Doolittle bent over the boy, studying the necklace with a magnifying glass. Dark-skinned, his hair salted with gray, the Pack medic looked to be in his early fifties. Doolittle was the best medmage I had ever met. He had brought me back from the edge of death so many times, we’d stopped joking about it.

There was something so soothing about Doolittle. Whether it was his manner, his kind eyes, or the soft Southern accent, tinted with notes of coastal Georgia, I didn’t know. The moment he walked into the room, Roderick relaxed. In thirty seconds they had struck a bargain: if Roderick stayed on his best behavior, he would get ice cream.

Not that Roderick had to be bribed. It took us almost an hour to get to the Keep and the entire ride over, he did not say a single word. He didn’t move, didn’t fidget, or do any of the normal things a seven-year-old kid would do in the car. He just sat there, quiet, his brown eyes opened wide, like he was a baby owl.

Doolittle pressed his thumb and index finger just above the necklace, stretching the boy’s skin. A vein stood out, burrowing from the gold band under his skin into the muscle of his neck like a thin root.

“Does it hurt when I press here?” he asked.

“No,” Roderick said. His voice was barely above a whisper.

Doolittle probed a different spot. “And now?”

“No.”

The medmage let go and patted Roderick’s shoulder. “I do believe we’re done for tonight.”

“Ice cream now?” Roderick asked, his voice quiet.

“Ice cream now,” Doolittle confirmed. “Lena!”

A female shapeshifter stuck her red head into the room.

“This young gentleman is in need of ice cream,” Doolittle said. “He’s earned it.”

“Oh boy!” Lena made big eyes and held out her hand. “I better pay up, then. Come on.”

Roderick hopped off the chair and took her hand very carefully.

“What kind of ice cream would you like?” Lena asked, leading him through the doorway.

“Chocolate,” the boy said quietly, with a slight hesitation in his voice.

“I’ve got loads of chocolate…”

The door swung shut behind them.

Doolittle looked at the door and sighed. “The necklace is rooted in the sternomastoid. If I try to remove it surgically, he’ll bleed out. You said his mother put this atrocity on him?”

“Yes,” Curran said.

“The collar glowed when the husband came near,” I said. “He was reaching out for it and she yanked it away from him and snapped it on the boy.”

“So it was probably intended for her husband,” Doolittle said.

“That, or it’s an equal opportunity offender,” I said. “Any neck will do and the boy was the closest.”

“And it killed the girl instantly?” Doolittle asked.

“Pretty much,” Curran said.

“Strange. It doesn’t seem to be actively harming the boy at the moment beyond rooting in.”