CHAPTER SIX:
They arrived a little after ten the next morning — June first, dragging two suitcases she'd clearly overpacked, then Theo trailing behind her with his backpack and the stuffed fox he pretended he'd grown out of and never actually let go of. Lyra was on the front steps before the car had fully stopped.
Theo hit her on the run. She caught him, felt the solid weight of him against her ribs, and for a second the whole house — the lock, the photograph, Calder Mace's face in black and white — receded to something manageable.
"You have a gate," Theo said, muffled against her shoulder. "With, like, actual guards."
"I noticed that too."
June came up slower, scanning the front of the house the way she scanned everything now — for exits, for calls, for the thing that didn't fit. Sh
