Fifer studied Thisbe’s note again, then looked up at Dev. His black eyes bored into her, not angrily but soft around the edges, making her catch her breath. A strange feeling swept through her, something she’d never felt before. She wasn’t sure if it was uneasiness or just a bad fish for dinner, but whatever it was made her feel weird.

Dev realized he was staring and dropped his gaze. “We have a big job to do, I guess,” he said. Then, softer: “I’m sorry I was staring at you.”

Fifer wasn’t sure what to make of the strange feelings she was having lately. “It’s fine,” she said. She smiled in a friendly way to let him know she wasn’t bothered by him staring. And then she started to think they were making way too big a deal out of all of this when they had dragons to slay.

Dev got up quickly and cleaned up the remains of dinner. Then the two sat together in front of the fireplace to go over their plans. Dev checked over his three finished long spears, adding a bit of melted tin to make the spear points sharper and sturdier, and hoped the magic Fifer instilled in them would help things out.

Fifer reread the instructions for the obliterate spell to make sure she absolutely knew how to use it. Now they just needed the dragons to take their places in the middle of the night. By the time Maiven and Aaron and the rest of them arrived, hopefully the dragons would be taken care of and Florence would be up and moving around like old times.

As Fifer was folding the instructions and Dev was getting up to put his spears by the staircase for later, Dev glanced outside the south window. There was something moving in the orchard, bigger than the foxes.

He went to the window. “Fifer!” he said, and beckoned her to join him. “Come look.” There was a herd of deer picking its way among the apple trees. A sight hardly ever seen outside of the forest. “They must have heard about all the fruit on the ground out here,” Dev said jokingly, then pointed them out to Fifer. The animals were moving slowly past the boundary to the bright green grass, near where the pieces of Florence lay.

“They’re beautiful,” said Fifer, who’d never seen a deer before, much less several of them together. “Look at how they step so carefully. And that little one, tilting its head!”