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Silence.

Not the kind he would have wanted, but silence nonetheless.

The sun eventually began to show its face. Torr was about to suggest they take shifts when they heard voices.

Zach. And a woman, though not the grandmother.

“A maid, I think,” Laria whispered next to him. “She’s asking Zach if he needs anything.”

Though he strained to hear them, Laria did not seem to have any trouble. His sister had always possessed the best hearing of any of them.

But it wasn’t something he heard that troubled him and made him shoot to his feet, Laria right on his heels. No, it was the sensation of an uncloaked Cheld, here in Stone Haven.

They bolted from the bushes, the risk of being seen less than that of the unknown Cheld.

“We shouldn’t run,” she said next to him.

“No.” But they could walk fast. Very, very fast.

“Who do you think it is?” Laria asked, but Torr didn’t take the time to answer. He did break into a run then, straining with the effort to hold himself back to a human pace.

“I have no idea,” he said. “But there’s no doubt as to what they are.”

Fuck it.

He ran in earnest then. If his brother or friends were in danger, being outed wouldn’t matter anyway. Laria must have had the same idea, for she was only steps behind him. They avoided the main streets as they whizzed past buildings.

The dual mansions came into view above them on the hill. Wasting no time, he pinpointed the presence to the Henry Hutton house. Kenton and Alessandra’s home.