My body locked up as I clutched the cool marble. Their thoughts. The sights and sounds. My own rising terror. My legs shook, knees weakening. I couldn’t move as my throat seized. I couldn’t shut them out. I slid to the floor, pressing back against the base of the pedestal. It was too much. They were inside me— their fear, their panic, their last thoughts— and I couldn’t pull myself out of it. Couldn’t stop them from being a part of me. I tucked my knees to my chest, squeezing my eyes closed as I pressed my balled fists to my ears.
Help me!
I’m dying!
It hurts— oh gods, it hurts.
He’s gone. He’s dead.
I’m bleeding—
Lis. Lis. Lis.
I don’t want it to end like this.
I can’t.
It’s not fair—
“Lis!” Hands clamped my arms, shaking me. “Calista,” the voice demanded. “Look at me.”
Dragging in air, I was terrified to do so— terrified by what I’d see— but it was brown eyes staring back at mine, eyes a shade darker than mine. Grady. He’d found me— like always, he’d found me.
“I can hear them,” I rasped, shaking. “Their thoughts. Their screams. I can’t stop it— ”
“Just focus on me. Just me, and take a breath— a deep, long breath. Okay? Focus on me and breathe,” he ordered, the warm brown skin around his mouth taut as another’s voice started to intrude on my thoughts. “You focused?”
“I— ” I began to look away from him. Blood pooled along the floor. Rivers of crimson, slick and shiny. Blood splattered along the base and up the sweeping golden pillars. Still arms and legs. Skin torn apart by deep gouges. . . .
“I saw this,” I whispered. “This is what I saw, Grady. This is— ”
“I know. That doesn’t matter right now.” He clasped my cheeks then, forcing my gaze back to him. “Tell me how I’m supposed to make catmint continue to bloom?”
His question caught me off guard. “W-What?”
“Tell me how I can get your favorite flower to keep blooming?”
“I like catmint, but it’s . . . it’s n-not my favorite. Tickseed is.” My mind suddenly filled with images of tiny, daisy-like yellow blossoms. “The moonbeam kind.”
“Okay. Whatever. How do you get moonbeam to keep blooming?”
My brows knitted. “You have to deadhead them— cut off the little black buds, the spent blossoms.”
“Good to know.” His hands smoothed the hair back from my cheeks. “You picturing those flowers?”
I nodded as my mind finally began to calm. Grady . . . he’d done this before, when we were younger and I hadn’t learned how to sever the connection with others. Pushing off the floor, I threw my arms around him. “I don’t know what I would . . . I would do without you.”
“It’s okay. I got you. It’s okay.” His arms tightened around me. “You hurt?”
I shook my head. “N-No. It was just their thoughts. I couldn’t— ”
“I know. I know.” He rose, bringing me with him. “We’ve got to get out of here. Get farther into the house and hide before they get in.”
“The ni’meres?”
“Not just them.” He pulled back, quickly scanning my face and body for any injury I might have lied about. “I saw the Rae coming over the hill.”
“W-What? Why?”
“I don’t know.” He grabbed my arm, squeezing as he looked around. “But something bad is going down, Lis. Primvera is burning.”
My chest went cold. “What?”
He began to lead us through the crowd. “I saw the Rae from the solarium. Saw it before the ni’meres came. That’s when I started to look for you. Careful,” he warned, guiding us around a motionless pair of legs.
I didn’t look to see what had caused those legs to become so still.
“Knew right off something bad was going down.” Grady shoved his other hand through his mop of curly hair.
“Do you think it’s the Westlands?”
“Who else could it be?” he said. “They must’ve made it farther into the Midlands than anyone knew. That’s the only answer.” He grunted as someone knocked into us. “We’ve got to hide,” he repeated. “And then the first chance we get, we’ve got to get out— ”
Glass shattered behind us. Grady looked over his shoulder as I did the same.