"I can't believe this actually works," Alex mused.

"I can't believe that you actually chucked this away for five months," Regulus muttered, disgruntled.

"And I can actually see your face scowling!" Alex exclaimed.

It was a month into the summer break and Alex was sitting in her own room again in the attic, looking into a small mirror in her palm. The morning sun was already well on its way to its zenith, but a quick glance at the clock on her wall said that she still had thirty minutes or so. During breakfast she'd suddenly remembered that she might have forgotten to include an important quotation in her Charms essay and, unable to remember exactly which book the passage came from, proceeded to rummage through her rather messy trunk and found a small, albeit familiar, voice coming from one corner.

"I gave it to you on Valentine's Day!" Regulus said in an outraged voice, but the face in the mirror was smiling.

"You bought it at Zonko's! I thought it was some sort of a joke!" Honestly, exactly how a girl was supposed to react when a boy gave her a mirror, of all things, Alex didn't know. Did Regulus have a problem with her appearance? Weren't gifts usually bought at Honeyduke's? "Besides, I live with two roommates, and both of them are very suspicious about new items."

"Right," Regulus said drily.

"You could have told me that it was a two-way mirror," Alex said. "Then I wouldn't have had to make Edge travel all the way from here to London to deliver a measly letter."

"Well," Regulus said, his voice softening. "I wouldn't call your letters measly."

"Hmph," Alex said. "So this is a two-way mirror. It's rather novel, isn't it?"

"I suppose," Regulus said off-handedly. "Muggles have something called telephones, right?"

"Muggle Studies homework?"

"Yup," Regulus said. "We're getting to some really exciting materials this year. Fifth year will be fantastic." Regulus' eyes were gleaming in a way that only happened during Quidditch games and Professor Binns' History of Magic lectures. Alex rolled her eyes.

"You need to get a life," she said.

"Right," now Regulus was rolling his eyes. A sight that not many got to see. "Life in Grimauld Place. It'd be easier to catch a unicorn in the Forbidden Forest."

"Sirius is gone—"

"Sirius has gone off to Potters again, Father's "away" on business, and Mother decided to host a tea party. Again. Alex, there is only so much tea I can tolerate in one summer."

"You like tea."

"Not in a garden surrounded by in-laws plotting my future decades," Regulus grumbled, then his face shifted. "You could come," he said.

Alex wasn't sure exactly how she could subtly refuse this invitation. "Your mom hates me," she said.

"You two never got the chance," Regulus said, sounding almost encouraging.

"Reg, your mom likes me as much as my mom likes you."

"You know, I'm the second son—I'm basically a throwaway. She wouldn't mind whom I invite to a tea party," Regulus said brightly, but Alex did not fail to notice that Regulus didn't deny any of the things she said.

"I have to work," Alex said, trying to sound reasonable to someone who had never worked an hour in his life.

Regulus, to his credit, was attempting to look sympathetic. "Didn't you say that there was someone who was sort of funny? Maybe it wouldn't hurt to—take some time off. He might go away."

"I don't know," Alex said. "He doesn't exactly do anything, much." There was a customer who had begun to frequent the restaurant she was working in a few weeks back. Most of the times he came in when her shift was almost over—Krater, the manager, usually let her go before six—and sat by the bar, looking at everything but nowhere in particular. Perhaps it had only been her imagination, but it sometimes felt as though he was waiting—anticipating her to do something. Alex wasn't sure. She didn't tell her mother, of course—having to spent half of the summer away on missions was already making Sophia Wilson twice worried as usual—and now Regulus was bringing it up again.

"Reg," Alex said, "I can't just go to London. Where would I stay?"

"At my house," Regulus said like it was the most natural thing in the world.

"Your mother—"

"I'll talk to Mother," Regulus said, giving his characteristic grin. "She won't say no."

"I don't know," Alex said.

"Just think about it," Regulus said.

"Right," Alex said, unconvinced. Apparently Regulus sensed this.

"So how is everything?" he asked.

"All's quiet, as usual," Alex said, smiling lightly. "Mom's away again, but she said that she'd be back before the week was over. Grandmother writes that everything's going alright over there. Her husband's fully recovered."

"She's still writing to you, then?"

"It is still a bit odd," Alex said. "And we don't write often."

Alex couldn't remember when their conversations grew casual. Their conversations had always been on the careful side, and Alex had always watched what she said to Regulus, just in case that she sounded a bit too—Muggle. Or weak, or ignorant, or overly foolish, because she knew that he had little patience for people who failed to see the matter at hand as it was. But somehow it felt almost possible to talk with him like a pair of normal teenagers for once, and Alex couldn't tell why that was. Perhaps something had changed.

"Alright, I've got to go," Alex said, regretfully looking at the clock on the wall. "My shift starts in fifteen minutes, and it's a bit of a walk."

"Fine," Regulus said, looking resignedly indulgent. "Have fun, I guess."

Alex rolled her eyes. Trust Regulus to wish her fun at work. "Right," she said.

"Don't forget the tea party!"

Corner Tavern was an ancient tavern just a little off the main road, where most of the town's residents liked to stop by after work for a drink and a bit of gossip. Alex had initially planned on getting in touch with Mr. Munson, a local convenience store owner who had "allowed" her to work part-time at his store last summer, but he had mysteriously disappeared from the town with a dingy sign on the door that said, 'family emergency.' Alex had briefly entertained the idea of not working this summer—but her mother was away on Order business again, again indefinitely, and even though her day job as an editor of Transfiguration Today meant that they had some income, it was barely enough to support the large amount of time that her mother had to spent abroad and pay for utilities in their house. So back to work it was.

The late summer mornings in her town were unusually pleasant, and Alex thought back to the summer when McGonagall had first visited her has a cat. It had been raining then, and it seemed so odd that it should not rain now—but it wasn't—

Krater, as usual, was all business when she walked in.

"Right on time," he said briskly. He was—Alex could actually not tell what his actual age was. As far as she knew, his uncle used to own the place, but got rather sick—the old Mr. Krater, Alex remembered, didn't have any children—and he came from some city in the north—perhaps Newcastle—to oversee it for a while. Alex thanked her lucky stars that Krater was unfamiliar enough with the local politics—and town gossip—when he first arrived to hire her. Her family's reputation had not, it seemed, grown any better during her absence, although most people tended to ignore her on daily basis. Alex nodded at him and went to the back to put away her jacket before coming out to prepare the place.

"A fine example you're setting, Higgins," Krater said about fifteen minutes later to a young man who had walked in. "Wilson will learn not to be early, no?" Higgins mumbled some apology under his breath before shooting Alex a glare. She pretended not to see it.

The work was busier as usual. The good weather encouraged more people to come, and Krater made her set more chairs and tables up outside the tavern so that people could drink outside. Amidst the bustle and the crowd, Alex didn't have a chance to catch a proper break until late in the afternoon, just when people had finished their lunch but weren't ready for dinner.

"Wilson," Krater said, "dish duty with Higgins."

Alex shrugged. "Alright," she said, going inside the kitchen, where Higgins was already at work. It seemed that he had several overdue piles of plates.

"Hand over the sponge, would you?" Alex said, trying to find a comfortable position in the small kitchen. Higgins glared at her.

"Think you're better than me, Watson?"

"I've no idea what you mean," Alex said dully, far too familiar with Higgins' antics. Higgins had been in the primary with her—along with Ramsay and the gang—and although he never quite made the cut into the popular circle, he seemed to believe that being nasty would guarantee an upward movement in the local teenage social circle.

"Don't think I don't know all about your situation," Higgins spat out. "Your mum's pulling her back sending you to that boarding school, and now you have nothing to eat. God knows what your mum's been up to—"

"Higgins," Alex said, "is your life so mindlessly boring that you have to take an interest in me?"

"Don't be stupid," Higgins said, "I'm just minding my own business. You're getting into my business." Alex swallowed an exasperated sigh and kept scrubbing. All logic would be lost on him.

Unfortunately, Higgins had a knack for detecting moments when someone was disparaging him, however mentally. "You know what, Watson?" he said, throwing down his dish towel. "You can just shove your smart-ass a—"

"Oi!" Krater had somehow appeared from the front of the store. "Is there a problem here?" His face was mild as he surveyed the kitchen, but his gaze was hawk-like.

"No," Alex and Higgins muttered at the same time. Krater gave them a last glance before going back to his stool. Alex kept her eyes down and kept scrubbing.

After five people began to trickle in, one by one, and they were again called back to take orders. Alex tried to relax and concentrate on the orders at hand. The strange man—he may not come today. He sometimes didn't. But when the clock on the wall ticked to five thirty the door of the tavern opened, and Alex did not need to look in the direction to know who it was.

The man was wearing a loose jacket, as usual, with its hood drawn low beneath his eyebrows. One could barely see his eyes. His shoulders hunched at a grotesque angle, but his back was straight and tall—clearly he did not normally walk that way. He unsuccessfully shuffled to the usual corner of the tavern where he signaled that he would like to order something. Next to her Krater let out an annoyed breath.

"That one again," he muttered.

"I can go," Alex said, trying to sound cheerful and failing. The memory of Regulus' mentioning of the man only worsened the anxiety that she already felt.

"No," Krater said, frowning. "Higgins is on it." Without a comment, Higgins got up from behind the counter and picked up a menu. He brushed past Alex, not failing walk into the right side of her body with his shoulder. Alex suppressed a wince.

"I can do it, you know," Alex said defensively. Krater didn't even shrug.

"I know," he said. "But if I were you I'd steer clear from that one. He looks at you when he thinks you're not looking." So Alex's suspicion had not been wrong. He was looking at her.

"About Higgins—"

"Please," Krater scoffed. "Of all people, Higgins does not deserve your defense."

"Wasn't going to defend him," Alex muttered, thinking that it was probably a bad idea to ask Krater to be nicer to him. The people at table six made a motion and Alex signaled that she was coming.

"Good night," Alex muttered about thirty minutes later when she exited from the closet, putting on her jacket. Krater waved carelessly from his stool; Higgins glared at her direction again.

The way back home was again oddly pleasant. The sun was beginning to set, but the sky was still bright enough for her to see everything clearly—the number of people across the street, Mrs. Sunfield's chairs, the windows open to let in the fresh air, everything. She closed her eyes and breathed in everything.

She paused in her step.

But the pause was so momentary that no observer could guess that Alex had stopped in her tracks to listen to something. She walked as usual, brisk pace, arms swinging casually at her sides. She came to a crossroad and took a sharp right turn, risking a small glance to the way that she had come.

There was no one.

Her hands automatically went into her jacket pocket, where she had sewn a small sheath inside the lining of the fabric for her wand. Feeling the familiar weight between her fingers gave her a bit of assurance, but it seemed unlikely that that man—the hooded man from the restaurant—would be unarmed.

Most wizards these days tended to be armed, after all.

She took another turn, this time into the alleyway, where the older part of the town was situated. The picture was considerably darker due to the narrowness of the space between buildings and the consequent lack of sunlight. Alex did a quick calculation and made another left turn, followed immediately by another turn. The footsteps that she had heard were leisurely, unhurried, but that man had been tall despite his slouch. He could easily outwalk her in speed and pace. So she would need to catch him unaware.

She made the decisive left turn and ran to the alleyway at the end of the small gap, her wand in hand.

The way was empty.

"Looking for me?" came a voice from behind her. Alex gasped and dropped her wand, turning around.

The man, on the other hand, did not seem alarmed—or even particularly worried. He bent down slowly and picked up her wand, taking even more time to stand up. He rolled the wand between his fingers, considering. "Ebony," was all he said, cocking his head to one side. His hood seemed to have come off some time during Alex's failed attempt to corner him, and Alex realized that she had until now never seen the man's eyes directly, despite the several dozen times she had seen him at the tavern. But she could see him now, despite the shadows in the alleyway, could make out the contours of his face, his nose, his deep-set eyes…

"Interesting," the man continued. "Do you know where this wood comes from?"

Alex couldn't mask a start despite herself. "Did you talk to Ollivander?" Alex asked back, remembering the wandmaker's words almost four years ago. But the question was superfluous. Every question was probably superfluous. The moment that she had gotten a clear look at that man's face, Alex knew. She had seen it countless times before, on a photograph that she had never showed anyone, not even Reg…

"Don't need to," the man said, still regarding the wand thoughtfully. "It is a famous tree, after all."

"I'm afraid I don't follow," her voice was shaking. Alex wasn't sure why it was shaking. And the wand—she had to get it back, didn't she? She was there, defenseless, in the alleyway, while the sun was setting. She needed to—get the wand back—and go home—

"It's a bit of a long story," the man said, smiling rather grimly. "Perhaps another time." He held out her wand, the handle towards her. Alex took it mutedly.

"Aren't you going to ask me who I am?" the man asked, the grim smile still on his face.

"No," Alex said, "not really."

"Already know?"

"I don't know anything," Alex said testily. "I'm guessing."

"Maybe you're wrong."

"No," Alex said. "I'm not. Not this time."

The man let out a long sigh. "I'm sorry," he said eventually, looking away.

"What for?" Alex let out a sound that was too hysterical to be called a laugh. "This is the part that I don't know, you see."

The man, if possible, looked even sorrier. "She didn't tell you," he said.

"Nothing."

"Then how did you—"

"Does it matter?" Alex said.

"Well," the man said carefully, "I want to know more about you. Of course I do." Her response was too weak to be called a snort.

"I know—it's just—it's a bit hard to explain," he said. "Actually, I'm not supposed to even mention half of them."

"Oh," Alex said. "Well, that certainly makes things easier, doesn't it?"

The man didn't say anything in response. He simply smiled sadly at her, and somehow—for some reason—this made her unbearably sad.

"What do people even—what do they even do in this kind of—" Alex looked away, stomping her foot on the pavement.

"Well," Altair Wymond said, almost casually, "it's almost dinnertime. I didn't have much at the place you work, I'm afraid." He straightened his jacket and looked almost indifferently at her. "Are you hungry?"

Alex once believed that she had had her share of awkward meals. To name a few, one may recall the morning after McGonagall's visit to her house before the start of the first year, when Alex had stealthily stolen into the kitchen in the morning (unsure what mood her mother would be in) and found the table already set and lain with food. This did not make the meal one iota less awkward, and it was not until Christmas dinner the same year, when Alex had come back from school, that she no longer felt apologetic about wanting to go to Hogwarts against her mother's wishes.

Or one could also recall the morning after Regulus had given her a necklace as a Christmas present. Rebecca was unaware of what had transpired, of course, but she was vigilantly keeping Regulus under her surveillance; meanwhile, Alex was too embarrassed and confused to say anything intelligible that entire day. Leila had some inkling of what might have caused Alex to bumble more than usual (Alex had never been very smooth in her eyes) and did not aid in her attempt to mask it—quite the contrary. Regulus, unfortunately, was still too discomforted by the wound on his torso to take any decisive action, especially in the public sphere. The silence lasted as long as the meal itself, until Leila decided that she had had enough and began a loud conversation across the table with Rabastan Lestrange on why his Beater skill was never impressive.

If there was ever criteria on which meals were to be judged on their awkwardness, Alex knew that she had some. This dinner, however, made the cut.

They had apparated to some part in London—Alex guessed that it was London—and Altair Wymond seemed to know the way rather well. Alex had followed mutely, her hand glued to her wand, and he simply walked in front of her, never quite looking around, and never looking back at her. At last they arrived at a place that Alex expected the least, but she was too nervous to say anything.

"Toppings?" were his first words to her.

"Er," Alex paused, regarding small bowls containing diced vegetables as if they would leap from their resting place to attack her. "Mushrooms?"

"Mushrooms," Altair mused. "And spinach, maybe." He turned towards her. "Do you like spinach?"

Alex shrugged helplessly, trying to convey with erratic wiggling of her eyebrow that she had no particular opinion about spinach or leafy vegetables of most kind. She didn't think that she was very successful.

They sat down by the far corner of the pizzeria. Alex fiddled with the plastic peeling off the cushion of her seat.

"So," Altair Wymond said, almost casually, "how is everything going?"

Alex tried to hide the twitch in her eye. "Everything?" she repeated.

"School," Altair decided. "How's Hogwarts?"

Alex cleared her throat. She wasn't sure how she could have been marveling at a two-way mirror with Regulus less than ten hours ago. "Fine," she said. "The final exam results came back. They were fine."

"Okay," he said. A silence followed.

"What house are you in?" he asked eventually.

"Did mum really tell you nothing?"

Now it looked like Altair was trying to hide a twitch in his eye. Alex wasn't sure if she pitied him or simply wanted to accuse him of something. "We haven't been in touch in a while," he said.

"Why not?"

"I really can't say."

"Why not?"

"For reasons that I can't say," Altair sighed. "If things had been different, I would tell you, but if things had been different—" a wry smile appeared on his face. "Well, then I suppose we wouldn't be having this conversation."

"I don't know how I'm supposed to tell you things when I don't even know why I haven't met you in fifteen years," the words came out in a rush.

Altair Wymond again looked inexplicably sad at these words and it made Alex feel somehow sad again. Alex wished that she didn't have to feel those feelings. "Okay," he said. Alex looked away.

"Slytherin," Alex muttered grudgingly.

"Sorry?"

"I said Slytherin," she said more loudly. "My house. It's Slytherin. I heard you were in it, too."

Altair's expression was again unreadable. "It seems to be a family tradition," he said, attempting weakly at a smile.

"That's what the Sorting Hat said, anyway," Alex said. Altair's eyebrows rose.

"Did that thing talk to you as well?" he asked excitedly. "Soph would never believe it whenever I told her."

"Why wouldn't she believe it?" Alex said.

"I don't know," Altair said, and for a second he seemed like a normal thirty-five year old man. "Apparently it never talked to her during the Sorting. I was nervous, you see, and for while I thought I was imagining the voice until it told me that I wasn't imagining a voice in my head."

Alex shook her head. "I never told her," she said. "It talked about you." And mom doesn't like to talk about you, she added silently.

"Really?" Altair said. "What did it say?"

Alex hesitated. "That it would give me the same chance that it gave you," she said.

"Well," Altair said, his wry tone returning, "I'll tell you right now never to take that chance."

"What do you mea—"

"Here's your pizza," the waiter said unceremoniously before letting the large pan settle obtrusively on the table. Alex looked at the gooey cheese uncertainly.

A sudden realization seem to dawn upon Altair. "You don't like pizza," he said.

"I like pizza," Alex said quickly.

"Is it the cheese? I—"

"I can eat cheese, it's fine." She looked uncertainly at Altair. "Aren't you going to have some?" she asked.

"I suppose I should," he said, but his face looked as though eating was the last thing on his mind. "Dig in," he said to Alex, and she gingerly picked up a slice before taking a tentative bite. It was warm and soft to the bite. She looked up to tell him that the it tasted fine, but the look on his face stopped the words coming from her mouth.

He was staring at her—well, not quite staring, as some people do unpleasantly, but rather gazing in silent curious wonder, as though she were a particular breed of puppy that he had never seen before. His brows were furrowed, as though this puppy was posing a terribly difficult puzzle for him to solve, but the way his mouth formed a half smile told her that he wasn't unhappy.

Alex cleared her throat. "The pizza's getting cold," she said. This seemed to make him wake from the daze somewhat.

"What did the Sorting Hat tell you?" Alex asked, watching him chew. Altair shrugged.

"That it had never seen my kind before," he said before frowning, as though catching himself off-guard. "Whatever that meant," he added quickly.

"The Darkhiders?" Alex asked. Altair spluttered.

"Sorry?"

"The Darkhiders," Alex repeated. Altair stared at her for a while.

"Do I even want to know how you found out about that?" he asked eventually. Alex shrugged.

"I might have snuck into the Restricted Section," she said. Altair shook his head.

"That's old legend," he said. "My parents came from the continent, I know that much—but the group is long gone. Even Grindelwald couldn't find them." His face darkened a little. "Not that he's a particularly pleasant person to talk about. Shouldn't you be eating more? You still grow at fifteen, right?"

Alex didn't know how she was supposed to react to that. "I stopped growing more than a year ago," she said.

Altair looked vaguely disappointed. "Really?" he said.

"Girls usually don't grow much at fifteen."

"Huh," he said. "I didn't know that—I didn't have any sisters."

"Or brothers," Alex supplied.

"Or brothers," Altair conceded before looking at her oddly. "Just how much did you find in the Restricted Section?"

"I got it from the Hogwarts album collection in the library."

"Oh," Altair said. "Naturally."

"I spend a lot of time in the library."

"Do you?" he said. "What's your favorite subject?"

Alex hesitated. "Defense Against the Dark Arts," she said. "I don't know—it's always hard to tell."

"Why would it be hard to tell?"

"Well—it's supposed to say something about you, isn't it? When you say you like Defense Against the Dark Arts, it's like you're making a political statement."

"Aren't you?"

"I don't know," Alex said glumly, thinking about Regulus' smiling face in the mirror that morning and her mother's absent bedroom.

"If it makes you feel any better," Altair said, looking somewhat hesitant, "defense was my favorite subject, too."

"Really?" Alex said, and she found that it did somehow make things better… "Did it help you—make a choice about your career? I'm entering fifth year, and all—"

The wry smile came again. "I guess it did."

"And what do you do—oh," Alex said, trying not to look too disappointed. "You can't say."

"I'm sorry," Altair said. "If it's any consolation, it's for your own good."

"How can that be for my own good?" Alex said. Altair looked away.

"I heard that you didn't really get along with my grandparents," she said, trying to change the topic. She found that she didn't really mind talking to him, not at all…

"Which ones—oh. Soph's parents. No, not really," he shook his head.

"Why not?"

"Have you met your grandfather?" Altair said, as if that said everything.

"No," she said. "He refuses to see me." Altair's face crumpled a little, but he tried to mask it with a smile.

"I'm sorry," he said.

"Grandma's rather nice, though," Alex said.

"Oh, Clara's perfectly lovely," Altair said.

"Mum's a bit like her."

A strange, faraway look came into his eyes. "Yes," Altair said quietly. "Yes, she rather is, isn't she?" He seemed to grow conscious of Alex's look and checked his watch—Muggle watch, Alex noted with a bit of a surprise.

"It's growing late," he said. "And I should have you home before your mother arrives."

Alex stood up automatically before she had time to process what he actually said. "Wait, what—"

But Altair had already gone away to pay and Alex followed him to the door cautiously. He continued to walk once they were both outside, however, and didn't stop until they reached a relatively secluded alleyway.

"How do you know about my mom?" Alex demanded. "No one's supposed to know—"

"Hold on to me," Altair said, getting ready to dissaparate. Alex took his arm and braced herself for the foreign sensation of being squished into a very tiny cube. When she regained enough awareness, they were in an alleyway a few blocks away from her house. It was so dark that she could almost not see his expression.

"Wait," she said. "How do you know about this place—how did you find me?"

"Hiding you amongst Muggles might have worked when no one was looking, but people are looking now," Altair said quickly. "I'm sorry, Alex, but I don't have a lot of time, and there's always a chance that someone saw us."

"Is that a bad thing?"

Altair opened his mouth to say something, but then closed it, apparently having thought better of it. Alex ignored the sting in her eye and made the move to go.

"Wait," he said. "Before you go, I have to tell you something."

"What?"

"Something's approaching," Altair said slowly. "I can't say what, and I can't say when, but the thing that affects every person in Britain—and you must understand what I mean—is growing stronger. In the Slytherin house this advice may be useless, but trust no one, Alex. No one, except your mother."

"And you?"

"I—" again Altair seemed to think better of something, and stopped.

"You are still wearing the necklace that I sent you, aren't you?" he asked instead, and Alex's hand flew automatically to her neck.

"That was you," she said. Altair nodded.

"It's a rather outdated thing, but—it has been passed down for generations for a reason, I should like to think. It's supposed to protect you, when nothing else can. Now you should go."

Alex hesitated. "Wouldn't you like to come in?" she asked in a small voice.

For a moment Alex thought Altair hesitated, too, but the moment passed quickly. "I can't," he said. "And—ah, best not to tell your mother that you saw me."

"Why not?"

"It may be yet another thing that she could never forgive me for," and the sad smile that he gave her at this moment would stay with Alex for the rest of her life. But Alex didn't know that now. All she knew was that her father was leaving.

"But—"

"Go!" he said so urgently, that Alex found her feet obeying him when her heart wasn't in it. "Go!" and he said something to her in a language that she didn't understand.

"Bye," she muttered before turning around to go. The streets were now completely dark, lighted only by the street lamps. The moon wasn't up that night.

When she looked back, he was already gone.

The windows of her house shone with light when Alex reached it close enough to see it—a sure shine that her mother was indeed home. But the sight, instead of making her feel happy and warm, shook her in its eerie unfamiliarity. Again she wondered how it was that Altair Wymond knew of her mother's whereabouts or where she would be tonight with so much accuracy when even Alex didn't know when her mother would be back—because her mother herself didn't know until the last moment. Trust no one, he had said, but the words seemed to apply more to him than anyone else.

As soon as she approached the entryway, Sophia Wilson hurried out to the front porch.

"Alex!" she said. "Where have you been? It's already dark, and you weren't by the restaurant—" Wordlessly Alex hugged her tightly and buried her face in her mother's shoulder—she was too tall to snuggle into her mother ever again.

"Sorry, mom," she said quietly. "I was just taking a walk. I didn't know that you'd be back today."

"Well," her mother said, sounding slightly mollified but still upset. "It's dangerous to go walking in the dark."

"I know," Alex mumbled. Sophia Wilson regarded her daughter carefully.

"I suppose it's all right," she said. "Nothing happened. Let's go inside—I made dinner."

Alex realized that she actually hadn't eaten much at the pizzeria. "What are we having?" she asked.

"Mushroom ravioli and spinach salad," her mother said, leading her into the house. Alex remembered for the first time that evening that her mother was rather fond of spinach—and that she didn't know what Altair Wymond liked.

"Okay," she said quietly. She lingered at the doorstep and cast one last glance at the darkness.

"Alex?" her mother called from inside the house.

"I'm coming," she said, closing the door. "By the way, grandma wrote a letter."

Sophia Wilson was informed on what had happened that spring. "Oh?" she said simply, but Alex knew that it made her glad to hear about her parents, at least a little.

"Yeah," she said, nodding. "Apparently the country air suits both of them quite nicely. I wasn't sure what she was talking about with 'Riverdale,' but maybe you know. So grandfather's condition has been looking quite good, and grandma says that they think he'll be able to resume normal activities pretty soon…"