He saw a glimmer of something dark and wicked come into her eyes. He took a step toward her. “You crossed the line a long time ago, and it’s way too late for you to come back. More to the point, I don’t intend to let you try.”

She was silhouetted against the bay window that looked down on Waterfall Park, her slender body gone suddenly still. Outside, feeders were pressed against the glass, yellow eyes gleaming.

There was a subtle shift in her features. “Maybe you can’t stop me, John.”

He straightened, clasping the staff in both hands, the magic racing up and down its length in slender silver threads.

Her smile was faint and tinged with regret. “Maybe you never could.”

In a single, fluid motion she dropped into a crouch, wheeled away, and catapulted herself through the plate glass of the window behind her. Before he could even think to try to stop her, she had dropped from sight and was gone.

Nest Freemark was standing on the sidewalk outside Waterfall Park when the apartment window exploded as if struck by a sledgehammer, raining shards of glass into the night and sending feeders scattering into the shadows like rats. She turned toward the sound, her first thoughts of John Ross, but the dark thing that plummeted through the gloom was screaming in another voice entirely. Nest stood frozen in place, watching as it began to twist and reform in midair, as if its flesh and bones were malleable. It had been human at first, but now it was something else entirely. It struck the jumble of rocks midpoint on the waterfall, bounced away, and tumbled into the catchment.

Nest raced for the narrow park entrance, her heartbeat quick and hurried and anxious. She burst through the un-gated opening as the dark thing climbed free of the trough, a two-legged horror that was already losing what remained of its human identity, dropping down on all fours and shape-shifting into something more primal. Its legs thinned and lengthened and turned crooked, its torso thickened from haunches to chest, and its head grew elongated and broad-muzzled.

Stefanie Winslow, she thought in horror. The demon.

Re-formed into something that most closely resembled a monstrous hyena, the demon shook itself as if to be rid of the last of the disguise that had confined it and lifted its blunt snout toward the heights from which it had fallen. Feeders leaped and scrambled about it in a frenzy, like shadows flowing over one another, eyes bright against the dark. The demon snarled at them, snapped at the air through which they passed, and started to turn away.

Then it caught sight of Nest and wheeled quickly back again.

Even in the scattered light of the street lamps, Nest could see the hard glitter of its eyes fix on her. She could see the hate in them. The big head lowered, the muzzle parted, and rows of hooked teeth came into view. A low-pitched, ugly snarl rose from its throat. Maybe it intended to finish what it had started in Lincoln Park. Maybe it was just reacting on instinct. Nest held her ground. She felt her magic gather and knot in her chest. She had fled from this monster once; this time she would stand and face it. The demon, it seemed, had made up its mind as well. It could have turned away from her, could have scaled the park fence and escaped without forcing a confrontation. But it never wavered in its approach.