Ryan breathed slowly, trying to adjust to the shock of such an abrupt transition. Slowly he came to feel a semblance of normalcy. He sat in the ritual circle in Harlequin’s chamber, and as he took breath in and released it, he no longer choked on the sweet fragrance of candles. He relished them; they washed away the metallic odor of blood and the stench of gutted corpses that drifted in his memory.