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The ground trembles beneath my feet as people are running in every direction. Masked men shove women aside, Lords crawl through mud. Ladies in jewels scream with their skirts clutched in both fists and a magistrate trips over a fallen servant and keeps crawling. Someone’s peacock mask lies cracked in the grass, its painted beak split clean down the middle.

Good.

Let them crawl. Let them scream. Let them taste, for one single breath, what helplessness feels like. But the children— My chest breaks around the thought. The children.

Smoke burns my throat, the air is thick with ash, fog, and the sour stench of fear. I stumble forward through the stampede, one hand reaching for my cane that is no longer there. Lost somewhere inside that burning house, my cane, my pistol and most of all my certainty.

A man collides with my shoulder and nearly sends me to the ground. I catch myself against a stone fountain slick with soot and rainwater, then shove onward.

“Edward!” I try to shout.

The sound tears from me, but the chaos swallows it. Another blast detonates behind the west wing and the force throws several people forward. I duck as glass rains across the lawn, glittering like cruel little stars. Heat licks the side of my face. Someone screams for a carriage, another screams for God, but God has not attended this party. If He had, He would have burned it sooner. I turn in the fog, searching, through black trees, bright orange fire, running bodies. Several masks lay on the ground. Blood scattered everywhere. Then I see him. Lazarus.

At the far edge of the lawn, sickle in hand, coat torn and hair wild around his face. He is shouting something I cannot hear over the roar of the burning manor. Beside him, half-obscured by smoke, is Edward. My heart seizes so violently I nearly sob. He is turning in frantic circles, searching the crowd, searching for me.

I lift my hand. “Ed—”

A hand clamps over my mouth, reeking faintly of tobacco, metal, and expensive cologne. My body goes cold before my mind understands why, as a hard chest presses against my back. An arm locks around my waist, pinning both of my arms tight against my sides, then a voice slips against my ear.

Slimy, a soft Austrian accent. Eerily calm.

“If you utter one vowel,” the man whispers with delight, “I’ll murder them.”

My eyes widen. Across the lawn, Edward turns, for one moment, I think he sees me. I try to move, but my assailant’s grip tightens, enough to remind me that it could harm me.

“Ah, ah,” the voice murmurs. “Careful, little Widow. You are clever enough to understand velocity, yes? A pistol fires faster than a lover runs.”

My blood turns to ice. Edward’s hand goes to the knife at his belt as he scans the fog. Lazarus steps closer to him, still looking toward the burning house. Neither sees. Neither knows. I am right here. I am right here. My eyes crinkle as tears threaten once more.

The hand over my mouth presses harder. “Do not make me prove it.”

I stop moving. Every instinct in me claws against restraint, to bite him. Kick, scream, grab and break his fingers. Draw some sort of blood, but Edward is there, somewhere in the chaos, Alcott is there too. And this man, this creature behind me, knows exactly where they stand. He has men in the fog. I can feel it.

The way the night holds too still in certain places, the shadows gather between trees and a fleeing guest suddenly veers wide around nothing at all.

No. Not nothing. Guards, guns, traps and my death sentence does not come alone. Here is not only my death sentence, but the entire funeral procession. His lips brush too close to my ear.

“Finally I have you,” he whispers. “The beautiful consequence.”

I cannot breathe, not because of his hold on me, but because of the voice. I know it, I've heard Edward speak of it without saying a word. Seen his face go white at the memory and watched Alcott’s eyes sharpen when that name entered a room.

The Collector. He has me and now he has won.

The realization settles into my bones with horrifying quiet. For once, there is no clever plan waiting behind my teeth. No blade hidden beneath lace. No pistol disguised as elegance. Only fog, fire, a hand over my mouth and the men I love standing close enough to see but too far to save.

Love.

The word strikes me with such cruelty I almost make a sound. The Collector chuckles softly. “Oh, do not look so devastated. It spoils the effect.”

I glare into the dark, though I cannot turn enough to see his face. He inhales near my hair, as though savoring victory.

“I have waited for you for a long time.” His arm tightens around my waist. “Edward was always so selfish with his treasures.”

My stomach twists. Edward.

Across the lawn, he takes three steps toward the trees, eyes wild. He senses something, he knows terror too intimately not to recognize its shape. The Collector stills behind me.

“Tell me,” he murmurs, “shall I shoot him first?”