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I twisted aside as vomit sprayed up my throat and hit the ground, acid burning as I retched miserably. My stomach cramped, and my eyes stung, but the rest of me was starting to ice over.
Fingers caught my chin, but other than pressure I couldn’t tell if they were warm or cold, smooth or calloused. They tipped my head up, and then I was staring into piercing gold eyes that watched me so sharply I felt the look scour my very soul.
“I’ll get the others,” Miz said, a frown tugging at his beautiful mouth as his fingertips traced the shape of three lines on my cheek. The scratches Nightmare made.
I just stared, my chest hollowed out, my body covered in what must be a rime of ice, as he stood and vanished in a cloud of shadow. Darya’s blood was on my hands. It soaked into my jeans. Stained my skin beneath the denim.
Another rush of acid and bile poured up my throat and I heaved, doubled over, but then there were hands pulling my hair back and others stroking up and down my back, and Miz was crouching in front of me, carelessly stepping in Darya’s blood.
“This is Nightmare’s doing,” he said, looking beyond me. “I can feel her here.”
Her name triggered another spasm of retching, and I curled over myself as my stomach cramped painfully.
“Get rid of the body,” Tor said, his gravelly voice easily recognisable. I felt better for hearing him, and for hearing Death’s murmured reply. The hand stroking my back vanished, and darkness wrapped around Darya’s body. When I blinked, she was gone, only a pool of blood and the knife Nightmare had put in my hand remaining. Miz picked it up to inspect it and dropped it instantly, flexing his hands.
“She made this knife,” he said, eyeing me with an expression I couldn’t decipher. Nor did I care to. “It has your signature on it,” he said. “And you have blood on your hands. She forced you to kill, didn’t she?”
I dry-heaved again, tears squeezing out of my eyes. I didn’t speak, didn’t want to say it out loud.
“Such misery,” he breathed, fingers returning to my cheek where Nightmare had slashed me. “So much suffering.”
“Don’t be an asshole, Miz,” Tor muttered.
I swallowed hard, my mouth dry as I rasped, “Take it away.”
Miz took my anxiety away when we first met. He could do it again.
Misery stared at me for a long moment, his golden eyes flickering with thoughts I couldn’t guess at, but after a moment he leaned closer, soft lips brushing over my forehead. The crushing grip bruising my chest lifted, and I could breathe. The tightness in my stomach eased. The headache that had begun to pound at my temples faded. But I was still sickened by what I’d done, still ashamed, still crying.
“I can only remove the physical misery,” he said, leaning back and watching me uncomfortably closely. “If I took it all away, there’d be repercussions.”
I frowned.
“With an event this big,” he explained, gazing at the pool of blood with a frown, “it becomes a formative event. To take away your misery would be to change who you are, or who you’ll become. It could make you someone who kills without feeling remorse.”
I shied away from the possibility, leaning back into Tor who released my hair to wrap his arms around me. “I don’t want to kill anyone. Ever.”
Miz’s mouth flattened, something like sympathy in his bright eyes. “Your wants rarely come into it,” he said and pushed to his feet, glancing over my head when Death returned, his boots trampling grass as he came to my side.
“What happened, little one?” he asked gently, crouching in front of where I’d collapsed in the clearing. His smoke-grey eyes were unbearably soft; I glanced away, convinced I didn’t deserve his softness. Not when I’d just killed my friend.
Oh god, what if Nightmare ordered me to hurt Byron or Honey? I couldn’t live with it. I couldn’t bear it.
“Cat,” Death prompted, still in that soft tone. It made my entire chest hurt.
I opened my mouth to tell him, to tell all of them, but I choked on my tongue. Pain wrapped like a chain of thorns around my throat, and my bloody hands flew for my neck.
Panic erupted like a star through me. I opened my mouth to gasp out a plea, to confess how terrified I was, but that chain dug deeper into my skin.
Nightmare lured me here. She compelled me to bring Darya to the woods and then kill her.
The words were on the tip of my tongue, burning in intensity, but when I reached for them, only air gurgled up my throat. And after it came the bitter copper of blood.
“Stop!” Miz said urgently, rushing across the distance he’d put between us, pale hands reaching for me, his beautiful eyes wide with panic. “Stop, Cat, you need to stop speaking.”
I swallowed blood, hot tears falling down my face.
“She gagged her,” Miz told the others, each word bit out, harsh and short. “Nightmare fucking gagged her.”
