Alima talks to Bulan at night while she sets out offerings. They’re usually two plates of leftovers, or two mugs, or maybe a box of sweets. Today it’s two slices of hazelnut bread with butter. "Baba wasn’t a dog person, you know," she remarks. The match gutters out, and she frowns before striking another. "He didn’t hate them, but he loved cats. We had a reddish one when I was little... I think her name was Rachel?"

She flips to a page in a notebook and makes a tally. (Sometimes she says a number as she marks, but not always-- she’s gotten to a hundred and forty by now.) Then she looks at one of the picture frames; the photo is a bit faded, but there’s Ned and Alima with Ruby.

He whuffs. "Ruby, sweetie. Like the--"

"Oh no, ’like the gemstone.’ Ruby." The incense is lit. "She’d sleep on my pillow and get cat fur in my hair. Mom said I’d turn into a cat after letting her do that so much, so I stopped."

He smiles at her and noses her boot.

"I didn’t know she was joking, so I was crying about it to Baba for like, an hour," She finishes with a laugh. She gives him an ear scratch. "Who’s a happy wolf?"

He stands up on the table to look at the offerings--he can’t feel or smell anyone coming to take them. "You haven’t called me Baba since you were--"

"Not for you, Bulan," she scolds. "It’s for Baba and Mom. Off."

He gets another scratch on the neck when he walks over, but it’s an absent one. She’s waiting for a response for the offerings, but after half an hour, neither of them sense anyone.

Later, long after Alima’s been picked up by Malachy, something snaps like a rubber band. "Oh, finally!"

Ned catches orange perfume and is awake immediately. "Lucy?"

Right to the side of the table--she’s misty and wavering, but she hears him. "Ned--!"

He’s up and running, and she reaches in turn, but she’s gone when he gets there.

She has to be alive, or she wouldn’t have so much trouble getting to the offerings. But she isn’t back in the mortal world either, or he’d have smelled more than just her perfume.

-----
Alima’s forced to turn in early when she loses her standards for humor, and she bumps into Malachy in the coat-room.

“Aww, it’s barely twelve. Can’t stay awake with the grownups?” He hides a grin as he peels an orange.

“I can, but I probably shouldn’t,” she admits. She processes that he’s eating in the coatroom, and wonders why it feels off. “Why are you eating in here?”

“Quiet time.” He reassembles the long strip of orange peel and holds out half. “You want a bit before we leave?”

She thinks his eyes look green, but maybe it’s the light. Orange juice is seeping down his knuckles, almost into his sleeve. She reaches over and takes the orange half from cold fingers.

-----
Mal comes back after Alima just went to his car, so Harry asks, “Forget something?”

“Just went to the bathroom.” He sits back down. “Where’s Alima?”

Aine shoves him and laughs. “You’re not even drunk and you have shit memory! She needs to get home.”

“Oh, she needs a ride? One minute--where are my keys?” He looks at everyone--they’re either confused or stifling a laugh. “What?”

Harry is laughing. “She just said you’d be getting her home, mate!”

“When did she say that?” He checks his pockets. Something’s wrong, something’s--

Owen is as confused as Mal is, and looks around. "Mal, did you actually--"

“Maaaaal.” Mag shakes her head as she hoists him up. “Your idiot is flaring back up. Alima just said you were in the car.”

“What?!” He tears out of her grip and runs.

There is an empty space where his car should be--but the haphazard globe of an orange peel is perched on the front block.

“What the...” Mal reaches for it--But what would I do with a fucking orange peel?--and Owen grabs his wrist.

“Shh. Aine.” Owen takes out a vial of pounded acorns and taps some into his mouth, with no sign of tasting the bitterness. When Aine is recording, he kneels and cups a hand behind the peel, then exhales like it’s a candle he’s blowing out.

It turns into a deer’s skull.

-----
Malachy is whistling. It pierces through her head in spite of the softness. At the stoplight he takes the rest of the napkin-wrapped orange out of his pocket. “Here we go.”

“No, but thanks,” she tells him. “That first half didn’t settle well.”

A tsk. "So delicate."

She laughs and pushes him, but he doesn’t respond. They pass the gym, and she looks from it to Malachy--why is he taking the long way to Ogma’s? It’s twelve-thirty, and when they got in the car...

“When did we get in the car?” She wonders suddenly.

He smiles at her, presses her shoulder with a cold hand. It sinks into her skin through her coat.

She keeps a hand by her knife, because it’s warm and it almost sounds like it’s humming. “Malachy?”

The Hunter looks in her face and laughs, bloodless pale skin and cat-green eyes.

The knife is clanging to get out of its sheath. She takes the handle and it leaps out for his chest, but she’s not good with her right hand and the angle is awkward--she hits his arm instead.

His blood burns down her wrist, and she knows he can feel the iron, but he manages a tight smile. “You learn fast!”

Alima moves back for him, knife hissing with Fair Folk blood. “Get away get away GET AWAY--”

He laughs again, and the world shudders to a stop.

...Light? The moon? No, just a flashlight. A policewoman is tapping on the window with it, shining at her from above. “--okay? Can you hear me? Miss?”

Alima’s halfway in a ditch. The key’s still in the ignition--she rolls the window down. “I wasn’t driving,” she says, still dazed. “I drank a lot.”

“Don’t worry,” the officer says patiently. “Did you run into something? Where’s the driver?”

“I...” she struggles to remember through her shivering. “I should be home. This is my friend’s car--Malachy’s.”

“Oh, Alima Song! You’ve been gone for at least an hour--your friends called from the Live Oak.” The officer unlocks the door, but the ditch is making it hard to open. “Does anything hurt? You’re shaking.”

“It’s cold.” She unclips her seat belt and struggles up. Her knife’s sheath clangs against her leg, and the knife itself is in the middle of the driver’s seat. “I don’t--”

“Gods in the west, you’re bleeding!” The officer gets her radio out.

“It’s the Hunter’s blood,” she says, but the officer shakes her head.

“Not much better.” She turns her radio on. “This is Officer Campbell--I found Alima. She’s on the freeway, a bit past the Marshbrand exit. She’s shaken up and she’s got Folk blood on her, so we need an ambulance or mage. Also, we need a tow truck to get her car out of a ditch. Over.”

Campbell opens the passenger door and gets a tube out of the glove compartment. “All right, sweetie, I have some acorn lotion. That should keep your arm until--oh, sirs, wait!” She stops two boys in suits from coming too close. “Unless you’re trained in first aid, just move along. We’ve got help coming.”

“First aid is a tricksome phrase,” the black-haired one says absently, jumping into the ditch to inspect Malachy’s car. “Oi, Jeff!” He waves the blonde over.

“Lads, don’t try any heroics,” the officer warns. “We need a truck for--”

They wrench it out of the ditch. Campbell steps forward at the crunch of metal, but more in wonder than alarm. “Fianna?”

“We are, ma’am.” They walk back over, and are careful not to come too close.

“Alima Song?” The first one asks.

“Y... yes?”

“Oh, good.” He writes something down in a notepad. “If it weren’t so late in the year, we could help with the Folk blood, but oh well. If you need help again, just use this.” He holds out a whistle made of antler, strung on linen cord.

It’s nothing special--it looks like an old-fashioned kid’s toy. But she can feel strange, wild magic beating through, and she hasn’t even touched it yet.

“Take it,” Campbell assures her, hushed and reverent. When Alima does, the bellow of a stag flares through her head.

She takes the blanket that the officer gives her, and is relieved when her arm is treated and bandaged. The pain fades slowly, but she can sort of move her arm and the burns have lessened after ten minutes, when they can hear ambulance sirens wail.

“Wes is gonna kill us, mate!” He tells his partner gleefully.

“Finally beat the sod at something! Fianna out!” They high-five each other, vanishing with the noise. Their cackling bounces around like a playful cat, and it takes a shade too long to die off.

With a sudden break of warmth, the stars burst through the clouds.

Next Chapter: XV: cat’s cradle