The book fell naturally to a dog-eared page: David with the Head of Goliath . She’d seen the painting a hundred times in slideshows. But here, on this page, the colors were impossibly deep. Caravaggio’s own severed head, held by the young David, seemed to stare directly up at her. She felt a chill.

Elara looked up. The student was gone.

And Elara, clutching a library card she knew she’d never have to renew, stepped into the dark.