Chapter Thirty Three
Theodore
I don't want to kill good men, but good men are the only ones offering.
Rose refused to speak to me after the ordeal in the park, which made lunch a horribly awkward affair. She wasn't pleased, but she wasn't displeased either. I gave up on trying to sort out her thoughts; even she couldn't figure out how she felt about what happened.
I lost my composure, which is embarrassing to admit since I pride myself on not doing that. Which isn't to say that Henry didn't deserve it, because he did, but I could've handled myself better.
Or I should've been able to handle myself better. But when he put his hand on her, especially considering the information I received from Marcella only hours before…
I may have overdone it, just a little, because when we returned home, Rose stomped into the bedroom and locked the door behind her.
Marcella's appearance was unexpected, as was the information she brought, so maybe that's what threw me. Uriel is skulking around despite Morrigan's stop order. Not surprising. He's in contact with Marcella. Fine, I knew they were conspirators, and she already got an earful about it. But he's trying to get in contact with me, not to enforce a punishment dictated by my mother but to talk. To have a friendly post-torture chat.
When I gave Marcella my answer, which was, absolutely the fuck not, she called me a stubborn moron, and I called her a lying vermin, and that's when I found out that Uriel was the one to give Rosalie that bruise a few weeks back. Then, I lost my grip on my temper, and the tulips I planted in the front yard paid the price.
So maybe I wasn't exactly in the best headspace to see Henry, but he did deserve to be smacked around a little. Though she has wondered it, Rosalie hasn't asked me if I'm sorry. I'm glad because I promised not to lie to her, and I don't think she'd be happy with the truth.
When I left Cora's house, Rose still hadn't come out of the bedroom, so she didn't get a chance to ask where I was going. I didn't have to tell her that I was on my way to kill a good man.
His name is Oliver. He’s an insurance appraiser, and he’s due for a promotion soon. He grew up in St. Louis and moved here to follow a woman. He’s been working on a screenplay for four years. He calls his mother every week. He doesn’t have children, but he dreams of being a father. He’s honest, and he’s loyal, and he’s kind, and he made a stupid decision, and now I have to kill him.
He lives in a quiet suburb with manicured lawns and this is our town, slow down signs staked every block. His house looks like all the others, a cookie cut by hands intending to sell the fantasy he's been pretending at for six years. I didn't make the deal. I would've given him sixty years. I would've given him a lifetime, but Hayes wasn't as generous.
There are so many men like him. So many souls like his, waiting to be collected. Whenever I'm not home with Rosalie, I'm here, hesitating in front of a stranger's house and knowing that I could walk away, that I could choose not to do this. I do it anyway. It occupies most of my time, these meetings. Time that could be spent tending my ruined garden or eating fine food. A wave of nostalgia makes me nauseous, but I steel myself.
Pity for Oliver won't save him, and pity for myself won't save me.
He doesn't answer the door when I knock. I don't expect him to. Not many people can be brave enough to face their death, even when it's anticipated. Even when they've been watching the clock tick to midnight. I wish he was brave. One of us has to be.
I send a wisp of power towards the lock. It clicks, and the door swings open.
He's already on his knees. His eyes are nearly swollen shut, but they widen as I approach. He's begging. It doesn't matter.
I want to apologize, but I don’t. I want to ask for his forgiveness, but I won’t. He was aware of the consequences when he made the bargain. His wife would love him for six more years. She wouldn't follow through on the divorce. I wonder if he considered having children with her, knowing he wouldn’t see them grow up.
His wife isn't here. A small mercy. The woman he sold his soul for won't be present when it leaves his body. No, the passivity of that statement is an injustice. She won't be present when I steal it.
Beyond the frustration of my circumstances, a weariness has crept into me. I don’t want to be the person I’m becoming, but it’s far too late to choose any other path.
There's a man in front of me, and he is begging.
I cool my voice. “It will be quick.” The reassurance does little for the fear that sours the air. “It will be painless.”
A dark splotch spreads on his pants. The stink of urine almost makes me gag. “I don’t want to die," he whimpers.
I almost tell him that I don’t want to kill him, but I know better. Hesitation would give him undue hope, and I am not cruel. I am trying not to be cruel.
He slides until his back hits the wall, curling in on himself. Close to death, even the bravest men are slave to their instincts. It disgusts me to think of myself as a predator and him the prey, but there are few other words to describe the way he makes himself smaller, hoping I will pass him over for more delectable meals.
I don't need to touch him to slip his soul from its home, but I do. I cup his face with my hands, a kind touch to cart him into the afterlife. I don't linger in his memories long. Once the cacophony of him fades into the chorus within me, I step back.
He's nothing but a crumbled body on the ground now. His wife will find him. It'll look like a heart attack, rare for his age but still reasonable, and she'll never know the price he paid to keep her close.
What of my price? I catch my reflection in the window as I leave and avert my eyes.
Six weeks remain before my self-imposed deadline. I whisk into the shadows to find my next victim.
When I return home, Rosalie is asleep on the couch. She stirs when I enter, squinting at me through thick lashes. I gently scoop up her feet and sit, placing them in my lap.
"You look tired," she murmurs, absent of the anger I expected to come home to.
"I don't get tired."
She hums and sits up but doesn't pull her legs away. "My phone is still at Azmaveth's house."
I tap my index finger against her ankle and say absently, "I can get you a new one."
From the way she slumps, it's not the answer she was looking for. I'd comb through her thoughts to find her true meaning, but there are enough whispers in my head, and I am tired. Not physically, but the weight of the souls I've taken tonight presses down on me. If not for her company, I might dive into unconsciousness and stay there until someone ripped me back to reality.
"No," she says, "it's okay."
We sit in silence for a moment. She points her toes, letting out a small squeak at the stretch in her muscles. It's almost daylight. She should've slept in the bed, and I open my mouth to tell her as much, but what comes out surprises both of us. "I… had a bad day."
She bends her knees, arching her legs over me, and leans forward to wrap her arms around her shins. I resist the urge to tug her back down, settling for my finger still tapping against her skin.
"My day wasn't great either," she says. "Are we gonna talk about it?"
I can't tell her no. Not when she's looking at me like that. "I'm worried that it will only ever get worse."
It being me. I don't clarify. She doesn't need me to. She nods, thoughtful, and reaches for my fidgeting hand. "I'm not afraid of you."
Maybe she infected me with the impulse to pose questions I already know the answer to because I ask, "Do you love me, Rosalie?"
The lie tempts her. I can see it in the way she exhales, in the soothing scratch of her fingernails against my arm. It would be unfair of her to ask for honesty and not give it in return, so she evades instead. "You tried to kill Henry."
She says it like I wasn't able to kill Henry, which I am. It would've been easy. Like picking a grape from a vine, but that's not what she wants to hear. "He grabbed you. I didn't like it."
At my admission, she slides closer. I know what she's doing, rewarding my honesty with affection. Part of me wants to protest. I can't be trained like a dog exchanging good behavior for scratches, but I like having her close, and the scratches are nice.
"You can't threaten everyone who touches me," she says quietly.
"I can."
"You shouldn't."
Instead of arguing with her, I let my head flop back and close my eyes. "Okay."
She's quiet for a moment, moving her hand from my arm to my hair and scratching my scalp. The noise that escapes me isn't quite a purr, but it's not one I'd release in mixed company. I slouch to give her easier access. It's not rare for us to have nights like this, but I wasn't expecting her to be so forgiving after my outburst. I must look ragged for her to opt out of picking a fight.
Then she asks me for a memory, and I understand why she's being so sweet to me. I don't sigh, but I come close. This, too, isn't rare. Plucking Andrew's murmuring from the rest and dragging it to the front of my brain is exhausting. All of this is exhausting, but I can't deny her this small pleasure.
"Christmas Eve," I say. "You were fifteen. He didn't have money for a gift, but he picked up a skein of dollar store yarn and learned to knit with wooden pencils. He practiced for two months. He made you a keychain."
She shifts to press herself against my side and rest her head in the crook of my neck. I miss her hands in my hair, but I put my arm around her and pull her closer. "It fell apart in a week," she whispers. "He was so upset."
I picked a memory tinged with melancholy on purpose, because I'm also tinged. "You kept it for months, though. A little scrap of yarn on your keys."
"I threw it away. I'm sorry."
I lean my head against the top of hers and breathe in the smell of her shampoo. "You don't need to apologize."
She wasn't talking to me.
A month passes before Marcella returns again. It's early morning. I'm in bed with Rose. More and more often, I find myself here. If she knows what I do when I'm not with her, she hasn't mentioned it. If she knows she's in danger, she's putting on a brave face.
I don't think she knows. She doesn't think about it when I listen. I listen less these days.
Marcella announces her presence with a wordless nudge in my brain. I haven't spoken to her about it, but I'm glad for her not adding to the ruckus of noise clawing at my skull. It's constant and worsens when I haven't expended energy, which I try not to do in Rose's presence. Her fingers curl against my chest when I untangle myself from her, but she doesn't wake up.
Spring has arrived, bringing with it warmer weather and the peeping of distant birds. None make homes in the tree at the back of the house. I try not to think about how even the most primitive of creatures know to avoid me. Marcella is leaning against that tree with her arms crossed. Her eyes narrow as she surveys the way I'm dressed— or, more accurately, not dressed. I didn't bother putting on a shirt.
"Are you having fun playing house?" she asks.
I stop a safe distance from her and conjure a ball of sparks the size of my palm. She watches me toss it from hand to hand like she's worried I'll launch it at her.
I consider launching it at her. "What do you want?"
"Checking in. Making sure we're still on the same team."
"There is no team. The team dissolved."
She cocks her head. "Then I need the presence of my savior, lest I become frail and misled. Oh, Lord, show me the way—"
"What do you want?"
Her hesitation is slight, but it's so unlike her that I mark it. I must've really scared her last time. Good. I don't know if I'd actually be able to stomach hurting her, but I don't mind that she thinks I could. "I bring the same request," she says carefully, "with more urgency. Uriel wants to meet with you."
"He knows where to find me." I'm not sure if that's true, but it feels true.
"Forgive him for trying to go through the proper channels. He doesn't want a fight."
That makes one of us. From the way she uncrosses her arms and straightens, she knows it, too. "I'm not going to beg you, Theodore. But you should talk to him."
"I don't take orders from you."
She sighs. "And every day, we suffer for it."
"Why are you working with him, anyway? You know what he did to Gemma."
Her mouth thins. "If I only worked with people whose methodology I agree with, I wouldn't be standing here, would I?"
"And what of your methodology? What about your core belief, the monster who hurts monsters? How could you betray yourself so quickly?"
She exhales through her teeth and pushes past me. "I didn't come here to argue with you. Talk to him or don't, you bumbling idiot."
I catch her arm. "Aren't you going to invite me to dinner?"
"My breath is precious. Best not to waste it."
She's always been good at putting on a face, but there's an exhaustion in her, too. I'd feel guilty if she hadn't gone behind my back every opportunity she got. "When?" I ask.
"Tonight."
"Where?"
"He said you'd know."
Not the motel, since he's going through Marcella instead of my mother. Not Azmaveth's house, because Uriel wouldn't want to risk him alerting her. "He'll be alone? No surprises?"
"I'm sure there will be surprises, but like I said, he just wants to talk."
"Fine," I say and release her arm. She shakes it, but I didn't harm her. I don't know if I could. I mean, I could, but I don't know if I could. "Get out of here before Rose sees you."
"Why? Are you afraid I'll tell her the deal she made is null? That when your mother finds out what your plan is, the poor girl is as good as dead?"
I glare at her. She flashes her palms. "Okay, okay. You used to be better at taking a joke."
I don't know if that's true, either.
That night, when Rose excuses herself to shower, I leave. She's used to finding herself alone without a warning, or she should be by now. It's better than trying to explain where I'm going. What I mean to do. What I have done, knowing the potential consequence.
I love her. I think I love her. I could love her. But love has never been enough to derail the fate I've been condemned to since the moment my mother pulled me from that river. Love won't save me. It didn't save Elias or Anya or Gemma, and it definitely won't save Rose.
I guess I'll have to do it myself.
Maneuvering through the shadows is easier than it was before, and it was pretty easy before. I'm not exactly sure where I'm going since I didn't travel here last time of my own free will, but muscle memory and intention guide me.
It's not quite dark on the west coast. The sunset is interrupted by the trees surrounding the clearing, casting strange shadows on the ground. They stretch around and ahead of me as I push back into the realm of the living and into the center of the clearing.
Uriel is already here, standing at the far edge of the clearing beneath some trees. He's pulling at a low branch and picking at a leaf. When he turns to me with his beady black eyes, fear pins my feet in place. He makes me quiver like a whooped child because that's what I have been. For centuries, that's what he's made me.
It ends today.
"You're as clever as I assumed you were," Uriel says. He's far away but doesn't shout, trusting that I can hear him despite the distance. "I was worried you wouldn't show."
I scan the treeline for any sign of an ambush and find nothing. "Coordinates would've been helpful," I say at an equally low volume, "but you've always struggled with specifics."
We're close to the motel. This is the clearing he brought me to years ago, after I met Rose and was whisked away to live under my mother's thumb. It's unchanged, like a it exists in a bubble safe from the inevitable decay of time. We are similarly unchanged— physically, at least. It's our curse, never aging, never growing. We can alter our appearances. He does, but only to torment me. Then he defaults back to this form, too tall and uncanny, evil incarnate. Or maybe I believe that because I know what he's done, what he's willing to do. Does evil have a face? Or have I associated his face with evil?
Marcella trusts him, or she at least thinks whatever he needs to say is important enough for me to hear. In spite of myself, I trust her judgment, so I wait.
He starts, "If your mother found out you were so close, she might request an audience."
I trust my own judgment more, so I gather the moisture in the air and sharpen it into a dagger made of ice. It's cold in my hand, but there isn't any body heat to melt it.
The branch snaps back into place as he releases it and turns to face me fully. He surveys the dagger. "That would be unfortunate for both of us, so I'm glad to make sure she doesn't find out."
"Get to the point."
"Point!" He gestures towards the dagger. "Ha. And they say you don't have a sense of humor." At my unamused expression, he continues, "I'm not a man who likes to lose, Prince of Carrion. Gemma and I had that in common."
I tighten my fist around my makeshift weapon. "You tempt me to violence by saying her name."
"I'm being honest. If violence tempts you, that's your nature and not my fault." He laces his hands behind his back and tilts his head, exposing his neck. I scoff at the display, but he takes a step towards me. "I've crossed lines. Yours and hers, and others' I'm sure. But I never forced her into anything. Honest, see?"
"You hurt her."
"So did you."
In a quick, smooth motion, I fling the dagger at him. It catches his shoulder and stays there. He rears back with a hiss, flicking at the object protruding from him and wincing. He doesn't remove it. So he does feel pain, or the illusion of pain. I wondered how my mother managed it with me. Intent, it seems, is the key. That and a sharp object— and a few thousand souls whirring like a fucked up generator within me.
He groans, "That was impolite."
"The point," I remind him.
"The point is," he lowers his voice, "I like to be on the winning side, and it's looking more and more like that's…" He gestures towards me. "You have my sword, Prince of Rot."
He's lying, or he's stupid, or he thinks I'm stupid. All three, probably. He's spent a hundred lifetimes using the blood on his hands to warm my mother's bed, and now— "You chose your side. You can't jump ship when the water gets choppy."
"Ah, but that's the best time to jump ship."
I narrow my eyes. "Morrigan would kill you if she heard you speaking about this." Unless she set him up to it, but from the timidness of his step towards me, it's unlikely. "If you think you have immunity because of your proximity to her, you're wrong."
"Nothing can kill me, Heir of Decay. I'm already dead, as are you. Or have you forgotten?"
"Do you really want to argue semantics right now?"
He shrugs.
"Why?" I ask.
"I told you why."
"No, you didn't. I'm not a fool. You don't believe in me." I cock my head. "Something happened."
His menacing joviality dips into true anger. It's rare that I can crack him, and so quickly. "Your succubus is very convincing."
"Don't insult me by lying."
"Gemma's punishment was the final straw atop a very, very tired camel."
I shake my head and prepare to probe his thoughts— but stop myself. He's taken so many souls, nearly as many as my mother. Even if he can't hear them whipping around inside his skull, would I be able to? And if I can't, do I want to subject myself to the disgusting stew that is his brain? "I do have more important things to do."
He grinds his teeth. "Morrigan killed my child."
That… I knew that. Six of them. "That was years ago, and my mother didn't kill them. Gemma did."
He reaches across his body and pulls the ice dagger from his shoulder. When it leaves his body, he stifles a scream into a groan. The dagger dissolves into mist in his hand. "There were seven," he pants. "My youngest survived. A girl, Aurelia. Gemma called her Goldie."
I shuffle through the memories stored within me, reaching for Gemma. She finds me instantly, grasping at the forefront of my mind. He's… telling the truth. A baby with ringlets of brown hair and Uriel's coal black eyes babbling around sounds her mouth couldn't yet form. An image floats to me, one of Uriel on his knees before Gemma. Begging for one, just one. Aurelia will live and die a human. Morrigan will never know.
Their mistake. My mother always finds out.
"That's almost an anagram," I say.
He doesn't laugh. "Condemn me for my ego. I'm not sure if my girl knew who I was. I saw her so infrequently, only when I thought it was safe. It was never safe. You know that, I presume." His shoulders slump. "She was only a year old. Her mother didn't know about me, about any of this. Aurelia was harmless, and she was taken from me. Is that enough for you, Prince of Carrion?" He throws his arms wide. "Have I made myself properly vulnerable?"
Part of me reaches for empathy. The moral high ground beneath me is cracked and trembling. Who am I to turn him away? Another man before me, another course of begging. I could let him prove himself to be better than who I think he is.
But that part of me is small and easily ignored. I ready another dagger, this one made of the sparks lighting on my forearms. "No."
He blinks, fixing his eyes on the weapon. "No?"
"You can't come here with a sob story and expect me to forgive you. If it takes a personal tragedy for you to see the right of things, you're either selfish or stupid. In either instance, I don't need your help."
"Marcella is far more practical. She ought to be the heir."
I laugh, low and quick. "I'll tell her you said so."
Before he can respond, I charge him.
He lunges to the left to avoid a direct impact, so I conjure walls of wind on three sides, caging him in. He stumbles back, slamming into one of them with his palms raised. Understanding with an undercurrent of terror flickers across his usually unreadable expression. This isn't a bluff. It's not a tantrum. I'm going to kill him, and it's going to hurt.
I close the distance between us and bring the dagger towards his chest. He catches my wrist, straining, trying to coax burns from my undead skin. I know better now. He taught me the line between real and not real, and the pain he's trying to produce isn't real. But he hasn't had the same education, so when I electrify the arm that he's grabbing, he rears back with a grunt and lets me go.
This, too, is an advantage: he can't kill me. Not without the promise of his own demise, because if he did, if my mother found out, he'd face worse consequences than I can offer.
But what I'm offering is pretty bad.
"This isn't necessary," he says, cradling his hand. "Marcella can act as an intermediary. You won't ever have to see me, if that's what you want."
He's trying to subdue me. I'm trying to win.
I swing again, this time driving the dagger of lightning into his neck. I've never heard him scream before, an animal noise of shock and pain, one he can't swallow. It's a nice sound. He gathers shadows around him and blinks out of this plane. I follow, tailing him in the space between life and death, nipping at his heels with my own conjured shadows.
He appears just outside of the cage I made for him, still with the dagger in what would be an artery, still screaming. I'm behind him, stalking towards him with a predator's intent.
It's not enough. Nothing I can do to him will be enough.
He's a coward. At least Azmaveth stood by his choices.
Just to see if I can, I craft hands from air and will and send them to wrap around Uriel's arm. They yank, pulling his shoulder from its socket, then twist, snapping the the bone in two, then three, then four. He cries out again, but it's less than satisfactory this time. I want— I need more. I need him to beg, and I need to deny him. I need him dead and resurrected just so I can kill him again. I need to keep him here, suffering, until the sun expands and the ground beneath us turns to fire and then ash and then nothing.
I need his soul. I need to tear him apart every single day until he doesn't remember who he is or what he's done to deserve such punishment.
He whirls to me, resignation thinning his mouth. I wipe the calm from his face with a whip of lightning. It slashes his cheek, splitting the skin but not drawing blood. "Tell Azmaveth—"
I hit him again. This one cuts from the corner of his mouth to his ear, slicing his face open. White teeth and saliva flash as he grimaces. "Tell him I wish we lived in a kinder world. Tell him…"
He smiles, and it's a grotesque thing, the skin split open and stretching. "I suppose I'll be able to tell him myself."
I grip his throat. He doesn't fight me off. He stopped fighting a while ago. Before he entered this clearing, if I had to guess. Light bursts from his chest, a beacon shot into the darkening sky interrupted by my arm, then my head as I lean close to him.
"Stop it," I growl. "You don't get to give up. You don't get to avoid this. You deserve this. You deserve worse than this."
But he's already gone, dissolving beneath my palm. After Elias, I thought I'd be more prepared for the impact, but it knocks me off my feet. Backwards, like a physical blow, and then I'm falling and it's so bright, so goddamn bright and loud, a thousand thousand voices all speaking over each other and I'm not falling anymore, I don't exist anymore, it's only them, all of them and him—
A memory flits past me, swift and small as a hummingbird. I grab it from the air and cup it, examining the music and joy and longing. A ballet, a love story, a sweep of hair behind a theater, a brush of lips on a cheek. I grab another and another, consuming them with a fervor I can't name, a desire I can't place, watching the births of children and evenings at the market and football games and quiet afternoons by the river.
I'm forgetting something important. Something I need to do. I study memory after memory but none of them are mine, and there are so many. I reach again, and the next one I catch trembles in my hands—I have hands? A body, one central being?—before I sink my teeth into it. The fragments of a badly played trumpet dribble down my chin like juice from a ripe plum. Another. Another. I gorge myself on the whispers and terror and rage, the lives and deaths, every piece of them I can get my hands on.
One is faster than the others, jerking around like it doesn't want to be caught. Like it's angry. I bend my legs, because I have legs now, and leap—
Gravel digs into my knees. They're bare, as are my arms. My chest is covered by a thin cotton shirt with the sleeves cut off. I wipe sweat from my brow with the back of my filthy hand and keep my head bent over the fire that's been burning for days. There are offerings surrounding it, grain and fruit and cheese, but they're untouched.
Without lifting my eyes, I palm a sharpened stone and drag it against my wrist, drawing a thin line of blood. It stings, but the pain is nothing compared to the loss of my—of Uriel's—wife.
This isn't how you summon Morrigan. Morrigan can't be summoned, but Uriel doesn't know that yet.
I squeeze my hand into a fist and let the blood dribble into the fire before me. The heat licks at my skin, but I pay it no mind. "I don't know what name to call upon," I say, "but you know that I reach for you." The blood sizzles as the logs pop, but I don't move my hand away. "You who has taken my love. I ask you to take me as well."
An ember lands on my skin. I hiss through my teeth at the bright pain, "You who has taken my love, I offer myself to you. I will serve you." My heart pounds in my ears. If I keep this up for much longer, I'll have blisters. "Anything," I whisper. "I will give you anything. I will do anything."
The answer frightens him— me. I've been at this altar since her death and haven't heard anything other than the settling stone and the crack of flame. But now, a voice slips inside, right at my ear. "You don't mean what you say. The heart is fickle."
I hide my flinch and keep my hand suspended above the fire even as the blood begins to clot. "Mine is not."
"You do this for love." It's not a question.
"You will find none as loyal as I." The flames raise higher, engulfing my hand and wrist. My arm trembles, but I don't cry out. I don't pull away. "Let me serve you as she does."
"She doesn't. She's dead."
I've heard it before from other mouths, but the reminder makes me dizzy. Or maybe that's the fire, or the blood loss, or facing a being I know nothing about.
Uriel didn't know what he was asking for. What he'd become.
"Then let me join her," I say.
Boots scrape on the gravel behind me, but I don't dare turn. "You don't need my favor for that."
"She will not dance with me in the next life." My entire body shakes. The flames stretch to consume my forearm. The pain is secondary to my request, to my need and despair. "If it is you who holds her soul, let me walk beside you."
There's a long pause. Then, "You will serve me."
"I will serve you."
Hands grip either side of my head, forcing me to look at the fire and the blistered, peeling skin of my arm. Death leans in close so that her words brush my ear: "Then rise."
When I slip back into my body, I'm on all fours in the grass, retching. The sun is gone, but it's as bright as day. That light… it's me. Like an unshielded lantern, it fills the space empty of trees and beyond, stretching out and up and—
Oh. Oh no.
We're not far from Morrigan's motel.
I struggle to my feet. Shadows dimple the light, scurrying from tree to tree, drawing closer until a face peeks through two trunks. A frowning face. A face that looks like mine.
My mother finds my eye and tilts her head. She knows my intent, as I know hers. My mistake. She always finds out.
I open my mouth to dare her to come closer, to punish me here, but I'm not the one that will be reprimanded for my misbehavior. It's not my existence I've been jeopardizing.
In the smirk that grows from her scowl, she realizes it, too. Before she can throw a taunt or worse, offer her hand, I dive into the space between life and death with one word in my mind, repeating over and over like an apology: Rosalie.