood. A top hat mounted above the door. Perfect Fit, Every Time. The bell rang as they entered. The shop smelled of felt and old paper. On a velvet cushion by the register, a small mouse in a tiny gold-and-purple cap watched them with black eyes. The hatter came from behind the counter. “How can I help you?” he beamed. “A top hat for the gentleman? It would go wonders with your coat.” Scott grinned. “Maybe another time.” The hatter nodded, his smile widening. “For the lady then.” He extended his hand with a flourish. Before she understood what was happening, ribbon and fabric flew from the shelf and danced around her head. Scissors trimmed a little too close to her head. The vibrant green hat finished, the ribbon rolling itself neatly on the shelf. A purple feather hung down over her eyes. “Uhm, actually…we’re here for a clue,” Lilly said as she carefully removed the perfectly fitted hat. The hatters smile stretched in a way that made her want to run. “Oh! Payment is required up front, of course.” Not bothering to hide his pouch, Scott offered him one gold coin with a magnifying glass etched into it. “Very well,” the hatter said. In a blur of fabric and ribbon, hats formed on the counter. Wizard cones, top hats, wide brims, one that shimmered like oil. "Nine hats," he said. "The heaviest holds your clue.” He reached below the counter and lifted a perfectly level, golden hooked scale. “You may weigh only twice." Scott's grin fell with concentration. Lillyanne looked at the row and started to count in threes. The door was locked behind them. Whitney was still outside. The clock had started.

"Tick tick," the hatter sang, tapping the rim of the golden scale. "The clock does love a slow girl. Eight way the same, and the ninth is heavier.” Lillyanne stared at the nine hats. Wizard cones. Top hats. One that shimmered like spilled oil. Her mind moved the way it did at the poker table—cold, in threes. Three on one side. Three on the other. Three set aside. One weighing tells her which group hides the heavy one. The second weighing narrows three to one. Simple. It had to be simple. She reached for the first hat. Scott's hand closed on her wrist. His grip was tight. His silver eyes were serious now, the grin gone. "Lilly. If you're wrong, we lose the clue. We lose the room. We lose Marjorie." His voice dropped. "Let me think it through with you." "There's no time," she said. "Then tell me you're sure." She met his eyes. "Trust me." A muscle jumped in his jaw. He let go. Lillyanne lifted three hats onto the left dish. A stiff felt bowler. The oil-slick one. A green pointed cone. She set three more on the right. The scale trembled. The right dish sank. A soft clink as the chain pulled taut. The hatter clapped once, delighted. Behind the register, the small mouse in the gold-and-purple cap sat up on its haunches to watch. She cleared both dishes and set the three untouched hats aside. From the heavy group she chose two—a wide-brim straw and a red pillbox—and placed one on each side. The scale held level. Even. Her breath left her in one quiet push. The third hat from the heavy pile, the one she hadn't weighed, was the answer. A small black top hat with a violet band. She lifted it off the counter. "That one," she said. The hatter's grin split wider. "The clue is inside, love." She turned the hat over. A slip of cream paper was tucked into the silk lining. She pulled it free and read aloud. "Closer and closer you come, but you're not quite there. Something sharp they used to slice—how unfair." Scott exhaled through his teeth. Whatever he'd been holding in his chest let go a little. "Sharp," he said. "Something that cuts." "Whatever caused it," Lillyanne said. The words came out flat. "We need the weapon." The hatter bowed low, one hand sweeping his own tall hat off his spikes of black hair. "Out you go, then. The clock has other appointments." The shop door clicked open on its own. Lillyanne folded the paper into her pocket. She kept the black top hat too. Something told her to. On the purple-tiled street, the woman in red was gone from the doorway. So were the two men at the fountain. Only the man in the gray hoodie remained, still leaning, still watching. He pushed off the lamppost as they stepped out. He had waited for them.

The man in the gray hoodie pushed off the lamppost and crossed the purple tiles toward them. Lillyanne felt Scott shift closer to her side. She had seen this one before—leaning outside the hat shop, measuring them like a butcher measures meat. Overhead, the fake sky had gone the color of a bruise. Night was coming down over the tent, and every team out here knew it. "You two walked out of there with purpose," the man said. His voice was lower than she expected, steady. "That means you found something." Lillyanne pulled the black top hat from under her arm and set it on her curls. She tipped the brim. "Don’t I look great?" "Baby," he said, one corner of his mouth lifting, "I'm sure you look great in a lot of things. That hat ain't one of them." Scott stepped closer to him, his body tense and shoulders squared. "Don't call her baby," he snapped. The man laughed once, short. His green eyes stayed on Lillyanne. "Easy, scarlet. I'm not here to steal your girl. Or your clue." He held both hands out of his hoodie pocket, empty. "Name's Dijon. I want to talk alliances." Scott's hand went to Lillyanne's elbow. She didn't move. "Alliance," she said. Flat. "Two hundred teams and you pick us." "I picked the team that walked out of the hatters with a clue in less than ten minutes." Dijon shrugged. "My partner is somewhere out there right now. When she finds her body—and she will—we'll have a clue chain of our own. Two chains beats one. Two teams beats whatever's waiting at the end." Behind him, down the tiled street, a woman in a red dress stepped out of the shadow of the tall inn with its purple gables and gold trim. Whitney. Last year's winner. She didn't come closer. She only watched, arms folded, head tilted like she was reading a menu. Lillyanne felt the cold under her ribs. Whitney watching meant Whitney knew Dijon was here. Whitney knowing meant an offer had a shelf life. "Why us?" Lillyanne said. "Because he's been through this before," Dijon said, nodding at Scott, "and you think faster than he does." Scott made a sound in his throat. Lillyanne pulled the hat off. Weighed it in her hand. Their clue said find the weapon. Dijon's partner hadn't found her victim yet. He was buying in early, before he had chips. "Find your body first," she said. "Then we'll talk." Dijon smiled, slow. "Fair." "Meet us," she said, and glanced up at the crooked windows of the inn. "There. When you have something to trade." "Deal." He tapped two fingers to his temple and stepped back into the dimming street. Scott waited until he was gone. "Lilly—" A loud ticking interrupted him. It echoed through the streets, loud. “Crap,” Scott cursed. He grabbed Lilly’s elbow and yanked her toward the inn. “What are you doing?” she barked. “We have to find the clue.” “There will be no more clues if we’re stuck here at night. This place isn’t normal. Just because we didn’t choose victim doesn’t mean we won’t become one out here.” He pulled her to the inn where others hurried in. And just as the shifting-faced woman from check-in appeared at the door, Scott pushed their way in. She gave him a dirty look before turning and locking the door. Fists pounded on the other side, and then a scream echoed, this one deeper within the inn.

The scream pulled Lillyanne deeper into the inn. Bodies pressed past her, all shoving toward the same sound. Scott kept his hand on her elbow, but the crowd was tight and hot, and she lost sight of the door behind them. Gold sconces flickered on beige walls. Purple carpet ran up a narrow stair. She didn't know where the scream came from until the crowd broke into the bar room and she saw. Marjorie hung from the ceiling fan. The old postwoman's braid swung slow. Her satchel was gone. Her boots turned in a lazy circle. Lillyanne felt the coffee she hadn't drunk climb up her throat. They had hidden that body. They had hidden it behind a closet wall in Room 103. Someone had gone in and pulled her out and strung her up here for every team to see. The teams were already working. A man in a green vest called out the cuts on Marjorie's neck. A woman with a notepad copied them down. Another team argued over the knot. No one looked at Marjorie's face. No one looked at Lillyanne either, and that was worse. She scanned the room. Every set of eyes she caught slid off her like grease. Which one had done it. Which one was waiting. She grabbed Scott's sleeve and pulled him back through the crowd. A short hallway ran off the bar and stopped at a blank wall. She dragged him into it and put her back to the plaster. "They moved her," she whispered. "They know it was our room. They want me to see." "Keep your voice down." "They could've just killed us in the street. They didn't. They want to challenge me. There is more than a game to them. It’s like a test." Her hands were shaking. She pressed them flat to the wall. "I can't tell who. Everyone out there is cold, Scott. Every one of them." Scott's head snapped up. "Quiet." She stopped. She heard it too. A scrape behind the plaster. Small. Close. Scott pressed his palm flat against the dead-end wall and pushed. A panel gave. It swung inward on a hinge she couldn't see, and warm lamplight spilled out. A girl sat on the floor of the hidden nook. Round face, green glasses pushed up her nose, brown hair coming loose from its knot. She had a notebook open on her knees and a pencil in her teeth. She looked up at them with surprise. The girl took the pencil out and smiled a small, careful smile. "Hi.” She held her notebook to her chest. “You’re the ones who found her, right?” “How’d you know that?” Scott snapped. She had this look in her eyes as she looked down shyly. Like the computer geek at her poker table. She wasn’t here to win. She was here to study the game. “You know,” Lilly smiled, “I think we might be able to help each other.”

Scott's hand closed around Lillyanne's arm before she could step into the nook. He pulled her back a half step and put himself between her and the girl on the floor. "What are you doing?" he said. His voice was low and flat. Lillyanne pried his fingers off. "Working." She crouched at the edge of the panel so her eyes were level with the girl's. The girl held the notebook tighter. Green glasses caught the lamplight. Up close she looked younger than Lillyanne, maybe nineteen, with ink on her thumb and a jean cuff turned up over a scuffed boot. "You're not here to win," Lillyanne said. "Are you?” The girl's mouth opened, then closed. She looked at the notebook. "No." "Then why." "I can't say." She pressed the pages flat against her chest. Lillyanne believed her. The fear was too specific. "Okay," Lillyanne said. "Then don't say. Trade instead." She kept her voice soft, the way she talked to a bad hand at her poker table. "You've been watching. You know which teams found what, who's talking to who, who's moving. You give that to me. Every night. Anything you see." "And what do I get." "Him." Lillyanne tipped her head back at Scott. "He's won this game twice. Anything you want to know about how it works, the rooms, the clues, the rules nobody tells you—he answers." Scott's head turned. "Lilly." "Any question," Lillyanne said, holding the girl's eyes. "Right, Scott." A long beat. She could hear him breathing through his nose. Then a short, tight nod. "Any question. Once a night." The girl studied them both. Her pencil tapped the notebook twice. "Emmy," she said. "I'm Emmy." "Lilly." "I know." Emmy almost smiled. "Deal." Lillyanne exhaled. "First question's mine. The postwoman. Someone took her from our room and hung her in the bar. Did you see who moved her?” Emmy's smile faded. She shook her head. "I was in the west stair when it happened. By the time I came back, she was already up. I'm sorry." "Anyone missing from the crowd after." "Did you see anyone strange around here?" She patted the notebook. "No. I mean…I don’t know. I thought I saw…I mean it couldn’t be, but earlier I thought I saw the Game Master’s butler." Lillyanne’s blood ran cold and her breathing stalled. She didn’t bother asking if she was sure. “Okay. Anyone else.” Emmy shook her head. "Good." Lillyanne stood. Her knees ached. "We're in one-oh-three. Come at first light. Knock twice, wait, knock once." "I know your room," Emmy said. Quiet. Matter-of-fact. Lillyanne's stomach dropped a half inch. She kept her face still. "Of course you do." She stepped back and let Scott push the panel closed. The hallway went dim again. She started toward the stair without waiting to see if he followed. She had a source now. She also had someone else who knew exactly where she slept. She would count that as a win until morning proved otherwise.

The stair creaked under Lillyanne's boots. Scott climbed behind her without a word. The inn's hallway had shifted again since morning—a sconce that had been on the left now burned on the right, and a door she didn't remember stood between theirs and the corner. She kept her eyes on the brass 103 and did not slow down. Inside, Scott turned the lock and slid the chair under the knob. He checked the closet, the crawl space, the drawer beneath the table. Empty. He came back and stood at the foot of the bed. One bed. She hadn't let herself look at it earlier. "I'll take the floor," he said. "You have a bad heart and we walked all day. You'll take the floor and be useless by dawn." She pulled the top hat off the table and set it on the dresser. "We share it. Clothes on. Backs to each other." He watched her. The strand of white hair fell across his eye. "You sure." "No. Sit down." He sat on the edge. She sat on the other edge. The mattress dipped and put them a foot closer than she wanted. She counted the exits. Door, window, crawl space. Three. She counted Scott's tells. He rubbed his left wrist where the band was. His breathing was shallow but even. He hadn't looked at the closet since he'd checked it. "Rules," she said. "We sleep in shifts. You first. Two hours. Then me." "Four hours each. You need the sleep more than I do." "Two. I'll wake you." He didn't argue. He kicked his boots off and lay on his back on top of the covers. His hand rested on his chest. She sat against the headboard with the hat pin she'd pulled from the violet band held loose between two fingers. Not much. Better than nothing. The inn made its night sounds. A door slammed two floors down. Something rolled across a ceiling. A woman laughed once and stopped. Lillyanne did not close her eyes. At some point Scott's breathing changed—slower, deeper. She watched his chest until she was sure it kept rising. She thought about Emmy knowing the room number. She thought about the butler in the white suit walking these halls. She thought about the blade they still hadn't found and how every team in the inn was probably thinking about it too. She woke him at two. He woke her at four. Neither of them died. When gray light came through the window, she was already dressed and lacing her boots. She had made it to morning. She had also spent the night learning that Scott slept with one hand on his chest and the other within reach of the lamp, and that he trusted her enough to close his eyes. That was worth something. She would decide what later.