Pain was a constant companion.

Caedel couldn't remember much of a time when it hadn't lived comfortably within his skin, stinging and thrumming like a second heartbeat. His skin collected scars like a crow collected trinkets. Bite marks, scratch marks, burn marks, whip marks. He was a living display of cruelty.

But in that moment, Caedel didn't hurt.

His ears rang with the gunshot. He couldn't care less. His eyes were glued to the boy who'd fired it.

A pair of cherry wings spread wide, leathery and thin enough to let the glow of the light through. A thin frame that couldn't belong to anyone older than he was.

His savior.

The next second, the muzzle of the gun was trained on him.

The boy's face was pale and thin, all angles and planes. Freckles matted near the corners of his eyes and jaw. Hair the same shade as his wings fell over his brow and around his neck. Blood decorated his cheeks, as if making up for the lack of color. Reflective pink eyes stared out from that frightening yet arresting countenance.

Caedel wouldn't have minded if the boy had pulled the trigger. Would have thanked him, even, for the release. But those eyes flitted over him, absorbing the details. At once they were alive and dead--alert and aware and bright with it, but flat and emotionless. Yet even still, their pupils thinned with every scar they passed over.

"I was never here," the boy said. "Understand?"

Caedel nodded, a little jerk of the head, still a little afraid that if he blinked or looked away, all of this would disappear like a dream or an illusion.

"Good." The boy stuffed the gun in the back of his waistband, and a bit of life seemed to come back to him. Under his breath, he muttered, "At least it was someone worth killing this time."

His hand flashed out and something small and square smacked Caedel in the chest. "Take that," he said. "Go. . .find a group home or something. I dunno. Don't die, anyway."

Caedel looked at the thing he'd been tossed. It was a simple pleather wallet. Inside was a decent amount of money, a library card signed Alabaster K. Blacke, and a Polaroid of the boy--Alabaster?--and a blond-haired kid.

When he looked up, Alabaster had already climbed back onto the windowsill. Before Caedel could call out--thank him--he was gone.