She hit stone far too soon, which was an unpleasant surprise, but she wasn’t dead, which she found more agreeable. The stone she’d struck was moving, and warm to the touch. When her senses righted themselves, she realized she lay on Shale’s back. His wings beat three, four times—the ripple of his shoulder blades’ muscle reminded her of lying on an inflatable raft in surf on her spring break trip to the Fangs back in school—and they rose again. She swore in five languages, then started to slip; panicked, she caught his hold of his wing, which veered them abruptly left until she let go. At last she locked her arms around his neck, and her knees at his flanks. He was taller than her, which helped. His wings pressed against her sides on the updraft, but not tight enough to hurt.

“Jerk,” she said.

“Witch.”

“Fair.” She laughed. They spiraled higher into the night.

*   *   *

Matt and Sandy Sforza almost came to blows over the question of who would host the Rafferty girls. Neither wanted to let them go home alone. Sandy thought they’d be more comfortable with a woman, but the room Sandy and Lil shared was barely large enough for the pair of them, let alone three guests. Matt’s place was closer to the edge of town, and his boys could share a room, though Simon would complain.

All of which would have meant nothing if the Rafferty girls didn’t want to go with Matt, but when he asked, Claire said yes. She’d tended to Ellen and Hannah after their father collapsed, after the Stone Man left, after the Blacksuits came.

Sandy gave them a lift in her wagon; she still lived, and parked, near the market, though the last decade’s rising rent had forced her and Lil to carry their lives on their backs snail-like from apartment to apartment until they bought their present coffin. Matt did not know if she stayed for the commute, or for her pride. Sandy’s people had lived near the market since they first came from Telomere; so had Matt’s, but he’d got in too many fights over the old ways with his old man back when his old man was the type to fight with fists to care much for history. Bruises and swelling obscured the ways things had “always” been.