The guest registers held the names of the truly unfortunate of the City, like Xandre Lacalle and, in the earlier pages, Danil Skalnis showed up briefly as well. Niko Tsavian had used the shelter once or twice, perhaps for a nearby bed and a quick nap between two close work shifts. A step up, and there were the volunteers: Danil again, returning the favor to the shelter that had assisted him when he had been a newcomer to the City. Galina Arnaud, a woman who by rights should have had little to do with the shelter, save to donate from a distance. She had been particularly active in helping to organize the shelter’s social events, events that she rarely attended.

Finally there were the events where the top tier came in at last, the gentleman benefactors and the ladies bountiful. Professor Malveaux, Dr. Boadu, and Julian Outis all made appearances. Nobody in the top tier was a victim, which was no surprise to Miranda.

The knowledge, the answers . . . it’s all in your head, an inner voice murmured.

If that was true, why was she wasting time poring over lists and lists to prove—to prove what? That the City Shelter was a popular place?

Can you feel anything? A certain similarity?

Khabir and Fernando were very, very good at what they did, picking apart the fine, jumbled details of everyday life and finding threads and patterns of unusual activity. Miranda’s forte lay elsewhere, not with facts but with people, intuitively and ruthlessly uncovering their motives and motivations.

She suddenly realized that she was twitching her fingers in the motions the Trickster had taught her for weaving a barrier against the pain. She was not yet sure that the Trickster was real, but the barrier worked regardless.

She smiled and announced to Fae, “I think I need to sleep on this.”

Preparing for bed took time. Miranda endured Nurse Benet’s assistance meekly, feeling as if she needed to make up for her previous behavior. When at last she was alone in the bedroom, she spoke aloud into the empty darkness. “Can you teach me to spin a maze?”

There was no answer, but she was so tired that before she had time to feel fretful about the lack of response, she had already fallen asleep.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Miranda had not dreamed since the accident, not properly. It might have been the drugs. It might have been stress or pain, the unfamiliar bed in the hospital or the unfamiliar bed in the guest room of Khabir’s country villa. Whatever the reason, she could recall only dim, strange, unconnected scenes, scant of meaning or substance. It could be said, then, that her half-serious, half-whimsical request about spinning a maze was granted when sleep took her wandering to bear witness to a strange confrontation.

“I offer the usual for the usual price.”