Hæra looked at it and then raised her eyes to him in silent question. She wouldn’t blame him.

“Don’t be daft.” Jonathan propped the gun up against the wall.

“You said you would.” She remembered the night Jonathan had looked at the dark computer monitor, his face blank and cold. “You said if you thought I meant Madeleine any harm, you’d…” She trailed off. Jonathan hadn’t said what, specifically, he’d do.

“And do you mean her harm?”

“No.” She said it with a force that made her ribs hurt worse.

“Well then.” Jonathan looked away, and Hæra remembered she was naked, as she’d been on the night they’d met. “I’ll call Sue. Can’t use my mobile, some bloody Stormhorse must have buggered the tower.”

He took the lantern and left the room, leaving it in darkness again. Hæra looked at the wall. Her bones hurt. Beyond the bedroom, Jonathan moved around. After a moment, he called, “The landline’s out. Hold on a tick.”

Hæra held on a tick, and then another tick, until he came back. His face was pale as he set the lantern on the dresser. “Someone cut the wires from the phone box. No, not cut. Tore.”

The implication was clear, but absurd. “How would Asgall know to do that?”

“I told him about telephones all those years ago. He was fascinated by them, how you could talk to someone on the other side of the Earth. And he’s been skulking about the place for weeks. Must’ve figured it out.” Jonathan rubbed his hands over his face. “Clever bastard. Never forgot a thing I said. Nobody ever listened to me like he did.”

Hæra knew what Jonathan meant. She thought of how she’d hung on Madeleine’s every word. That had to be different, though. She’d cared for Madeleine from the first moment. Soon, that caring had become more, something Hæra had never believed she could feel.

Asgall wasn’t capable of that. He couldn’t be.

“Years ago,” she rasped, “on the night my family attacked me…before that, we were sitting out there at the kitchen table, and you asked if my kind could…”

“Wait,” Jonathan said sharply. “Tell me what hurts worst.”

Where to begin? Oh. He meant her body. She said, “My left arm. Mainly my wrist, I think.”

Jonathan winced. “Yeah, that’s a funny angle. Hold your arm up, and I’ll get some ice, it should still be frozen. Then…” He pinched the bridge of his nose as if he had a headache. “We’ll clean you up. Put you in some of her clothes. Get you back to the main house, and if he didn’t cut that fucking landline too, I can call…”

They looked at each other, realizing at the same moment that Asgall had definitely cut that fucking landline too.