"Not quite," I answer for his first question, and I'm thankful for the pressure from his hand when my thoughts go that awful night, with poor Penny caught in the thick of it, trying to hex away the wings I'd grown to escape him. "Someone has to," is all I say for fighting the Humdrum. And I can, or I'm meant to - it doesn't really matter. He kept coming for me all the same.

I think about birthdays instead. I never really missed mine. There wasn't time for it, space for it, but maybe Darrow will be different. "When's your birthday?" I ask Bitty, curious, skin still humming with that tiny poke. The thought of Bitty celebrating anything, even himself, makes me smile. "What do you do for it?"