I dreamt of Jodie. Three of her, all casting shadows of the other two. The first was the woman I knew; cut and broken but standing through it all. She was breathing heavily, like she’d just run ten miles, and was ready to fight. The second was taller, her hair longer. Her cuts were gone, replaced with scars and bruises, and she had the spear. Still slick with fae ichor. She shifted when she moved, one moment she was wearing a hoodie, the next she was in full Lower Court plate, then a mixture of the two. The third was large, barely physical and angry. Fire burned out of her eyes, eating her innards, and when she opened her mouth the same black, choking flames whipped into a snarl. Her veins pulsated with it, in liquid form, and it burned through her capillaries. Far away, further than I should ever be able to see, a bird with small, dark feathers circled the three. Round and round, in a gyre that threatened to crack with every arc, unpredictable in flight but definite in it’s aim. All three Jodies turned at once, merging into one for a moment and breaking apart, darkness erupting from their eyes, and the bird turned inwards. It sped up, getting closer and closer in a space where distance meant nothing, and met the Jodies, now charging, and pierced them, all three, all in different points in space. The bird came out the other side, feathers tearing off to reveal pink skin beneath. It landed, nearly falling forwards on its own momentum. The bird, now half-human, looked up at me, with the most familiar set of eyes I had never truly seen.

I woke up in hell, with a gun in my face for added effect. My demon was freckled and short, though thickly built, and dressed in all black. The woman from before, I reckoned. I hadn’t intended to bring her with me, but she didn't seem to care.

“Where are we,” she asked, though it barely sounded like a question.

“I don’t know.” I didn’t. Wherever we were it wasn’t a part of the realm I’d ever seen. The sky was violent cuts of orange and red, all dark and smoky. They extended down to the ground, a patchwork of shattered earth and stone, fire, or the reflection of the fire in the sky, running through the cracks. In the distance, small mountains of rubble hung in the air, languidly pushed about by some ancient blast. The air itself was like an explosion, stifling and clotted, burning in waves. Hell wasn’t that inaccurate a descriptor.

“Are we…”

“No. I portalled us out before the blast.”

She kept her gun level and examined me, analysing me, as if she could uncover everything about me by looking.

“I can call a chopper to pick us up.”

“We’re nowhere a chopper can come. This is a different world.” She hesitated at that, “The blast was unavoidable,” I lied, “I could only get us out.”

“You saved me.”

“Yes.”

“You’re a witch.”

“Yes.” My mind raced, searching for anything I could do that wouldn’t end up with a bullet in my head, but there was nothing. No movement, no equipment, nothing. She had my gun. All I could do was talk, stall the inevitable.

“How do I get back. Don’t try to lie, I’ll know”

“You can’t.”

“But you can?”

I looked up at her, “Bingo.”

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The witch-hunter hesitated, “Fuck.” She lowered her gun. “Give me the rings.”

I made like I would take it off and then dove to the side, seizing her lull in attention. I backhanded the gun, pushed myself off the ground and leapt, barreling my body weight behind my broken shoulder into her. The world flashed white in pain, and she cracked me in the back of the head with the pistol. I tried to grab at the witch hunter to pull her with me as I fell, but my shoulder burned, slowing me long enough for her to shift her weight. I hit the ground, one of the rocks knocking the wind out of me through the small of my back. I lay there for a moment, gasping for air, staring up at the fire in the sky. She stamped down on my stomach once, twice, both times burying the small rock further between my shoulder blades and for the second time in as many minutes, I was made intimately familiar with the barrel of her pistol.

“Ring, or I shoot you right now.”

I slipped off the ring I’d borrowed from Francis and threw it to the side, it didn’t skitter far before slipping into one of the shallower crevices. Saghir’s ring was nowhere to be seen. She’d probably taken it from me before I woke. “Try anything like that and I’ll shoot you. I can find my own way out of this place.” She couldn’t. “Get up.”

I picked myself up and dusted myself off. The environment stretched out to the horizon, but scraps of the rest of the world hung at the edges. “I need my ring. The one you gave me back in our world. It’s the only way to get back.” I could have overpowered her, knocked her out, and then searched her for it, but I didn’t have any magic.

“Well where is it?” she said.

“I don’t know, you have it. Maybe the world glitched and gave it back to you, maybe you stole it off me. But without It, I’m as useless as you.” She ignored the jibe and looked out at the horizon, picking a spot.

“I don’t have it. I’m missing a lot of my things too. Some kind of scavenger, probably. You’ll need to find another way back.” Another way, ask Saghir again for her help. The idea sent chills down my spine, if I never saw her again it would be too soon.

“There are no other ways. We need that ring back.”

“You have an idea.” another question that wasn’t a question.

“I know someone.”

One of the scraps of reality looked forested, if the Lower Court held Hyde Park they probably held a few others, it was a safe bet. “That way.” I took a few steps toward it, hoping that it would get me a better vantage point. The woman didn’t move. I felt her eyes burning into the back of my head and turned. She kept looking at me, studying me. “We should get started.”

“Stop.” I turned around, she had her gun raised again. A wave of nothingness passed through me, leaving me calm.

“Chloe Nash.” Names only had power insofar as they could use them to find us, and since she already had there was little point in hiding. “Yes.”

“Confirmed body count of fourteen operatives in the span of three months, part of the bloodiest coven in this part of the country.” I didn’t say anything and waited for her to make her decision. Kill me, or work together. Kill herself, or kill her morals. I would’ve made the choice a lot faster, but I didn’t need her to get home. “You know we had a nickname for you, back before we got your real name.”

“Are you going to shoot me?”

“I should.”

“It’d be suicide.”

“I don’t know that’s the truth.” Her arm never wavered, she knew how to hold it, even when she knew it was

“That doesn’t matter.”

“Either way, it’s a worthy sacrifice.” I had no defence, but to keep staring into her eyes. Ignoring the world, the fire, the gun, trying to convince the part of her that operated underneath reason, underneath ideology. “If you’re going to shoot me,” I said with a confidence I was getting much better at faking, “do it.”

She pulled the trigger, and a ripple tore through the air behind the bullet, scoring a line across the base of my neck, barely missing my clavicle.

“Try anything.” she repeated, “anything to make me think you’re fucking with me,” she shifted the gun so that I knew the next shot would go into my eye, “And I will kill you, witch.”