Just as I’m about to step into it, I glance over my shoulder in time to see the corpse behind me twitch, and the Harpy lurches upright, black blood pouring from her throat. One wing hangsuseless, but her remaining eye burns with murderous fury as she staggers toward me, talons scraping bone like a zombie on a mission.
“Oh, comeon!”I shout. “I already killed you! Stay dead!”
Then, another voice floods through my mind. Logan’s, urgent and commanding.
Run to the garden. The path has three turns. Take the first two and skip the third.
Happy to get as far away from the zombie-Harpy as possible, I sprint into the garden, my legs pumping so hard they burn. Behind me, the Harpy shrieks, the sound wet and horrible through her ruined throat.
First turn—I take it so sharp I nearly slam into the hedge wall. Second turn—my lungs burn.
How is she still moving? How is she still?—
A talon swipes inches from my back. I feel the wind from it, smell the rot and blood on her claws.
When you reach the center, the rose is under the biggest bone pile.Logan’s voice again.Don’t hesitate, or you’re dead.
The garden center opens before me, a clearing with several mounds of bones scattered like grotesque monuments.
Which is the biggest? That one? No, the one to the right?—
The Harpy crashes into me from behind.
We go down hard, rolling across sharp bones that dig into every soft part of my body. Her remaining talon rakes down my arm, and I scream. Hot blood—mine this time—soaks through my sleeve.
“Get off!” I kick out desperately, catching the creature in her wounded throat.
She reels back with a gurgling screech, just enough for me to scramble toward the largest pile on my hands and knees.
My left hand reaches out instinctively, but then Logan’s voice blasts through my mind.
Right hand. Sigil hand.
I thrust my right hand into the bones, scattering them with frantic sweeps. Where is it? Where?—
My fingers close around something soft. Something that doesn’t belong in this place of death and sharp edges.
Petals.
The Harpy’s talon wraps around my ankle, and she starts yanking me backward. But I’ve got it—the rose, exactly as described. Three blooms on one stem: white, red, black.
I grip the red bloom with my sigil hand.
The world explodes into light.
One moment I’m being dragged across bones by a zombie Harpy. The next, I’m gasping on solid stone, the altar room’s torches blazing around me. The transition is so jarring I almost throw up, my body convinced it should still be fighting for its life.
Logan’s hands are on my shoulders, his gray eyes wild with panic. Real, genuine panic. From the always-controlled Logan Ashford. His hands are running over my arms, checking for injuries that aren’t there, and it would be sweet if he didn’t look absolutely wrecked.
“I’m okay,” I manage, and even though my injuries from the Underworld don’t transfer to my actual body, my arm throbs with phantom pain where the Harpy clawed me. “I got it.”
To prove it—both to myself and to him—I open my right palm. The red rose sits there for a heartbeat, impossibly vibrant against my skin. Then it begins to dissolve, petals becoming liquid light that seeps into my sigil.
“You did it.” Logan’s hands move to cup my face, thumbs tracing my cheekbones like he’s making sure I’m real. “You actually did it.”
“Did you doubt me?” I try for levity, but now that the adrenaline’s fading, I can’t stop shaking. Not from fear or pain,but from cold. Bone-crushing, soul-deep cold that makes it feel like I’ll never be warm again.
“Never.” He shrugs off his jacket and wraps it around me, pulling me against his chest. Cedar and smoke envelop me, along with blessed warmth. His arms hold me like I might disappear if he lets go, and honestly, I’m not entirely sure I won’t.
