With her mother to be gone all night, Solene figured the best thing to do was bake. It was better than worrying about why the Covenant had called her mother and Horus to a meeting that would go all night and why it had been called so suddenly. It was better than worrying about the Astarte or Dorian—especially when the latter had gone radiosilent since what had happened on the beach.

She grabbed the cookbooks from the bookshelf just outside the kitchen and flipped through the well-worn pages. The most stained and ragged of the recipes, raspberry tarts, greeted her like an old friend.

Well, that was a good place to start.

Solene tied her hair back and went about gathering out the ingredients not just for the raspberry tarts, but all her old favorites. With the television on and re-running older movies, she could spend as much time baking as she wanted, and just forget about everything.

It all came back to her, the most primeval sort of alchemy that she had learned from her Great-Aunt Helena. She measured out the dry ingredients, started adding the wet, all with the intuition that she'd refined under the instruction of Professor Ashling.

Just as she was about to start cracking the eggs open, however, she heard a knock at the door. Not the front one—the back one, by the kitchen. The one that was behind the fence. She frowned and set the eggs back in their carton. She grabbed one of the kitchen knives—just in case—and crept to the door.

The knocking grew louder, more frantic.

She approached the door and peeked through the lush violet curtain covering the window.

Standing outside in the growing twilight was none other than Dorian, eyes wide, splattered with blood, and physically shaking.

Immediately she threw open the door. "Get inside, quick."

He obliged, his blue-and-brown eyes blank. She slammed the door behind them and locked it. It was likely that no one saw him—or if they did, that they'd turn a blind eye to it, given the lilacs in the backyard. But she couldn't take any chances.

"What happened?" She asked.

He looked down at his hands, covered in blood. Then up at her. For the moment their eyes met, they gleamed one color—scarlet. Then just as quickly, he looked away. "I don't know."

Solene frowned. "How do you not know?"

"I—" he shuddered more violently. "I was just going to the convenience store, since Dad's away at the Covenant meeting and the other wolves came out of nowhere and attacked. I shifted—and then it all went black."

Awfully convenient, a part of her couldn't help but snark. But she silenced that part of her as quickly as it had arisen. This wouldn't help anyone. She wasn't sure she believed him, that he didn't remember—but she could put the pieces together. Guilt tugged at her stomach.

It was her fault that the world now knew that Dorian Beltane was Fenrir. Because he'd wanted to save her from Valo Durendal and the Astarte Coven. He'd tried to rescue the school for her sake.

And where had it gotten them?

It was self-defense, clearly—but would the Covenant even listen to that? Or would they take this as their first excuse to tie up the loose end of the prophecy?

Her chest tightened at the thought of him being taken away, of him standing trial before the Covenant.

There wasn't a choice, not really. She had to help him.

"You can stay here tonight, you were baking with me the whole time, you understand?" She set the knife down on one of the side tables Luna kept about and placed her hands on his shoulders. "You can get cleaned up in the bathroom upstairs, we have some of my father's old clothes you can borrow."

He nodded, eyes still blank. He opened his mouth to speak, only to frown and close it.

"I'll go get them for you, and you can leave those outside the bathroom and I'll get them washed." She started for the stairs, only to stop when she heard him call her name.

"Solene?"

"Yes?" She turned around.

"Thank you." His voice was so small, like a bird with a broken wing. "You don't have to do this, you know. I just. . . I couldn't think of anyone else to turn to."

Solene could feel her own heart cracking and melting like a popsicle that had fallen onto the boardwalk in the warmer months. "Of course I do."

With that, she continued up the steps, and an idle part of her wondered if this was what Horus had felt for her mother. If that was the case—then maybe she was beginning to understand why he did what he did after all. Which was terrifying, in that it meant she was all the closer to understanding why her mother murdered her father.

She'd taken some of her father's old clothes from the back of her mother's bedroom. In all of the years that had passed since his murder, it seemed that her mother had hardly gotten rid of any of them. It was just more of the usual confusion, the burning question of why her mother had murdered a man she clearly loved deeply still.

But she was grateful just to have this now.

She left the clothes folded neatly by the bathroom door, and took the bloodstained ones into the laundry unit with a heap of towels for good measure. Those would be done by the next morning, and with it another piece of evidence would wash away.

Which left her to return to her pastry-making with a new fervor.

Because the raspberry tarts and the rest were now an alibi.

Her mind was whirring at full speed as she mixed, considering all of the variables to come their way. What would she tell her mother? Would she understand— or would she turn Dorian in because of what he was?

Luna probably wouldn't come home until sometime the next day. The Covenant often provided accommodations when their meetings—especially their emergency sessions—went late into the night like this. But it also wasn't an impossibility, as Luna preferred the house on Solana Boulevard to all other places in the world, including even her childhood home in Three Ships Point.

Of course, Solene suspected that Horus preferred the house on Solana Boulevard to all other places including the Beltane Mansion as well. But that was beside the point, she reminded herself.

She'd put the tarts in the oven and was starting a batch of the classic, the chocolate chip cookies, when she heard the light padding of footsteps.

"Dorian, just in time." She turned around and smiled. "Help me bake?" "Sure." There was still a distance in his eyes. But he joined her all the same.

She turned the little TV on the kitchen counter on to the reruns of old movies, and they began their baking alibi extravaganza.

Dorian stared at the line of cookie jars and Tupperware with the products of their labor, hands planted on his hips. "What do we do now?"

Solene bit her lip. It had long gotten dark out. "I guess we should try to get some sleep. We can set up the guest room for you—it should work, even if Mom returns from the Covenant meeting early, she shouldn't know that you're here."

"I don't want to be alone," he said in a small voice. "Could I. . . could I sleep with you?"

He stopped. His face turned red and he looked away. "I meant on the floor of your room or in your room with you—but it's alright, we don't have to—"

"Come on, you're not sleeping on the floor." She took his hand. "I don't want to be alone tonight either."

She returned to her room after she'd changed into a nightgown. Dorian sat in the middle of her bed, marveling around at the posters on the wall, her bookshelf and frilly teddy bear collection, all the little trinkets and soft touches about. The moonlight filtered in through the lace curtains and the open window, mixing with the soft yellow light of the lamp on the nightstand with the hearts on the shade.

Solene made sure to lock her bedroom door behind her, and cast a charm to ensure its security. She turned off the lights and closed the window. Then she joined Dorian in the canopy bed. 

There was something she liked about the warmth of lying beside him, in holding him in comfort of the plush blankets and soft sheets. He buried his head in the crook of her neck.

It was in that hazy twilight before sleep that she heard him speak finally.

"I love you."

Before she could reply, that was when sleep claimed her.