The thirst roared through me and my fingers sank into the porcelain with little creaking sounds. If he went running off after Anna right now . . .

He yanked the door open so hard it hit the wall and more tiles shattered. The mirror above the sink cracked in gigantic zigzags, a spiderweb of expended force.

He was gone. I stood there, clinging to the stupid sink, every inch of me hurting and hot tears slicking my cheeks. I folded down, rested my hot forehead against the cool smoothness, and that’s how Benjamin and Shanks found me ten minutes later.

Shanks leaned against the door, his arms folded. “I guess Graves wanted to surprise you.”

“He didn’t go to class.” Dibs’s fingers were gentle. The blond wulfen smoothed some goop over my bruised cheek. He’d bandaged and gooped up the rest of me and was now working on my face with butterfly-light touches. “Hold still. I wish someone would have come and gotten me sooner. I can’t do much once it starts to get this dark.”

“Sorry,” I mumbled. My split lip hurt. All of me hurt. I seemed to have only gotten to the morning-after part of healing—the part where you’re stiff and wish you’d never been born, let alone in a fight. I didn’t even have the adrenaline rush or the part where you feel like you’ve kicked the world’s ass.

No, I just felt damaged all over.

“He saw you like that?” Shanks kept repeating it. He pulled the sleeves of his blue cable-knit sweater up, his large bony wrists exposed. “Man, oh man. Oh, man.”

“I didn’t have a chance to even talk. He got too mad.” I flinched as Dibs started smearing the stuff on my eyelid. Arnica, he called it. Good for the bruises. I’d’ve preferred Gran’s mugwort and a bunch of aspirin. “I, uh. You know.” I couldn’t even begin to explain it.

“I don’t wanna be the wulf in his way when something happens to you.” Dibs’s wide blue eyes were dark and worried. His black medical bag lay open on the bed next to me. He kept wiping the arnica stuff on his gray T-shirt absently whenever he needed his fingers cleaned. “He’s crazy-mad.”

I could even feel Benjamin outside the door, waiting and worrying. It was Shanks who had argued him into getting Dibs out of class, and it was Shanks who had shoved him out the door when I got all girlie and started crying some more. A pile of tissues scattered over the blue carpet, and the particular darkness of 1:00 a.m. filled the window.

I was beginning to wish I’d never gotten out of bed. If I hadn’t, Graves would probably still be here. It would’ve been nice.

Dibs dabbed at my eye. I hissed in a short sharp breath, and he gave me a quick look of apology.

“You did pretty good,” Shanks said suddenly. “I mean, she’s older. And fully trained. You still kicked her ass.”

“She’s rusty.” And weedy. I suppressed the urge to shake Dibs’s hands away from my smarting eye. “That was the only reason I had a chance. I don’t think she practices.”

“The Red Queen’s dangerous. Hold still.” The stuff he was smearing on me smelled nose-numbing weird. “This will sting if I get it in your eye.”

Like it matters—what’s one more thing to hurt? I had a better question. “What exactly do you know? Was I, like, the only person not to know who she is?”

Shanks shrugged. He tilted his head a little, listening to the hall. “Benjamin’s gone back to his room. Thank God, that was starting to bug me.” A little bit of the tension in him bled away. “I don’t know much, really. Just that the head of the Order’s the Red Queen. She’s been pressing for renegotiation of some Treaty terms for a long time. She gets a lot of what she wants; the Council just gets worn down. My parents used to talk about it after the cubs went to bed.” A shrug. “There’re just . . . rumors.”

“What kind of rumors?” I shut my eyes when Dibs murmured at me. He was so gentle, and I began to feel a little less battered. At least here with him and Shanks, nobody was messing with me.

“Just rumors. Nothing I can put my finger on, just saying that it’s better not to be in her way.” He gave me a long, measuring glance. “I can see why.”

So could I. “I didn’t know she hated my mother.”

He let out a laugh that was like a bark. White teeth flashed. “You sounded pretty sure.”

“It was a guess.” Or it was the touch blurring in my head, showing me other people’s business. Gran was big on minding your own business, but sometimes you just can’t. “A pretty good one, I suppose.”

Thinking about Gran made my head hurt. Her owl had pretty much saved my bacon so many times. I’d always thought of it as her owl because it showed up the night she died.

Now I wasn’t so sure.

“Why would she hate your mother?” Dibs finished smearing goop on my face. “Okay, that’s it. Let me take another look at that wrist. You’re not healing right.”

“I don’t know.” I tried not to sound fretful. “What do you mean, not healing right?”

“Too slow, especially if your aspect is rubbing through. Could be because you’re not fully bloomed yet. I wish I’d thought to bring that textbook. Maybe we should call Benjamin in—”

“No!” I yanked my hand away. Dibs squeaked a bit. “He’s already going to ask me what happened!”

“What would be wrong with that?” Shanks peeled himself away from the wall. “I’m a witness. She hit you first.”

I didn’t think I’d have to explain it to him of all people. “She’s the head of the Order, right? Who’s going to believe she jumped me first?”

Besides, I couldn’t tell him that I wanted to find Graves and get the hell out of here. The need to get on the road was itching under my skin in a big way.

“It’s the truth, though.” Dibs gently but firmly grabbed my hand, started manipulating my left wrist. It hurt. “Shanks saw it. Right?”

“You’re such an optimist.” Shanks sighed, crossed the room to the window. “She’s right. Her only witness is a werwulf from a reform Schola. Nobody will believe it. On the other hand, you did give as good as you got, Dru-girl. Maybe she’ll be embarrassed.”

What a cheerful thought. My wrist sent sharp jolts of pain up my arm as Dibs’s long slim fingers probed and poked and pulled.

My T-shirt was filthy with dried blood, sweat, and stuff I couldn’t remember getting on it. “You embarrass a bully, they’ll just lie in wait for you somewhere. Ouch! Stop yanking on it!”

“I think maybe I should splint this.” A crease deepened between Dibs’s fair eyebrows. He’s all business when he’s patching someone up. Hard to believe he’d barely even talk to me out in public because he’s so shy. “So what do we do, then?”

We? I don’t know about you, but I’m finding Graves once he’s calmed down and making the case to get the hell out of here. Like, yesterday.

“Leave it alone, I’m fine.” It hit me hard. I put my head down, breathed in softly. He’d said we. He took it for granted that it was his problem too. We. I didn’t think I’d be so grateful for one little word.

All at once I felt horrible about leaving him behind.

Dibs shrugged. “Wait and see. All we can do. Graves might have a bright idea. And Jesus, Dru. You should at least tell Benjamin. He wouldn’t have this job if he didn’t know how to play the game.”

“You keep saying it’s a game.” I let Dibs mess with my wrist some more. The blond wulfen produced a brand-new Ace bandage from the depths of his medical kit.

“Hold still.” He tore the package open with his white, sharp teeth.

Shanks let out an ironic little half-laugh.“Of course it’s a game. Djamphir are like suckers, always looking to one-up each other.” He gave me a guilty glance, tugged at the window sash. “’Cept you, of course. And then there’s Reynard. Wonder what the deal is with him and Red. You said she was trying to get you on her side about him.”