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It took a lot of effort to drag myself to his side, even though he was only a few inches away. He was crying. There was blood everywhere. Smoke stung my eyes as I tried to understand where all the blood was coming from.

“J?” I whispered again, touching his face with careful fingers. He flinched, his eyes finding mine, filled with pain and terror.

How was there so much blood?

He seemed to have a dozen cuts all over him.

A voice cut through the haze. My father. Arguing with someone I couldn’t see.

“He was supposed to be better by now,” my father snarled. “I’ve done everything you asked. The money. The access. Everything. And he’s still—” A sound of disgust. “This abomination. You said the ritual would work. You said he’d be fixed.”

My heart flipped over in agony.

My father admitted he hated me. Found me useless.

I wasn’t certain anything could hurt more. I’d suspected he didn’t like me much, he’d spent years pawning me off on nannies or my grandparents, ignoring me when he was home. But whatever this was felt a thousand times worse.

“Then we’ll use them both,” the calm voice said. “Add a blessing to your business. A boon in the wake of tragedy. As long as you’re prepared to be childless.”

“Whatever.” My father’s voice was flat, dismissive. “I’m done with him. Done with all of this. I’ve had enough broken promises.”

Use us both for what? Childless?

I looked at Jason. At the blood pooling beneath him. At the candles flickering in the dark like hungry eyes surrounding us both, at the torches flickering around the edges of the line of chanters. People in hoods, animal masks on their faces, and the heavy weight of dread settled in my gut.

They were going to kill Jason. They were going to kill me.

And my father was going to let them.

“The goddess only accepts that in which we are willing to give. And she chooses the gifts she provides,” the calm voice continued. “Take the knife.”

My father appeared a moment later, grabbed a fistful of Jason’s hair and yanked his head back. Jason’s face contorted with pain, tears streaming down his cheeks. He opened his mouth as if to say something, but blood poured out.

I gasped and gagged, jolting back as Jason just looked at me with those terrified eyes.

“Stop hurting him,” I shoved myself up, everything aching as if I’d had one hell of a beating while passed out, but I wasn’t bleeding like Jason was.

“You want to die first?” My father’s voice was flat, cold. “I don’t care. I’m done with you anyway.”

He shoved Jason to the ground, then grabbed my broken arm and twisted. I screamed and nearly blacked out, falling to my knees.

He pressed the knife to my throat.

The edge bit into my skin—sharp, stinging. A thin line of warmth trickled down my collarbone. A nick and a warning. I glared at him, searching for any sense of remorse, any reason for this madness. Anything beyond the cold rage dancing in his eyes in time with the flickering flames.

“Goddess, please accept this offering,” my father began.

Blood dripped from my neck onto the ground, inside their strange diagram of symbols. Everything narrowed to the plink of drops on the dirt. Even the voices chanting faded as I stared at what I was certain would be my death.

But the air shifted. A cool breeze ruffled my hair. The crescendo of noise slid into an odd, unnatural silence. My ears popping and partially ringing, as my heart raced.

The world narrowed. And for a few seconds, I thought the darkness began to writhe, as if the shadows themselves had awakened.

An icy hand gripped the back of my leg, crawling upward, as if using me as a ladder to drag itself out of the icy depths of frozen hellscape.

I gasped, startled by the chill, the sense of rising doom⁠—

Jason launched himself at my dad, putting himself between the knife and me.