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I snort, backing up to lean against the wall as Remy hits the dead body again. For someone who wanted it to be over with, he doesn’t seem ready to stop. A sound tears up his throat as he hits the demon again, and I decide to give him some privacy. Normally, I’d be fearful of leaving him alone in a state of sorrow, but I suspect this might be cathartic.

I stay close, shutting the door behind me and leaning against it. Eventually, the thud of metal against flesh slows, and I feel pressure on the door as Remy leans against it. Slowly, he slides down it, and instinct tells me to do the same.

“She fucking loved Arnold Schwarzeneggar. Me and Rose were feeling nostalgic one night and watched it, and Kayla lost her mind over it. Hearing a little kid repeat ‘I’ll be back,’ a thousand times in that accent is…well at the time, it’s annoying as fuck, but now?” He gives a soft laugh, and I wish there was something I could do to fix it. “Thanks, Ro. I’m surprised it felt as good as it did.”

“Yeah,” I say, and we sit like that in silence for a few minutes. I don’t want to push. He needs time, and I’m more than happy to give it to him. Eventually though, my phone rings, bringing me nothing but more bullshit.

“Hello?” I answer, wondering why the fuck the parking garage attendant from the compound is calling me.

“Hey, uh, Mr. Sauveterre, I’m really sorry to?—”

“Out with it,” I demand of the fledgling vampire.

“There’s a crowd of humans out here in the alley. I keep compelling them to make them leave, but they just keep coming. They keep seeing her and stopping, and I don’t know what todo,” he rattles out, sounding panicked. I hear a few voices yelling in the background, and someone says something about calling the police.

“Wait, wait, what do you mean? Seeing who?”

Remy opens the door behind me, gently so I don’t fall, and I stand up while the vampire on the phone stammers.

“Uh, Miss Parsons, um, she’s outside. At first I couldn’t see her, but then she walked in front of one of the lights, and well, she’s freaking people out, and?—”

“Is she covered in blood or something? How is she ‘freaking people out’ just by being outside?” I ask, growing annoyed. Fuck Gwyn and fuck her for interrupting my time with my brother.

“No, sir, I’m sorry. I-I wasn’t clear enough. She’s on the roof,” he says. “She’s walking on the edge, and people think she’s going to jump.”

Remy’s brows raise, and I swallow. She won’t die, falling from that height, but it’ll certainly fucking hurt. She has a gun, and she could just kill herself that way if she really wanted to. I don’t know what the fuck her goal is.

But my stomach plummets all the same, and I hate myself for it.

“You should go,” Remy says, and dread settles deep within me.

“Keep compelling them,” I order. “I’ll be there soon.”

25

GWYN

My vision is tooblurry to see the search engine results on my phone. I’ve nearly lost my balance already, but I keep walking as I scroll.

Because I have to figure out what that fucking dream meant.

I put one foot in front of the other. Right heel against the tip of my left toe. Swing my foot ahead. Left heel to right toe. Again, and again, I repeat, walking a perfectly straight line.

I take another swig of vodka, wishing it was the kind at Sanguivita with silver shards in it, because I’ve nearly finished the entire bottle and it hasn’t done shit. The nightmare feels just as realistic as it did two hours ago when I woke up from a dead sleep. The wind slams against me, and I drop the handle of liquor onto the balcony below. It shatters, and I’m glad it landed there instead of on an innocent passerby.

I’ve done enough to harm other people by mistake.

I use the back of my hand to swipe away tears that won’t stop. I hate feeling like this, and I just want it all to fucking stop.

Findingbody nightmaregives me an answer I don’t find useful.

Icelandic wilderness dreamcomes up with nothing.

Buried ashnightmareoffers even less.

Though I’ve never been there, and it wasn’t stated implicitly in my dream, I know I’d been in Iceland. I could feel it. My ancestral home had called to me, and I’d known exactly where I was. Between craggy mountains, I’d been abandoned amongst volcanic ash. Tiny flowers had bloomed through the sulfurous soil, stretching all the way to the mountains, and I was all alone.

The despair had been insurmountable, and when I woke, it had already settled deep in my chest. Encroaching vines of melancholy so intense I could taste it had wrapped around my heart and squeezed. The dread and anguish and hopelessness I’ve felt since my parents died—since before that even—seems amplified now.