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Theo shifts closer to her.

I lift my camera.

Through the lens, the spring looks wrong. Pale vertical lines stand near the far bank where there should only be water and roots. A post, maybe. A rail. A blurred form like part of a gazebo caught in bad light.

I lower the camera. Nothing is there.

I lift it again. The post returns.

"Either my camera is malfunctioning," I say, "or I'm seeing things."

Pepper turns toward me. "What do you see?"

I show her the screen.

Her face stills. Theo looks over her shoulder, his bourbon-leather scent sharpening until the back of my throat tightens.

"That post isn't there," he says.

"No," I agree.

Pepper reaches for her notebook, then stops herself and takes a breath. "Photo first. Notes second. Panic later."

"Solid order of operations."

She gives me a small smile, but her hand trembles when she puts on gloves.

I take three more pictures. In the first, the spring is empty except for water and roots. In the second, the pale post appears again. In the third, Pepper is in the frame. Except she isn’t where she stands. On the screen, she is several feet closer to the spring, at the open edge of the root ring, one hand lifted as if calling to someone.

I look up. Pepper is beside Theo, both hands visible, nowhere near the edge.

Cold runs through me.

"Ezra?" Theo asks.

I turn the camera so they can see.

Pepper's breath catches. "I didn't stand there."

"No."

Theo's hand closes around her waist. Too fast, too tight. He releases by inches, but his face has gone pale beneath his tan.

Pepper touches his wrist. "I'm here."

The route stone glows inside her bag, light pulsing through the canvas. The spring answers with a ripple that spreads against the current.

The sound of water grows louder. It fills my ears, my mouth, the spaces behind my eyes. Theo says my name, but his voice lands far away, muffled under glass. Pepper's scent thins into one bright thread, rosemary and vanilla wrapped around omega fear.

My hand goes transparent around the camera. "Oh," I say.

The ground tilts. For one breath, I’m heavier than I have been in a long time. Every inch of me arrives at once—skin, bone, pulse, and hunger. Then the weight drops through me, and the spring changes around me.

The half ring of roots becomes a circle of cypress posts. Loose white cloth moves in wind that does not reach my face. Chalk opens toward water, and ash darkens wet sand. Voices move through the clearing, layered until language turns to current.

An omega stands at the edge of the cypress circle. Her face will not settle. Red hair, maybe. Brown. Dark. Pale. Every time I try to focus, she changes. Her hand is lifted, palm out.

Behind her, an alpha shakes with the effort not to move. Next to him, a beta has both hands pressed to his own mouth, holding back a sound I can feel in my throat.