“Oh no, he’s not dead.” Nils lets out a sharp laugh. “Uncle Trygve needs a new vessel. Seers make the best hosts, since we’re already more susceptible to spirits. My dad was the perfect choice. Trygve will takehis body, and I’ll get the dad I always wanted. One who actuallywantsme to be his son.”
Nils steps aside, revealing a view of what he’s been working on: two large triangles fashioned from something dark and slippery with blood—
Intestines.Those are intestines.
I start to retch at the sight, even worse than I imagined.
The remnants of the ritual I discovered in the seer school. The chalky powder that formed three interlocking triangles. They must have been the entrails of three people, desiccated after lying there for thirty years. Sour bile burns my throat.
But there have been only two killings so far. Two triangles.
My stomach sinks with realization.
“The ritual requires the entrails of a witch, a hunter, and a berserkr,” Nils continues. “Originally, I planned to use one of the wild berserkir.” He waves a hand to a glass jar sitting on the desk, full of twisted intestines floating in green liquid. “But you justhadto choose my brother instead of me, didn’t you?”
His eyes flash in the darkness. Looking at Nils now, with his disheveled hair and wild expression, I don’t recognize him. This isn’t the awkward, sweet boy who showed me around Skallagrim, who became my first real friend here. I no longer know who Nils is or why I didn’t see this side of him sooner.
“But I didn’t! I told Amund the same thing I told you: I don’t do dating.”
Nils sneers, exposing too-sharp canines. “Liar.”
Screaming, I struggle with my chains.
I feel sohelpless. All my life, I’ve been afraid of repeating Mom’s mistakes and ending up like her. I swore I’d be different. I’ve been so careful to avoid romantic relationships, to not let myself love anyone like she loved my dad, so I couldn’t be trapped too.
But maybe that isn’t enough.
Maybe just being a girl in this world makes me a target.
No matter how careful I am, no matter how I look or dress, no matter how many precautions I take… no matter what I do, I’ll never besafe. Not really.
It was never about what I did or didn’t do.
Part of me always blamed my mom. How could she ever fall in love with someone who hurt her? But it isn’t as simple as that. Maybe Amund was right. Maybe abusive relationshipsarelike snap traps. Anyone can accidentally step on one, at any time, no matter how careful they are. By the time you realize what you’ve walked into, or how bad it actually is, it’s already too late. Sometimes leaving isn’t just difficult; it’sdangerous.
What happened to my mom wasn’t sudden, though.
It was gradual.
More like running downhill.
I do it all the time for cross-country. At first it feels easy. By the time you realize how steep the decline is, you’re more than halfway down. You’re out of breath, your muscles are screaming, and you no longer know if you can make it. Do you turn around and try to climb back to the top? Or do you take the easier option: let momentum carry you down?
After all, you’ve already comethisfar.
Running up that hill would take so much energy, more energy than you have to give. If you turn around now, what was the point? So you keep going down, down, down. Until one day you’ve reached the bottom. There’s nowhere left to go.
When you finally look up, you realize it was never a hill at all. It was a mountain. Where you started seems so impossibly far away, you can’t imagine ever reaching it again. Finally,finally, I feel like I understand Mom a little bit.
And my heart breaks for her.
But now I’ll claw my way up the whole fucking mountain if I have to.
I’ll do whatever it takes to get out of here before I become someone’s victim.
Just keep him talking, I remind myself. Already, my senses are slowly starting to sharpen. The lupine is wearing off. He must have underestimated how much to use. Probably since I’ve never actually gone berserk. I just need enough strength to break free.
“So you were the one who followed me through the school, weren’t you?” I ask, trying to stall him.
