The light spilled into the cramped hallway as Ivy opened her door. The sound of Nina’s heartrending sobs pulled at me as Ivy slipped out and shut it behind her. The newly undead were often unpredictable as their mind reorganized under overwhelming shifts of hormones and instincts while the body fought with the mind, trying to convince it that it was still alive. Hunger usually kicked in when the original aura was depleted to a measurable threshold. But that wasn’t why Nina begged for Ivy to return in great gasping sobs. It wasn’t blood Nina wanted, it was her soul.

Back against the door, Ivy stared at me with black, haunted eyes, chilling me. “You shouldn’t be here.”

“This shouldn’t have happened.” I hobbled forward, tears blurring my sight. “Ivy, I’m so sorry,” I gushed, my arms going around her as she began to cry.

Great gasping sobs shook her, and I held her to me, the silk feel of her hair bunched between us. My own tears flowed at the unfairness of it all, the end of her hope that she and Nina might have something normal, that they might have a life, a love, in the fleeting time they were allowed a moment of happiness before the curse came around full circle and took it all away.

“I’m so sorry,” I whispered, hardly breathing.

“She wanted me to kill her,” Ivy sobbed, her voice muffled. “She begged me, but I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t even lie to her and promise I would.”

“It’s okay,” I said, and she pulled back from me, eyes glistening as Nina quietly wept behind the door Ivy guarded.

Ivy wiped her eyes, looking more beautiful than I’d ever seen her even if it was grief that brought her alive. “She died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital,” Ivy whispered. “There was no way to stop it. And I couldn’t finish it. When she begged the paramedic to, I ... I wouldn’t let him.”

She’d fought them. She’d beaten them into unconsciousness with the savagery of a lover protecting the one she loved.

Trying to smile, I wiped the tears from my cheek and sniffed. “It’s okay,” I said, stomach knotting. “I wouldn’t have been able to do it either. Remember?” I hated them, hated the demons for this. Of all the curses I’d seen, heard whispers of, witnessed the destruction from, this utter raping of hope by destroying people through their love and fear was the worst.

Ivy licked her lips, haunted eyes flicking past me when Nina sobbed behind the shut door. “I should have killed her twice, but I was so scared that her soul would be lost forever when the lines fell and there was nowhere for it to go. Nina was fine until her soul went into the bottle.”