She slouches toward the glass doors, turning will into strength, forcing her body to stay upright. She can make it to the Butchery. She will see to it.

Sudden, unexpected warmth. Hands close around her arms and a body presses against hers, blocking her path. “What are you doing?”

It’s the Lady Alodia Lightning, coming out of nowhere. Not nowhere. She’s been sleeping in the medical bay too. Watching over Misery. Making sure she gets up to no mischief. Like now. Misery finds her tongue and the air in her lungs. “Let me go.”

“Where are you going?”

Misery tries to pull free, but the princess has an overpowering grip. “Leave me alone.”

“Do you think you can run? On this station? Where to?”

“I’m not running.” She gives up struggling, letting her weight rest against the princess’s slender bulk. She has to keep her strength up—for something. She’s not sure what. “I have to go. It’s calling me.”

“What is?” Alodia Lightning still won’t let her go. “That seraph? The one you transformed?”

Her skin is cold from the sweat lifting off it. “Holy bluestone,” she says. “It’s the transporter stone, isn’t it? It sends you somewhere when it’s activated.”

“Only if it’s programmed. What are you trying to say?”

“It’s an invitation,” Misery intones, clearly and slowly. Repeating what Ruin told her in the Butchery. As the syllables form in her mouth she knows them to be real and true.

“An invitation? From whom? To where?”

“The nullvoid.” Misery doesn’t know how else to explain it. The tangle of her life, the lies she’s told, the things she’s hidden. Mother’s death, the black hole in the center of her life, around which she whirls in a rapidly shrinking orbit. That event horizon will claim her soon. It’s better if the princess lets her go.

She says: “You heard the conversation I had with Dr. Sower?”

“I did. You think it’s voidsickness, what happened here.”

“Because it is.”

“The doctor says it isn’t. If anyone knows about voidsickness and its manifestations, it would be her. It’s her life’s work and very personal.”

Misery starts to laugh, and each jolt of her diaphragm sends pain through her chest, yet she can’t stop. “Why can’t you believe I’m voidmad? You’re the one who said I was full of shit.”

“Forget that. I was pissed, and—it doesn’t matter. You need to get back to bed.”