When Greymarket Towers finally rose before him, its windows flickering faintly like drowsy eyes, some of the tension eased from his shoulders. Home, or at least the shape of it. Safety. Routine. Something he understood. The front doors sighed open at his approach.
Mycor,Splice thought, reaching inward along the roots that tethered them.I have returned.
The response came slow and vast.Speak.
Splice’s jaw tightened. He shifted Goldie more securely in his arms as he crossed the threshold.I went to the Grove Core. Marigold Flynn was there. She found a body at the bonfire site. The disturbance deepened. I removed her before it could spread further. Something has changed, but I know not what.
A pause. The building hummed faintly, like sap drawing inward, deep roots listening.
She is safe,Splice added—too quickly, the urgency spilling unchecked.I brought her home. I carry her still.
The connection gave no reply. Only vast, patient silence filled the link.
Greymarket’s elevator doors opened with a sigh. Splice stepped inside, adjusted Goldie in his arms gently, and pressed the button for the fourth floor.
She stirred once as the elevator rose, murmuring something he couldn’t hear. Her head turned against his shirt, then she stilled again.
The elevator chimed. The doors parted. He walked to her doorway. The wards on her apartment recognized her and the door opened quietly, no key required. He stepped over the threshold, and somewhere in his memory bank, an image surfaced:a groom carrying a bride across the threshold of a shared home.
Inside, the apartment smelled like cinnamon and bergamot. The lighting adjusted automatically, lowering to a soft amber hue.
Splice moved without hesitation toward the couch in the open space living room, but then paused when he felt it.
Pressure. Observation. Predation.
They emerged like summoned spirits. First, a dark, sleek shape, leaping silently from the top of the bookcase with a flick of its tail. Then, a rounded ginger form, materializing from under the credenza.
Their eyes gleamed in the low light. Twin orbs of judgment. And then, horrifyingly, they began to approach.
Splice froze. His grip on Goldie remained steady. Her breath ghosted against his collarbone. He dared not jostle her.
But the cats were coming closer.
The dark one, a male, moved with the languid confidence of something that feared neither gods nor men. He sniffed the hem of Splice’s trousers, then sat between his feet, tail wrapped neatly around his paws, and stared with cold, half-lidded yellow eyes.
The ginger one, female, did not sit. She twined.She brushed up against Splice’s shin with deliberate force. His spine went rigid.
Do cats eat plants?he thought suddenly, with a spike of very real alarm.Some cats eat house plants. Some plants are toxic. Some plants are made of—am I edible?
The dark one flopped to the ground, his head resting on the Assistant’s shoe and his body on the floor. He rumbled. The ginger rose onto her hind legs and placed her paws against his shin. Splice made a faint, involuntary sound in the back of his throat.
He had survived the Collapse at Hollowmere, had stood unblinking before a dying saint as she screamed prophecy into the void, and had navigated a tribunal that lasted thirteen hours and briefly reversed the flow of time. He had walked unburned through ritual fire. But this… this was untenable.
“Stop,” he said softly, addressing them both. “Please don’t. I am not… a snack.”
The dark one on his foot purred louder. The ginger one made a sound of disappointment and plopped herself down, leaning to menacingly clean the male’s face. He hissed, but did not move away.
Splice anxiously dipped his head toward the woman in his arms. “Your familiars are touching me.”
Goldie stirred, her breath catching. “Whuh…?” Then, a little more clearly, “Are we home?”
“You are home,” he clarified. “But you… you have cats.”
That earned a soft snort. “Is Maeve trying to assert dominance?”
“The dark one has claimed my foot, and the orange one will not allow me to move.”
“Mmm. Sounds right.” Her hand uncurled from where it had been tangled in the edge of his coat. She blinked up at him, eyes heavy with exhaustion, but clearer now.
