Sink, my slaughtered heart.
Then the world fell around me.
Chatter fought with music, and it all twisted in the air into sickening beats that made my stomach coil. Many faces passed me, most of which I’d seen my entire life, but as I walked through the hall and into the ballroom, I was not the same. Stone had changed me.
When I entered the ballroom, three vaulted stained-glass windows, each in the shape of an arch that came to a point at the top, lined the wall to my left. Cyrus’s chiseled statues stood in the spaces between them. But it was the enormous chandelier hanging from a domed ceiling that summoned the eyes of every newcomer who stepped into this room. Inside the dome was gold leaf detailing and an oil-painted landscape, telling a sad tale.Feel me, this painting screamed.Feel my pain.
And at the other end of the rich hardwood floors, my soon-to-be family awaited.
I walked toward them, seeing most of Weeping Hollow in this room.
Two Heathens, Julian and Beck, were posted near the windows, where the westside congregated. They wore matching black suits, crisp white shirts, and cufflinks adorning their wrists. Meanwhile, the right side of the room tossed their scornful gazes.
Fallon looked beautiful in a forest green dress that complimented Julian’s tie. Even though she faced away from him in, what looked to be, a pleasant conversation with Monday, I couldn’t ignore the way Julian’s hand still stroked her spine as he slid a watchful gaze around the room. This subtle touch threatened my heart. I once had that, I thought.
The Heathens would now seem like ordinary people to any stranger who happened upon this town. But to the town, we could not forget the grief they’d put us through and the lives their curse had taken.
Fallon looked at me and flashed me a small smile.
I smiled back, but I hadn’t come to celebrate with friends or dance the night away. The man I wore this dress for was waiting for me at the other end of the room.
I approached with vengeance coiling my soul.
It was all I had left.
The man in the wheelchair beside Viola was nothing more than a skeleton. And when Darnell Cantini lifted his gaze to the girl standing before him in the red dress, his eyes took on an ominous shape.
He recognized it. He knew.
I leaned over him to whisper in his ear. “I know what you’re thinking. But no, Darnell, it’s not déjà vu.” My voice scattered, and I paused to collect it. “It’s no secret you’re dying, but there are far worse things than dying.” Darnell groaned and tried to reach for Viola, but I gripped his hand and pinned it to the arm of his wheelchair. “Each day I’m here, you will spend the remainder of yours trapped underwater to this anchor you call a wheelchair, looking over your shoulder and begging for the Shadows to take you. Because it’s not them you should fear. It is me.” I squeezed his hand, feeling the bones in his fingers crush. “We will have so much fun together, you and I.”
I felt a hand on my shoulder, so I let him go and pulled back with a crafty smile. “Viola, everything looks beautiful,” I said as she took me in. “You did amazing.”
“I’ve seen this dress before,” she insisted as Camora approached.
Camora grabbed the handles of Darnell’s wheelchair and guided him to the dance floor. She smiled as she slowly spun the wheelchair in a full circle, dancing with him.
Although I didn’t realize how close the two were, I set it aside and returned my attention to Viola. “It was my mom’s. I thought, what better occasion to wear this dress than a Founder’s Day Ball at the Cantini house to announce my engagement? The last time this dress floated down these halls was—”
“1994,” she said with displeasure.
I smiled, pleased. “Oh, you remember.”
She smiled, aware. “How could I forget?”
Cyrus approached to take my hand.
“You’re beautiful,” he said, eyes sweeping down my body. “Are you ready?”
Stone
Darkness stretchedabove the empty town.
The full Cold Moon was only a night away.
In town, where it seemed only spirits remained, I was greeted by gas-flamed streetlamps forging weary halos along cobblestone paths. I walked with my hands shoved into my pockets, ice crunching beneath my boots, teeth chattering, and white clouds breaking apart in front of me with every shivering breath. Snow flurries twirled and leapt like drunken flakes, and I kept my head down to block cold, biting winds from freezing layers off my face.
Each time a chilling breeze swept through buildings it stirred piles of broken signs that had littered the icy grounds. Words such asHeathens,Shadows, andDeathswirled around at my feet and clung to the sides of abandoned storefronts. My gaze sailed about, taking it all in.
