We used to go to Natalie’s all the time, hang out by the fire, make s’mores, joke about shadow knights who took their jobs too seriously. That was before Natalie became one of them. Still, there’s a tribe mentality among Valryn: when something happens to one of us, it happens to all. I don’t think any of us are convinced Lily hung herself, and the unknown is already eating at the backs of our minds like a parasite.

I start my car, and Natalie takes a step back. “Yeah,” I say at last. “I’ll be there.”

Her smile is genuine but sad, and it hits me square in the chest. I peel out of the parking lot and race home. After I arrive, it occurs to me that I don’t remember how I got here.

My head swims with images of Lily in life and death: Lily laughing loud, turning heads, her joy contagious. Lily hanging over Emerson Hall, head nearly severed, resting on her shoulder. Lily standing up in the passenger side of my Jeep as we roll down the road, singing at the top of her lungs in an off-key rendition of whatever’s on the radio. Lily’s body twirling to the left and right, like the rope is unwinding. Lily haloed by wings as she fights me in training, the dance she does when she lands a hit. Lily lifeless, arms resting at her sides, palms slightly open, scratched like Anora’s were scratched. Lily sitting beside me in my room, playing video games, her laugh echoing through me as she wins. I can’t even be mad at her—not with that smile. Lily’s blood dripping off her fingertips, staining the concrete at my feet.

My stomach reacts violently, twisting and turning until acid climbs up the back of my throat, and I stumble out of my Jeep to vomit on the gravel. I rest there a moment, hands on my knees, eyes burning. I push the gravel around with my feet to hide the evidence, but the smell is rancid and teases my stomach again. I wipe my mouth with my sleeve and push my hair out of my eyes before heading inside, surprised Mom hasn’t noticed my arrival.

Pausing inside the door, I understand why—she’s on the phone, and her voice is raised.

“He just lost his best friend—”

She pauses and takes a deep, shaky breath.

“I don’t care what Cain wants. He’s my son!”

She’s talking to Dad. I’ve never heard her raise her voice like this, and I’m both surprised and impressed. Of course, he’s only calling because I haven’t arrived at the Compound yet. I wonder absently if he started the conversation asking how I was.

Probably not, judging by how angry Mom sounds.

“You know, Bastian, I don’t think that really means anything to him anymore.”