Red. All I can see is red. What’s wrong with my vision?
“Excellent. Open your eyes,” a female voice says gently.
I do, and wince when bright light blinds me further. I throw my hands up to cover my eyes, my left palm brushing against my right wrist, irritating the stitches encircling it.
“Henry, it’s okay. You can come out now.” Margarite peered under the bed, only to find it empty.
Henry Willoughby was proving to be quite the challenge. He reminded her more of her original husband than any of the others so far, right down to the puppy-dog eyes that had lied to her face when she’d asked him where he was going that night.
An end-of-a-hot-day smell lingers in the air and the scattered clouds turn gold as I set off from my apartment. Easy route for my first run through the neighborhood in too long. The August weather is nice, and I revel in the familiar rhythm of feet pounding pavement.
Read it now
He didn’t see me watching him. Even if he’d noticed, he would have assumed I was flirting rather than reading his mind.
I climbed off the bar stool and followed him. I couldn’t allow him to make it back to his apartment. Once he crossed the threshold of his hallowed abode, I’d have to be welcomed inside.
Lorraine banged on the witch’s front door until her fists hurt, crying and calling her name. It finally flew open, and Jessamine jerked her inside.
“You have to give me more!” Lorraine sobbed. “It’s wearing off!”
“Child, I told you, love spells are temporary. You can’t bend the heart forever, and you can’t stop true love.”
Haruo Settlement of the Last Survivors of Japan, 2094
Translated from Japanese
It was only a matter of time. I am fortunate I have been spared from it this long.
But it is necessary.
Planning someone’s last song was a bit stressful. I fed the tabletop jukebox and took my sweet time choosing. A good song wouldn’t make the betrayal and ensuing death any easier to swallow, but choosing one might ease my conscience.
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Gerard hadn’t intended the end of the world it to be so chaotic.
He hurdled an overturned cart and dashed down the cobblestone street. All around him, screaming civilians scattered, desperate for a place to hide. Fleeing was futile. The governor had placed the city on lockdown after the first shadowspawn appeared.
Where the beast came from, I had no idea.
I was only passing through this kingdom. A gentle breeze threaded through my loose braid, and I’d been enjoying the quiet and the view, in spite of the large, bare patches dotting the green fields alongside the dirt road.
The field beside my childhood home attracts starlings. When I was young, I’d sit on the wooden fence and watch them. My father was always working in the garage behind our house, but whenever he saw me there, he’d stop and join me.
“Those are murmurations,” he’d tell me as dark clouds of starlings rose against the gray winter sky.
I don’t trust the picture box. The people in it stare as I walk by. They want me trapped inside with them. The animals watch me too—dogs and cats, even the family fish in the tiny glass bowl. I am observed as I observe them.
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The shock of cold water splashing all over my body startled me awake. My eyes frantically scanned the room as I tried to remember what had happened.
I am definitely not in my room.
The black walls were splattered with blood stains. A dingy toilet squatted in the corner, and iron bars blocked the doorway. I shivered as another round of cold water hit me from the other side of the bars.
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