The walk up the driveway felt longer than usual. The gravel crunched under Dejah's sneakers-cheap canvas shoes she had found in the garage months ago. The manor stood against the night sky, a monument to excess and bad taste.

She reached the massive double doors. She pushed. Locked.

She knocked. Silence.

She waited.

Finally, the side door-the service entrance-creaked open. Mr. Henderson, the butler, stepped out. He was a man who had perfected the art of looking down his nose, even though he was shorter than most of the guests.

"Miss Dejah," he said, clasping his hands behind his back. "Mrs. Kensington has given strict instructions. After 6:00 PM, you are to use the servants' entrance."

Dejah checked her watch. "It's 6:05."

"Rules are rules," Henderson said, a smug smile playing on his lips. "Just because you've been out gallivanting doesn't mean you've earned the front door privileges."

Dejah stepped toward him. Henderson didn't move. He expected her to beg. He expected the old Dejah.

She focused. She let the mask slip. She didn't touch him. She just projected.

It's called Sakki in the East-Killing Intent. It wasn't magic; it was a biological broadcast. She dilated her pupils, dropped her chin, and focused her gaze entirely on his carotid artery. She visualized the blade entering, the spray, the gurgle. The micro-movements of her facial muscles and the shift in her pheromones signaled 'predator'.

Henderson's smile faltered. His eyes widened. He took an involuntary step back. His hands started to shake. He couldn't explain it, but his lizard brain was screaming at him that he was standing in a cage with a tiger. The air around them seemed to drop ten degrees. He struggled to breathe.

Sweat broke out on his upper lip. "I..."

The front door clicked and swung open. Kathryn stood there, her face a mask of fury.

"Henderson! What is taking so long? Let the ungrateful girl in!"

Henderson practically collapsed with relief. He scrambled aside, bowing low. "Yes, Madam. Sorry, Madam."

Dejah walked past him. She didn't blink.

The foyer was blindingly bright. Crystal chandeliers dripped from the ceiling. Kathryn stood in the center, arms crossed.

"You have some nerve coming back here," she hissed. "Jenna is suffering because of you."

"I am not her organ farm," Dejah said quietly.

Kathryn gasped. "We fed you! We clothed you for fifteen years!"

"You fed me scraps and clothed me in hand-me-downs," Dejah corrected, looking around the opulent hall. "While you bought Jenna a Steinway."

Kathryn opened her mouth to scream, but stopped. She saw Dejah's eyes. The same coldness that had terrified Henderson made her pause. She felt it too-the shift in the power dynamic.

A maid came down the stairs, carrying a pile of Dejah's clothes-her few t-shirts and jeans.

"Since you want to act like a stranger," Kathryn said, regaining her composure, "you can sleep like one. The Sterling family is arriving tomorrow. Their patriarch needs the guest suite on the second floor. Your room."

"Where am I supposed to sleep?"

Kathryn pointed a manicured finger upward. "The attic. The storage room. It fits you better."

Dejah looked at the maid, then at the stairs leading up to the dusty, uninsulated attic. A slight smile touched her lips, invisible to them. The attic had the only skylight access to the roof. It was exactly what she needed.

"Fine," she said.

She didn't argue. She didn't cry. She took the clothes from the maid and walked past Kathryn.

The attic was perfect. It was isolated. It had a skylight that opened onto the roof. It was the perfect staging ground for a ghost.

Dejah was halfway up the stairs when the sound of a car engine roared outside. Not a normal car. The deep, throaty growl of the Bugatti.

Kathryn froze. "Who on earth..."

The front door, which Henderson hadn't fully latched in his panic, was pushed open.

Casimir Vanderbilt walked in.

He didn't ask for permission. He walked into the Kensington foyer like he owned the deed to the land. His presence sucked the air out of the room. He was wearing a dark trench coat that swirled around his ankles.

Kathryn turned, her face going through a rapid transformation from anger to shock to fawning delight.

"Mr. Vanderbilt?" she squeaked. "Oh my goodness. What a surprise! To what do we owe the honor?"

Casimir ignored her. His eyes scanned the room until they landed on Dejah, standing on the staircase with her bundle of clothes.

"I forgot to give my friend something," he said.

Kathryn blinked. "Friend? You mean... Dejah?"

Casimir walked past Kathryn as if she were a piece of furniture. He came to the bottom of the stairs. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, orange plastic bottle. It was a generic bottle of vitamins, probably something he had in his glove box for hangovers.

"Dr. Lowe said your blood sugar drops," Casimir said, his voice smooth, intimate. "You need these."

Dejah looked at the bottle. She knew it was a prop. She knew he was playing a game. But she played along.

"Thank you," she said, taking the bottle.

Casimir turned slowly to face Kathryn. The charm vanished. His face became a mask of aristocratic disdain.

"Mrs. Kensington," he said. "I couldn't help but overhear at the gate... something about a service entrance?"

Kathryn paled. "Oh, that... it's just a misunderstanding. House rules..."

"Rules?" Casimir raised an eyebrow. "You make a friend of the Vanderbilt family use the servants' door? Are you implying that my company is... unclean?"

"No! No, never!" Kathryn looked like she might faint. "It was Henderson! He's confused!"

Casimir looked at Henderson, who was cowering by the door. "I don't like his face," Casimir said simply. "I'd hate to see it again if I come to visit Dejah."

Henderson dropped to his knees. "Please, sir!"

Casimir turned back to Dejah. He winked. A quick, almost imperceptible gesture. "Call me if the accommodations aren't to your liking, Dejah."

"I will," she said.

He turned and walked out, leaving a wake of terrified silence behind him.

Kathryn stared at Dejah. Her eyes were wide, calculating. She was doing the math. The spare part had suddenly acquired a very powerful shield.

"Go to your room," she whispered, her voice trembling.

Dejah continued up the stairs.

Inside the attic, she tossed the vitamins on a dusty table. She locked the door. She went to the window and watched the red tail lights of the Bugatti fade into the night.

"Useful," she muttered.

She went to the corner of the room where she had stashed her emergency kit years ago-a loose floorboard under an old rug. She pulled out a black tactical bodysuit and a backpack.

She sat in front of a broken mirror. She needed to disappear. She pulled out a small tub of theatrical silicone paste. She applied it to the bridge of her nose and her cheekbones, altering the way the light hit her face. In the dim lighting of the underground, shadows were more important than reality. She bound her chest tight with bandages, flattening her silhouette. She pulled on a short, choppy black wig and darkened her eyebrows.

She practiced her posture. She rolled her shoulders forward, adopted a slight slouch, and changed her center of gravity.

In ten minutes, Dejah was gone. In the mirror stood a sickly, street-smart boy.

She opened the skylight. The cold air rushed in.

She climbed out onto the roof. It was time to go to market.

Before she left, Dejah paused. The attic was cluttered with the debris of the Kensington family's past. Old chairs, broken lamps. In the corner, sticking out of a box of moth-eaten coats, was a teddy bear.

It was missing an eye. The stuffing was coming out of its stomach.

It was hers. Or it had been, when she was five. Jenna had taken it one day, demanding it because she was "sad." Dejah found it a week later in the trash, cut to pieces with scissors.

She picked it up. She didn't feel sadness. She felt a cold, hard resolve. She put the bear back.

Voices drifted up through the floorboards. The insulation in the attic was non-existent, turning the floor into a diaphragm that amplified the sounds from the master bedroom below.

Dejah lay on the floor, pressing her ear to the wood. Her hearing focused, filtering out the hum of the pipes.

"...can't touch her now," Kathryn was saying, her voice shrill. "Not with Vanderbilt sniffing around. If she disappears into surgery and something goes wrong, he'll ask questions."

"We need the money, Kathryn!" That was Dejah's father-her adoptive father-Robert. "The stocks are tanking. If we don't get the Sterling investment, we lose the house."

"I know!" Kathryn snapped. "That's why tomorrow is crucial. Elder Sterling is coming. He's obsessed with health. We show him a happy, healthy family. We charm him. Once the check clears, we deal with Dejah. Vanderbilt will get bored eventually. Men like him always do."

Sterling.

Dejah's mind accessed the database. Elder Sterling. Net worth: 4 billion. Collector of antiquities. Medical history: Chronic heart condition, multiple bypasses.

A plan formed. It was elegant. It was dangerous.

She stood up. She checked her pockets. She had the wooden carving from Casimir (for radiation stability) and a small tin case. Inside the case were six special alloy needles. She had stolen them from a medical supply shipment years ago. They weren't silver, but a high-tensile titanium blend, perfect for deep tissue penetration.

She climbed out the skylight. The roof tiles were slippery with frost. She moved like a shadow, distributing her weight on the balls of her feet to avoid creaking. She reached the drainage pipe and slid down, wrapping her legs around the metal.

She landed in the flowerbed, avoiding the motion sensors she had mapped out years ago. She didn't vault the wall-her knees wouldn't take the impact. Instead, she used a stack of old pallets to climb over, moving methodically.

She walked for two miles to the subway station. She pulled a stash of cash-fifty dollars in small bills-from the lining of her shoe. It was her emergency fund, saved penny by penny over a decade.

The train to Queens was empty except for a few drunks. One of them, a man with a scarred face, leered at her. She stared back, her face hidden in the shadow of a baseball cap. She let a little bit of the "Killing Intent" leak out. He looked away, muttering.

She got off at a stop near an industrial park. She walked to a laundromat that had a "Closed" sign permanently taped to the window.

She walked to the back, to a large commercial dryer that was out of order. She tapped a rhythm on the metal side: tap-tap-pause-tap-tap-tap.

The dryer swung open. It was a door.

She ducked through.

Stairs led down into the earth. The air grew hot and thick. The sound of heavy bass thumped in her chest.

The Bazaar.

It was a cavernous underground space, an old prohibition-era smuggling tunnel turned into a black market. Stalls lined the walls, selling everything from illegal firearms to endangered species.

She pulled her cap lower. She needed money. Fast.

She walked toward the "Junk" sector.

Up on a metal catwalk overlooking the market, a man in a tailored suit swirled a glass of whiskey. Casimir Vanderbilt looked down at the chaos below.

"You're obsessed," Nate said, nursing his swollen nose.

"I'm curious," Casimir corrected. He pointed down. "Look. That kid. The way he walks."