“Muiriel.” His causal friendliness took the edge off how strange it felt being out at night, with other kids. At a party. In the dark I was just a regular teenager there to have some dumb fun and then go home after—for all anyone knew, home to a bedroom and a family of my own who knew me well and who in the morning would ask only, “Did you have a good time?”

Tonight I was one of them.

Elliot smiled at the three of us, nodded at Sean. “Ladies’ man,” he said. Kira and I laughed. Sean was dramatically affronted.

“You don’t know! I could be rolling with half a dozen girls; I could be bringing them all here one at a time on my bike handlebars because that’s how much game I have.”

Kira patted his arm. “Oh, honey, of course you could. No one’s doubting your…game.”

Elliot watched Kira’s every word, clearly charmed. He lifted the camera to his eye. “You guys mind?”

We moved closer together, Sean’s hand on my back, and the shutter clicked. No flash.

“Nice firelight,” Elliot said. He turned to Kira. “Will you show your ink to Dave and them? They don’t believe me.”

“Believe you about what?”

“That you drew them…that your parents let you.”

“Who is ‘Dave and them’?” I whispered to Sean.

“Art geeks,” he whispered back.

Art geeks? Even I knew that “Dave and them” getting invited to this but not Kira was simply behold the power of Katiana.

Kira studied Elliot. “Okay,” she said. “Muir, if I lose you in the dark, meet at the fire at ten-thirty?”

And then, above the fire and voices, the already-familiar, distinct cackle of Katiana. Kira exhaled.

“Will you be all right?” I asked her, low. “Stay away from them.”

She nodded. “I’ll keep the fire between us.”

“You sure?”

“I’ll stab them with the stick of judgment.” She raised her voice. “Sean, you keep track of Muir?”

“Yeah, okay! Sure!” he said. We watched her walk to the fire, Elliot beside and towering over her, and over most of the rest of the kids at the fire. Gangly. Artsy. Pretty cute. Kira was smiling up at him.

“Elliot’s okay, right?” I asked Sean. “Not a drunk dumb-ass?”

“Oh yeah, no—Elliot’s a good guy. We can keep an eye on her from a distance.”

We watched the silhouettes in the firelight.

“Hey,” Sean said. “She’s not taking art?”

“Not anymore.”

“Why?”

“Wanted a break, I guess.”

“Huh.” He frowned. “She doesn’t really have a stabbing stick. Right?”