“Here we are.” The orderly pulled a clipboard from a bin screwed into the door of a room on a hall lined with such bins. “Ms. Ayer has been sedated, but she’s capable of holding a short conversation. I can allow you ten minutes, then I’m afraid the patient needs her rest.”

“Gotcha.” Mai signed her name then passed the board back. “We’ll try to keep this as low-key as possible.”

After plucking a key from the wide ring attached to her belt loop, the woman opened the door and stepped away so we could enter. Once we were shut inside the room, I shivered.

There was no doubting this was the same woman from the grainy surveillance video, but she managed to appear more washed out in person than on the black-and-white recording. The healthy grayish—for an Unseelie—cast to her skin had paled. She sat in a wingback chair positioned in front of a tall window. Soft pink pajamas swallowed her, washing out her complexion. Her wispy hair settled in gentle waves across her shoulders. She didn’t turn to look at us. I’m not sure she knew we were there.

Fingers tingling with nerves, I advanced on Marshal Ayer. “I’m not here to hurt you. I just need to touch your skin.”

Glassy brown eyes stared forward in answer.

I pressed two fingers against her forearm, and a corresponding ping of magic told me several things. She was a dhampir, half fae and half vampire. Most damning was that even all this time later her skin held the signature I associated with waterlogged corpses and amputated children.

“She didn’t just see him,” I told Mai. “He touched her, infected her with his magical signature.”

“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”

“I’m not sure.” I waved a hand in front of Ayer’s face. “On the video, he steps into the hall and vanishes. She flinches, like maybe she saw him pull his disappearing trick, rubs her eyes as if it’s been a long night, then leaves the frame.”

“Marshal Ayer.” Mai came around and squatted in front of her. “We’d like to ask you a few questions, if you don’t mind.”

Ayer kept her gaze fixed on the moonlit horizon.

I took point questioning her. “What can you tell us about the night of the portal breach?”

A tic developed beneath her left eye.

“Did you see someone step from the portal?” I circled her. “Did he touch you? Speak to you?”

The marshal kept staring ahead.

“This is getting us nowhere.” I restrained the urge to kick the wall. “She’s too sedated—or too far gone—to be of any use.”