Chapter 13 · The City Without a Name

The shadow beneath Nara moved before she did.

Lin saw it slide across the wet pavement, thin as spilled ink, while Nara stood perfectly still inside the circle of silver thread. Rain hissed against the market gate. Beyond it, the unfinished stalls shuddered beneath their tarps, their brass hooks and glass charms trembling as if something enormous had just inhaled beneath the street.

“Nara,” Lin whispered.

“I know.” Nara’s voice came out small. Her eyes stayed fixed on the ground. “I can see it.”

Her shadow had the shape of a girl, but not her shape. Its head was tilted too far to the left. One arm stretched longer than the other, fingers dragging across the cracks between the paving stones. When Nara lifted her hand, the shadow did not. When she stepped back, it leaned forward.

Soren Pike pressed one palm against his bleeding side and raised his anomaly meter with the other. The device had lost its glass face. Its needle spun in frantic circles, tapping the metal casing like a trapped insect.

“That isn’t a shadow,” he said.

Tavi Rook shoved himself between Soren and the two women.