Thurston climbed the final rung of the fire escape and onto the tar and gravel roof of the tower. The wind was stronger up here, with nothing to break it.
The roof was empty.
Lightning struck again, and a ragged sheet of rain splashed on him.
“Where are you?” he cried.
“I’m right here,” Murgalen said.
He whipped around to behold a woman in a brown gabardine holding a brown umbrella. She had long red hair and a face full of freckles. She looked just the same as he remembered her on that autumn evening downtown two years ago.
Thurston was breathless at the sight of her. How he’d waited so long to see his love in human form again. Yet he hated her! But how could he hate someone so beautiful?
“You betrayed me,” Thurston said.
“I did no such thing,” she said, smiling.
She opened her ar
