"What—?"
The elder appeared alone in the lantern's beam, completely exposed, a blank space punched through the dense formation above her, as conspicuous as a void in a field of stars.
Her expression said she had not accounted for this possibility. Raphael noted it without surprise.
As expected.
Both were the Jester's constructions, different in precision but identical in fundamental nature, devices that emitted the same class of energy.
When the two beams met, they cancelled each other out.
The lantern could only reveal the castle's own illusions. The elder's flock was a different working entirely.
But the two energies opposing each other had erased her cover wholesale.
With the concealment gone, Raphael's gun was already trained on her.
"Damn you—!"
She tried to flee. But what moved faster than a bullet?
