Still holding that thought in my mind, I rested my head against Etude’s warm neck. Quen looked tense, his brow furrowed as he sat almost upright against the wind atop the equally large gargoyle who had agreed to take him. He was riding him like a horse, probably with a much better seat than I had but creating far more drag.

Quen smiled grimly as I caught his eye. Etude’s ear flicked back, changing the air currents racing over me, and my grip loosened when the gargoyle leveled his flight. I looked down to the ribbon of lights on the expressway. Traffic was heavy this time of night. “Do you always follow the expressways?” I called out to Etude, his tufted ears turning to catch my words.

“No.” He swiveled his head without changing his flight, one red eye finding me, his deep words seeming to reach me despite the wind ripping past us. “We fly as the arrow, but I’m not sure where Loveland Castle is. Normally I’d follow the resonance of the line there, but it’s so discordant right now, it’s hard to locate. I had one of the kids at the basilica look up directions online for me.”

“Sorry,” I said, then grimaced, thinking I needed to stop saying that.

A lumpy shape loomed out of the thin moonlight and dark trees, a ribbon of light trailing beside it where the river was. “There!” I said pointing, and Etude nodded, his ears going flat to his skull when he shifted smoothly to put it directly ahead. The second gargoyle grimaced, looking pained as his wing beats became short and choppy. I couldn’t feel the line yet, but clearly they could.

Sorry, I thought, then quashed it.

The river-damp air was cool, and we lost altitude when we left the warm ribbon of the expressway. We circled in the faint starlight. The castle was dark and empty, and the memory of burning into reality here burst against my thoughts with a hint of easily mastered panic. I’d been trying to keep Al from abducting a coven member. That hadn’t turned out so well, either.

“Circle once!” Quen shouted, letting go of the gargoyle’s shoulder long enough to make a circular motion with his finger. “I’ll see if there’s any magic down there apart from the line!”

Guilt hit me square on, and I looked down with my second sight. Sure, Quen had a stake in this, but he also had a little girl. And a dead love to revenge, I added, resolving to let it go. It would be my strength and his skill that would win or lose it.

My skin prickled at a wave of wild magic, and Etude shuddered, his skin rippling to make me clutch at him. “We’re clear!” Quen shouted over the wind. “There’s no one down there!”