Never. Say. Yours.
Harlan asked.
"Home," Josie said.
They walked back through the city. Past the docks. Past the old buildings. Past the shuttered fish market and the iron door in the alley. Through Beacher Street. Past Grindstone, dark and quiet. Up Whitfield Lane.
The house was warm. The lights were on. Vangie had left dinner in the oven. Pierogi. She'd been learning from Dane.
Josie sat at the kitchen table, between her beasts, eating her mother's pierogi, and the bond hummed, and the cards were in her pocket, and the thing under the city was stirring, and the seventh chair was cracking, and she wasn't afraid.
She pulled one card before bed. Just one.
The Star.
She put it back. She already knew.