“Twelve hours?” I said. “That’s not bad, for Ivor. Twelve hours I can live with. Harry, I’d quite like that hand back now, please. Thank you. I take it from that sloppy grin on your face that we succeeded. What’s been happening while we were away?”

“Every Loathly One in the world is dead,” said Harry. “All gone, from every nest in every country. It was clear you must have succeeded in your mission, and we were safe now from the Hungry Gods, so we set up a detail here to wait for your return. I volunteered to take first shot. The Matriarch said someone would be waiting here for you to come back, no matter how long it took.”

“Forever, if necessary,” said Roger. “The Matriarch was most firm on the matter. Sentimental old thing.”

“Grandmother always did have a taste for the big gesture,” I said. I looked at the tower, in its pit. The thing was obviously dead. It was slowly melting, its steel and technology and living parts all slipping and sliding away, rotting and falling apart. Slumping slowly back into the pit Truman had dug for it, and I couldn’t think of a better place to bury it.

“I feel like hell,” Molly said abruptly. She shook her head, as though to clean out the cobwebs, and then winced. “Damn! It feels like someone took a dump in my head . . . Did I hear you right? We killed the Hungry Gods? I can’t seem to remember much about what happened on the other side . . .”

“Probably just the stress of dimensional travel,” I said quickly. “Bound to play hell with the memory.”

“At least you aren’t infected anymore,” said Roger. “The Loathly One that was growing inside you is completely gone.”

We all looked at him. “Molly was infected?” said Harry.

“How long have you known?” I said.

“Almost from the beginning,” said Roger. “You can’t hide something like that from my superior half-demon senses.”

“Then why didn’t you say anything?” said Molly.

“None of my business,” Roger said easily. “Your magics were doing a perfectly good job of suppressing it, and it was clear Eddie knew about it . . . Besides, I was interested to see what would happen.”

“And just when were you planning on tell me?” said Harry. “No one ever tells me anything . . .”

“So I’m just me again?” said Molly. She grinned suddenly. “Any more of this, and I’ll start believing in happy endings.”

“Where’s Giles?” said Roger. “Didn’t he make it?”

“Giles has gone home,” I said. “I hope. Where is Mr. Stab?”

“Here,” said the calm, cold voice of the immortal serial killer. He appeared from behind the decaying tower, and nodded briefly to Molly and me. “I’ve been studying the tower as it dies. Most fascinating. I’ve cut out a few particularly interesting bits for souvenirs. The odd eyeball and so on. I hope no one objects.”