“You don’t know the half of it.”

“Then maybe you should tell me.”

“I can’t.”

“Can’t or won’t?”

Soraya wasn’t comfortable with this line of questioning, so she decided to ask a question of her own. “Why are you so interested?”

“Because you know why the nightdemon is here, don’t you?”

Soraya froze. “I—I don’t know what you mean.”

“You do.”

Soraya bit her lip, searching the woman’s face. Seeing a truth her mind had been closing in on for a while now, ever since she witnessed last night’s attack. She didn’t need her Ability to tell her what this woman was hiding behind those eyes. “You didn’t tackle Shim to save him, did you?”

Sunny lowered her gaze to her feet and shook her head. There was shame in the hunch of her shoulders. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think, just acted. I couldn’t let him hurt her. No matter what she is. No matter what she’s become. Still, I think if I had the chance to do it all over again, I’d have made the same choice.”

“Because you love her.”

“Have you ever loved someone so deeply you would kill for them?”

Soraya considered the question. “My father, maybe? But I don’t know if I could even kill for him.”

Sunny nodded. “Every time another villager is found dead, I hate myself a little more.”

Soraya could see the pain in her eyes, could hear it in the tremors in her voice. She was a good person who, by no fault of her own, found herself in an impossible situation. “When did you first realize the nightdemon was Seela?”

She shrugged. “About a month ago? For three straight nights she made excuses to leave after curfew. The first two nights I begged her not to go, but she was determined. Said the tavern depended on her ability to procure cheap booze. Except she never came back with any. She was always dirty and bloody and had the most incredible stories to tell about narrowly escaping the nightdemon. Except others had not been so fortunate on those nights.”

“But the third night you followed her,” Soraya guessed.

“Yes. I told myself I was only doing it to protect her. But looking back I think I already knew at that point. As mad as it was, I knew. And yet I needed to see. I needed to understand.”

“And do you? Understand?”

“Would you? Would you understand if the person who meant the most to you in the world was suddenly a monster part of the time and an angel the rest of the time? It’s impossible.”

“And yet you didn’t turn her in.”

“I couldn’t. I knew I couldn’t live with myself if I did. The only problem is that I can hardly live with myself now.”