Chapter 20 · The Woman Behind the Door

The woman stepped through the rift like she owned it.

Evira's pulse hammered in her ears. Blood still dripped from her palm where she'd bound Marcus, and now this—someone wearing her face, her voice, her body moving through that crackling tear in reality like water through silk.

Not someone. Something.

"Evira." Marcus's voice came out rough. He was on his feet now, one hand pressed to his side where the binding mark burned under his shirt. "Don't look at it directly."

Too late. She was already staring.

The woman looked maybe forty. Dark hair streaked with silver, tied back in a braid that had come half loose. Hunter's leathers, old style, the kind the guild quit issuing thirty years ago. Her face—

Evira's stomach dropped.

She'd seen that face once. In a photograph Marcus kept folded in his coat pocket, the edges worn soft from being touched too many times.

"Keira?" Marcus took a step forward. His voice cracked on the name.

The woman smiled. It didn't reach her eyes. "Hello, Marcus. You look old."

"You look dead." Felix's voice came from behind Evira, sharp and tight.