After all these years, he looks so much worse than I expected. The decay that follows me, that follows Dracula too, has nestled over Renfield, veiling him in cobwebs and dust and pale spots of mold, a stark sheen of gray enveloping him. He takes a wavering step toward me, and his whole body creaks, his bones half-rotted beneath his skin. He isn’t built for immortality. Dracula was never that generous, never bestowed that parting gift. Instead, Renfield’s trapped between life and death, and somehow, he got the worst of both worlds.

“I’ve missed you,” he says to me, a musty smell rising off him, his crinkling flesh thin as tissue paper.

“You’ve never even met me,” I say, and it’s true. We’re strangers, always have been. He shouldn’t have been able to find me.

But then Renfield drifts another step forward, his body illuminated in the candlelight, and I realize there’s someone else with us. A faint blot of ash hovers along the ceiling. The remnants of Dracula that escaped two days ago.

That’s how Renfield knew where I was. From across thousands of miles, Dracula beckoned him here, his freed ashes strong enough at last to call out.

Renfield parts his desiccated lips and asks the only question that matters to him. “Where’s the rest of him, Miss Lucy?”

“The rest of who?” I ask, feigning innocence.

But Renfield’s waited a long time for this, and he won’t wait any longer. His head down, he darts across the parlor, skittering like a snake past the fainting couch. His shadow envelops me, and we’re suddenly entwined, my fingers digging deep into his arms. Pieces of his flesh peel off in my hands, stiff as worn leather.

“That’s terribly impolite of you,” he says, and makes a quick swipe at my face. Something primordial flares up in me again, and I shove him hard toward the mantel, where he collapses in the corner, knocking the taper candle to the floor.

One candle, one flame. That’s all it takes for the fire to catch on the frayed carpet. Our house, our dubious sanctuary, has been hungry for destruction for years. We’ve tried to hold it at bay, but it was always a losing battle. Now I barely have time to blink before the whole room is alive and blazing.

The smoke thickening around us, I stumble toward the doorway. Bee doesn’t follow. She stands frozen next to the Victrola, the flames reflecting in her eyes, vacant as tide pools.

Fire. This is what happened to her before, how Thornfield Hall crumbled into cinders. How she lost Jane all those years ago. The past is crashing over her, stopping time, stopping everything.