Carefully he got to his feet. Balance came back to him more easily than he would have thought. Brushing the sand from his clothes and face, Asa wondered how best to begin. He knew his role here—was sworn to it by unbreakable bonds—but the town looked different from above than it did from below. First he had to get his bearings.

“Jeremy!” A tall man with braided hair and even darker skin than his own came jogging up to him. His memories of the people he had seen while observing Mateo Perez supplied the name Gage Calloway. “Hey, man, are you all right?”

“Yeah, sure. I just—I think I passed out.” The puddle of beer would support that story.

Gage paused. “You gonna be sick? Do you need some coffee or some water or something? I have a strong antipuke policy.”

“I feel fine now.” Fine. What a word for the ecstasy of having legs, arms, a voice, eyes—well, eyes of a sort. They did the job of the real thing. He was whole again. A person again. And this miracle he could only call fine.

“Yeah, you look okay, I guess. But I’ll give you a ride home.”

“What are you doing out here?” Asa thought this time of day—this, with the light beginning to emerge over the water—was sunrise, and that meant it was either too early or too late for most people to be up.

“Some people took my aunt’s patio furniture so they could hang out on the beach. I’m still missing a chair. If I don’t find it, Aunt Lorraine’s gonna kill me. This is the last party I ever have at her place, I swear to God.”

It would be, of course. Tonight Gage would probably die, just like most of the residents of Captive’s Sound.

Asa felt a wave of pity for the young man, who seemed friendly and kind. He wished he could say, Get in your car. Go. Drive as far as you can, as fast as you can.

But Asa belonged to the One Beneath. Working against Him was impossible. If he even tried to speak one word that would go against Elizabeth’s plan, so much as attempted to perform an act that might save one of the lives that needed to be ended, not only would he fail, but he would also be immolated in a flame that would make hell look like a top vacation destination. And that fire would outlast even hell, because death was a mercy he would never receive.

Yet at least a few of his actions could be his own, if they were harmless enough. “Come on. I’ll help you look for the chair.”

Gage stared at him. “Uh, okay. That’s—nice of you.”

Apparently Jeremy Prasad hadn’t spent much of his life being nice for no reason. It hardly mattered. No one here would have time to realize that Jeremy was dead, or who—no, what—was walking around in his skin.

So Asa enjoyed what freedom he had, walking along the beach with Gage to look for a plastic patio chair and reveling in the beauty of the last dawn this town would ever see.