Lu’s throat tightened. This woman reminded her so much of her father and Liesel it was like a spear through her heart. “Danke,” she whispered. On impulse, she threw her arms around the woman, and squeezed her into a hug.

She froze, but quickly recovered, even chuckling after a moment and patting Lu on the back. When she pulled away, some of the fear had left her face. She gave Lu a gentle, tentative smile, pinching her cheek like a grandmother. “I’ll give you pastries to take with you in the morning; you need some meat on these skinny bones. In the meantime, sleep. And sweet dreams, child. You deserve them.”

“You, too,” Lu murmured. The woman left on silent, slippered feet, and she and Magnus were alone.

“You like her,” he said, staring out the lone window in the room where he’d stationed himself since they’d been shown in. Like all the windows, it sported blackout shades, but he’d pushed them aside to peer into the night.

“I like anyone who offers me pastries.” She tossed her small pack on the bed, sat on the edge of the mattress, and pulled off her boots, throwing them into a corner. “Or who’s willing to stick out her neck for what she believes in.”

Magnus turned from the window, letting the shade snap back in place. She felt his gaze like two hot hands on her back, but refused to turn and meet it. Though everything was left to be said, also nothing was, and she didn’t have the energy for either. Avoidance seemed the best course of action. “You had the floor last night, so you should take the bed—”

“Shut up,” he said mildly. Startled, Lu turned and looked at him. There was a mischievous glint in his eye, and she realized he’d said it on purpose to make her look at him. She raised her brows and gave him a look, which he waved off with an imperious flick of his wrist.

“You’re still the girl, and I’m still the guy. I’ll take the floor.”

“Excuse me, mister sexist, but I’m a woman, not a girl. Additionally, my gender has absolutely no bearing on our sleeping arrangements—”

“Shut up,” he said again, this time with a quirk to his lips that looked suspiciously close to a smile. “Woman.”

Lu studied him a moment. “Just out of curiosity, are you bipolar?”

“I’ve definitely been called worse.” He sat on a chair opposite the bed and pulled off his own boots, tossing them aside in the exact offhand manner she’d done only moments before. Lu couldn’t decide which was more disturbing: the sight of his bare feet, strong and oddly sexy against the wood floor, or this new lightheartedness that had come over him without any seeming cause. She wanted to ask him about it, but was afraid the question might chase away his good mood, so she made a noncommittal noise and went to use the bathroom.

When she emerged, Magnus was on his back on the floor with his hands beneath his head. His eyes were closed.

“At least take the pillow,” Lu protested, stepping around him to the bed. She pulled the pillow from it, dropped it onto his face, then jumped under the covers just in time to hear his growl.

The pillow came flying over the bed, this time landing on her own face.

“Stubborn much?” she muttered, wrestling it aside. She stuffed it under her head and stared up at the ceiling, realizing she was still fully clothed. That wouldn’t make for a comfortable night’s sleep. As surreptitiously as possible, she unzipped her jacket, slid the trousers down her legs, and kicked both out from under the covers so they slithered to the floor on the opposite side from where Magnus lay.

After a quiet moment, he said, “Was that your attempt at being stealthy?”

Lu’s cheeks burned. Even in darkness, she felt exposed. “Some people can’t sleep dressed, Magnus.”

“I took my boots off,” he said, perfectly reasonable, and Lu smiled in the dark.

“The things that make you smile,” he said to himself, a hint of laughter warming his voice.

“How did you know I was smiling?”

Another quiet moment. Then, all laughter gone, he whispered, “The air feels lighter. And . . . so does my heart.”

It sat there between them. Such a small thing, but it felt immense and dangerous, as if he’d admitted to murder, or plotting a government coup. It also felt fragile as a soap bubble floating on a breeze. She wanted to capture that bubble in her hand and stare at it awhile, before it burst.

Lu whispered, “Magnus?”

He waited, not answering. The silence was deafening. Her heartbeat went jagged, and she knew he could sense that, as well as he could sense her longing and her wretchedness, the hole that had always been inside of her that nothing seemed to fill, except him. Lu swallowed the words she wanted to say, a litany of I need you I want you I think I’ve loved you my whole life, and said other, less perilous, words instead.

“What you said before, about what the Ikati really are. Our true form. Will you . . . will you show me?”

A quiet inhalation. “Now?”

His voice was gentle, a little unsure, and his hesitation worked on her like a reverse spell, releasing her own doubt so she sat up in bed with sudden, ravenous confidence. She looked down at him. He looked back at her, his eyes shining mercury bright in the darkness.

“Yes. Now.”

Slowly, he sat up from the floor. Then he stood, holding her gaze, those silvery cat’s eyes flashing. He removed his jacket, then dragged his shirt over his head and let it fall, so that finally he stood before her bare-chested and magnificent, in spite of the snarl of scar tissue that marked all the skin on his right side. Or maybe even because of it.

His hands went to the top button of his trousers, and Lu couldn’t look away. Even if she’d wanted to, she couldn’t.

She needn’t have worried, however, because before Magnus’s fingers had undone a single button, his hands and arms and chest had begun to glow softly, and the room was bathed in light.

It only took a few moments. He went from solid to beautifully amorphous, a man-sized shape of curling gray mist and tiny pinpricks of dancing lights, until the Magnus that had just stood before her had entirely transformed into a ruffling, shimmering cloud of vapor. His trousers slid empty to the floor and lay there, leaking air.

Lu jumped from the bed, clapping and squealing, bobbing up and down on her toes. “Yes! That’s amazing! I used to vanish when I sneezed before I learned how to control it, but this is—”

She fell still and silent because the beautiful cloud of vapor began to swirl around her in a sinuous coil, drifting over and around her whole body, slipping like living silk against her skin.

“Oh,” she breathed, lowering her arms as they were gently surrounded by mist. The mist trailed down her legs and Lu became acutely aware that she wore only her panties and a camisole. A tremor passed through her body, and the soft cloud contracted slightly around her, as if in an embrace.

Lu closed her eyes. She said his name, the barest whisper of sound between her lips. Feeling him like this was intimate and intensely sexual, so much so that a surge of heat passed over her, heat and desire, hardening her nipples and sending a spike of pleasure straight down between her legs.

The cloud of mist withdrew. She was left bereft, trembling, undone.

Then the mist changed again, drawing in on itself to coalesce into another form, not man or mist, or anything she would have ever imagined in all her wildest dreams.

A huge, powerful body, rippling with muscles. Four legs and sharp fangs and a long, sinuous tail, almond eyes glowing phosphorescent green against a wedge-shaped head covered in glossy black fur. As was the rest of him.

A panther. The most incredible, impossible thing Lu had ever seen. Shock leached the strength from her legs, and she sank to the mattress.

The animal stalked slowly toward her, a low rumbling purr vibrating through its chest. In disbelief, Lu began softly to laugh. He stopped a foot away, watching her with those preternatural eyes. He was feral and unnaturally large, towering over her and looking as if he was about to devour her whole with that set of impressive teeth.