Chapter 27:
Boots on the roof.
Kael's got his cut on before I've even stood up. He pulls his boots on without sitting down, and there's a shotgun in his hands that I didn't see him pick up from anywhere.
"Stay behind me," he says. "Not next to me. Behind."
"Kael—"
"Behind."
We go down the back stairs. Not the main staircase. The narrow one behind the storeroom that comes out in the alley, and he opens it slow and the alley's empty and rain's coming down.
And then I hear it again.
Boots on shingles. Up above us. Moving.
Kael points up. Then points at the alley mouth. Then holds up two fingers — wait.
And I wait.
And then a man comes over the edge of the roof.
He comes down the side of the building on a drainpipe, hand over hand, fast, and he's in a dark jacket and a hood and he'
