Griffin felt a chill when she awoke, and pulled the blanket up over her shoulder. She snuggled down into it as deeply as she could, grateful for the warm body next to her.

It was late summer in the Ring, when the days were still oppressively hot, but the nights turned cold. Griffin was in a corner of an old storage room, seldom used these days, in a makeshift campsite she had constructed with the three fluffiest blankets she could borrow from the laundry.

She didn't know how long she'd been asleep. Not long, most likely. It was still pitch dark outside, and she hadn't been sleeping well. Griffin doubted she was the only one. Things had gotten weird at the Abbey.

Griffin thought that it had started when J Hall got back from Wonderland. There had been whispers in the Halls about witches, which weren't supposed to exist. There was also the matter of the destructive power that Alex with Malice possessed, which some of the girls swore looked just like a God weapon, or the shield he carried, which could seemingly harness the Blue. Both of those things should have been impossible too,

Then Katrin, the best Hunter they had, died in a stupid accident, and that somehow was more unbelievable than any of it.

Katrin's B Hall cohort had tried to murder Rafferty St. John, and Griffin had had several nightmares in the days since, in which Seth hadn't kept running after she'd collided with Griffin, but rather turned around to silence her.

And now Rafferty was missing.

For four days.

The girls, hardly models of civility and restraint under normal circumstances, were on edge. There were tons of theories, tons of opinions, and tons of dustups. Max had even cancelled fasting day this week, for fear of making things worse.

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She was worried about Trevor. The guy was positively beside himself with worry, and Griffin was afraid he was becoming unhinged. He had cornered her near the kitchen the other day.

"It's a pageant, Griffin. It's all a damn pageant. Rafferty's only seeing what they want her to see," he had explained, just inches from her face. Griffin had nodded, so he'd let her pass, but she had no idea what he was talking about. As she walked away, she heard him say something about getting proof.

He'd come back today, brandishing a spike of some kind, and what looked like a scrap of net. He told her that this proved it. He told her he was going to find Vincent, and get the truth. Later, her friend Kara told Griffin that she'd seen Trevor riding off on his motorcycle.

Griffin realized she wasn't getting back to sleep. She sighed.

This place needed some good news, and it needed it soon.

Tonight had been nice, at least, in their oasis of blankets, and Griffin milked it for as long as she could, huddled in the dark. When the sky started to turn pink she knew it was time to get up. There was so much to do.

She rolled over and kissed Oscar's bare shoulder, and slipped out from under the blankets and pulled on her clothes.

Griffin doubted Oscar was actually asleep. Sometimes she wondered if he slept at all. Like most Jacks, he seemed to be in a perpetual state of readiness, and very little escaped his notice.

He was, however, lying still with his eyes closed, so she picked up her shoes, and carried them with her as she walked across the cold floor, so she wouldn't make too much noise.

She was almost to the door when she heard him speak.

"Don't worry, peach pie, everything will be all right. I promise."

Griffin liked to think of herself as anything but sentimental, but a warm feeling surged up her chest in spite of herself. She didn't say anything, she didn't dare give him that satisfaction, but she paused for a second so that he knew that she heard him.

She was floating, just a bit, when she turned the handle on the door. As she stepped out in to the hall she realized something else.

She really hoped he was right.