The shadow at Valerius’s right side leapt for her at that, a ribbon turning into a striking coil. It crossed the dew line and hit nothing, which is to say it hit something it could not recognize and lost its shape. It fell into a smear and then into a drip and then into the dirt. It didn’t come back.
“Moira,” Eryx said, because his hands needed to be on a sword and his voice needed to be on the woman who could tell him when steel mattered.
“Wait,” Moira said again, but there was heat under the word now, not caution only. “Look.”
The bindings were not attacking the children anymore. They had become a garment being tailored around Valerius. Bands crossed his thighs and waist and ribs. When he strained, they didn’t tear; they tightened. The coils at his forearms met and fused. The ones at
