Chapter 25: The Body Unhidden

Su's finger lengthened against Evan's wrist. The joint slid past its human limit. Gray ran under the nail, and pearl scales closed over the back of her hand like frost across glass. Evan caught her forearm in both hands. "Tell me what to do." The realgar had burned through the heat she kept in muscle and bone. Bitter mineral coated her tongue. Overhead the canopy sagged away from her altered shoulder. "Run," she said. "No." His voice held. His pulse did not. It struck against her scaled fingertips, each beat harder than the last, and she knew every ordinary variation of that pulse. She had counted it in sleep. She had counted it on cautious mornings when he still asked before he touched her. This was not that pulse. "Beyond the museum," she said. "Go." "Okay. Okay. People north, water behind us, you." His thumb searched her wrist for something…