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I stand at the stern as we cast off. As always, the Mortis takes a long time to recede but as it disappears into the darkened fog, the memories of the night remain solely with me. The image of a red-headed woman in blue velvet with her mouth parted and her eyes on mine.

Her face when I stepped back.

Her face when I said witch instead of kissing her.

The shock of being understood and not touched in the same breath.

I grip the rail, kneading it.

I had four reasons for not pursuing Saturna, all of them completely logical and sound. Still, I’d written them out on a sheet of paper that was supposed to be a student observation log and had instead become something closer to a diary, a confessional, and I had told myself that four reasons were an architecture with a solid foundation. I needed the reminder, again and again, to keep her at a distance.

Tonight the architecture is gone and all four reasons are still true.

She’s my student and I’m her professor and a relationship of any kind could cause my termination and her expulsion, not to mention the moral complexities of the power dynamic, which some corrupt part of me delights in.

She’s a witch, which means not only is her identity a powder keg but she has powers I know nothing about, powers that could affect me.

That the work I’m secretly doing—the work she knows nothing about—is potentially dangerous.

And…well, Roen. It always comes down to Roen. Because what happened to Roen is what happens when someone gets close to me, and I would not survive if it happened again.

Four solid reasons and not one of them held. I spent the start of the dinner looking at her across the room and pretending they still mattered.

Then I spent the rest of it discovering that they certainly did not.

The ferry slowly cuts through the dark. The soft yellow lanterns of Sogliano come up through the fog, then the dark spires of the city itself. I turn my collar up to the cold and disembark.

Tonight there are no footsteps behind me on the walk home. At least there’s that.

I let myself in through the alley gate and go up the stairs to my apartment.

I reach the landing.

My door is open.

Not forced open or splintered, but as if I left in a hurry and forgot to close it, let alone lock it. Which is possible, I suppose, especially in the mornings before work when my mind is tired and scattered. If I haven’t had enough coffee in my system, I’ve been known to grab a candle jar and attempt to drink from that.

Still, something isn’t right. I can feel it.

I stand there a long second, the hall empty and dark. Not a sound.

I gingerly push the door open with my fingertips, wincing at the loud creak from the hinges.

The front room is as I left it, illuminated in dim red through the unshuttered windows thanks to the Bleeding sky and the gas lamps outside. I light the candle on the sideboard, the shadows jumping along the walls before settling, and I slowly walk through my apartment.

As far as I can tell, nothing has been taken. The chart is where I left it, my books are undisturbed and the intake ledgers are stacked. Not neatly, of course, but they haven’t been trifled with. There is a method to my chaos that only I understand.

Had someone been in my apartment while I was at the formal dinner? Someone who knew I would be there? Someone who went through my research and set it back exactly where they found it, having memorized my mess? The same someone who left the door open on their way out, not by accident but by design, so that it would be noticed solely by me?

A message.

A tremor runs through my hands and I set the candle on the bedside table before sitting down on the edge of my bed.

The shadow in the corner has not moved.

I try not to look at it, but right now I’d give a lot of money to be able to open my mouth and ask it a single question: was anyone here, did you see them?

But I keep my mouth closed. If I ask the shadow something, I don’t get to put the shadow back. It’s a rule I made for myself two years ago and I have not broken it yet. If I acknowledge who the shadow is, then it’s all over for me.