It wavers, light on water, coming in and out of focus while the bell rolls in my hand. The metal, so cold now, gnaws at the top layer of my skin. I cry out, teeth sinking into the soft flesh of my cheek, drawing more blood.
The monster begins to solidify. Colors warping from white to gray and from gray to black. My stomach swims, nothing left inside but my ownsour bile. I clench my fists and scramble back, away from the monster, my breath leaving me in short, hollow puffs.
But it isn’t a monster anymore.
A scream sharpens in my throat when it materializes a face, dark hair spooling over the cut jaw, amber eyes. I peel back my lips. The only sound filling the room is the spit of dying fire in the hearth. I push back toward the bed, away, away, away, but the monster—no, theface—turns to me, and I see it for what it is.
It’s not a monster at all, not anymore.
It’s a ghost.
six
I am damned.
That is the only explanation for the thing now standing in front of me. A monster of shadow and smoke, boasting a face. But not justanyface. One I know.
My knees give out, betraying me. I crash against the bedpost, fingers scraping the wood for any sense of support.
“You.” The word is stupid on my tongue. “How is ityou?”
Silence.
It crashes in my ears like ocean waves, and I heave against the bed, my palm shaking on the cotton check of my quilt, smearing blood against the fabric. I stare at the ghost—the man—and my jaw locks, words crumbling to ash.
Father used to say ghosts were demons masquerading as flesh to drag us off to the shadow of Hell with them. To steal us away from Ithrandril. That in the Rending, Erybrus took his souls and Ithrandril ascended, allowed his brother to abduct who he wished. But this is no stranger, not a thing with horns and claws.
The figure steps closer, the mist around him undulating. I shake my head and press a finger to my throat. My heart beats a quickening step, my breath short and raspy. The room shrinks, and the man steps forward, fear dancing in his eyes like winking stars.
“You’re Bram Avery.” I wait for a reply, but none comes. Acting on instinct alone, I open my mouth and say the first thing that comes to mind. “You’re supposed to be dead.”
“How very astute.” His nose flares in annoyance. Beneath a strong brow, his eyes are embedded with hints of something like grief and longing. His lips turn down at the corners, as though he is waiting for the whole world to come crashing around him.
For a moment, silence lays roots in my mouth, my throat, rolling down to tighten my lungs. This should not be real. And yet, Bram Avery—a man who should be dead, whose grave I knelt against only days ago—is standing in my bedroom. He winces and falls to his knees, as if kicked. Locks of hickory hair swirl around his head, like weeds caught in water.
This is no monster. Iknowhim. Watched him walk with his little sisters to church, followed his coattails when he got lost in the orchards behind Avery Manor. I always thought him handsome, even as a child, but here he is, something else altogether.
When I drop in front of him, I reach out a shaking hand. My fingers pass through the lines of his body. I hiss and pull away from the cold.
“I don’t understand how you’re here,” I say breathlessly.
His expression softens. He drops back against the wall, one leg outstretched, boot caked in reddish mud.
“If I knew, I would explain it. But all I know is that”—he points to the bell still in my hand—“finally let you see me.”
Sweat breaks out along my forehead while his words settle around me. I slump to the floor, head against the side of my bed frame, skirt tucked around my knees.
“Have you been…in here?” I swallow, throat sharp.
“Don’t worry. I’ve always been decent.” He cracks a satisfied smile and drops his head back to the wall. “And no. It may come as a surprise, but even as a living man, I would rather be out amidst the trees than caught in the bedchamber of a woman I barely know.” His eyes find me again, glinting like polished copper. “I’ve been trying to speak with you for years, though.”
His confession twists my stomach. Bram Avery is my monster.
I release a breath. “What I need to know is why Bram Avery, whodied ten years ago, is sitting in my bedroom after I rang”—I hold up the bell—“whatever the hell this is.”
He shrugs, gaze licking the curve of brass in my hand. His own breath comes short and fast, as though he has been running for a very long time and has only now found rest.
“Where exactly are you?” I ask. “If you’re dead?”
