“They got a little wet,” he muttered. “But they’re still chocolate.”

Willis’s eyes lit up. He put down Chandra’s wig and picked up a brownie, carefully unwrapping the cellophane.

Zora took a bottle of Dante’s moonshine from the fridge, slamming the door a little too aggressively.

“What crawled up your butt?” Chandra asked.

“Don’t start with me,” Zora said, scowling. She swigged moonshine straight out of the bottle.

“I don’t see why everyone’s in such a bad mood. It was a great party. Good snacks, good dancing, good company.” Chandra wiggled her eyebrows at Ash.

Good company. She was talking about Dorothy, he knew. He glared at her.

“Too soon?” Chandra asked, all innocence.

Now Zora was staring at her, her face incredulous. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and said, “What the hell, Chandra?”

Chandra shrugged, unapologetic. “I refuse to be upset that Dorothy’s alive. I like Dorothy. And, yeah, okay, she’s working for the enemy now, which isn’t awesome, but it’s better than if she’d gotten lost somewhere in time and Ash fell in love with a soulless monster we didn’t even know.” Turning to Ash, blinking. “Well? Isn’t it?”

Ash hesitated. Nodded.

Chandra chewer her lower lip. “I’m . . . well, I’m a little surprised that she didn’t . . . you know . . .”

Willis said, blunt, “She didn’t want to come back with you?”

“No.” Ash fell back into his chair, suddenly exhausted. “She didn’t.”

“Oh. Well that makes sense, she has the big mission tomorrow morning, right?” But Chandra didn’t look convinced. She hesitated, glancing at Willis. “Now might be a good time to tell them about the other thing.”

Ash felt a flicker of interest. “The other thing?”

Willis took a small bite of brownie. “I was going to make you wait until tomorrow, as punishment for not letting me come to the party. But the brownie has put me in a better mood.”

Zora set the moonshine down. “You were going to make us wait for what?”

“It turns out I was right about the Fairmont walls. Easy to climb, and some fool on the fourth floor left his window open.” Willis took another bite of brownie, giving his head a slow shake.

He was enjoying this, Ash could tell.

“After that, it was a relatively simple matter to find out which room belonged to Roman. I ran into a young Cirkus Freak in the hallway, and you’d be amazed at how helpful he was.” He licked chocolate off his fingers. “Given a little incentive, that is.”

“What did you want from Roman’s room?” Ash was leaning forward in his seat now, drumming his fingers against his knee.

“The Professor’s textbooks went missing around the time Roman left, didn’t they?” Willis said. “We always thought they were lost in the earthquake, but seeing as Roman stole a bunch of other stuff from the Professor’s office, I didn’t think it was that much of a stretch to assume he’d steal these, too.”