Page 96 of The Ashes of Summer

It isn't fear. Fear would be easier. This is deeper—something vital being torn out of me with bare hands, because he came for me. Even after everything, he came, and this house ate him for it.

My Jacob.

Gone. Because of me.

The rope burns as I twist my wrist against it, and I bite down on the cry and I keep twisting. I've been working at these knots since they left me here, waiting for the house to go quiet, testing every inch of them for something Donnie's hands missed. My shoulders scream. My fingers have gone numb. Hope is a dangerous thing in this house—I've learned that the hard way—but when the knot shifts under my fingertips, my breath catches.

I freeze.

Then, slowly, I pull again.

It loosens. Another fraction. Another.

And gives.

My hand slips free.

I stare at it like it belongs to someone else. The rope's left angry red bands around my wrist and I don't care about a single one of them, because for the first time since they dragged me into this house, nothing is holding me down.

I get the other hand loose and I'm off the bed so fast I nearly go down on the marble. My clothes are scattered across the floor where they left them. My fingers shake so badly the joggers twist wrong around my legs twice before I get them on. The shirt catches over my head and for one humiliating second I'm trapped in fabric and darkness and grief, choking on my own panic.

Not him. Please, not him.

Jackson's smile flashes through my head and the nausea surges.

What if he knew it was a trap and came anyway?

What if he walked into this house already knowing?

The lock clicks.

Terror crashes back through me so fast it hurts. I back up until my legs hit the bed.

The handle turns. The door opens quietly.

And Harris steps inside.

For one disoriented second I just stare at him. He's pale under the hallway light, his hands trembling as he closes the door behind him, his eyes darting back the way he came before they find mine.

"Come."

Hope hits so hard my knees nearly go.

"There's no time, miss." His voice is rough with panic. "The guards are occupied with the sheriff and his men."

I have to grip the bedpost, because my body can't process the whiplash fast enough. One second I'm grieving him. The next⁠—

He's alive.

He's still fighting.

I follow Harris out without asking a single question.

The house has changed… somehow no longer a dead place. It feels alive, but for all of the wrong reasons. Somewhere below us men are shouting. Boots thunder across floors. Doors slam hard enough to echo down the long white corridors, and the whole place has the feeling of something that's been kicked open.

War. Jackson brought a war into his own house.

Harris moves fast for a man his age, guiding me down hallways I've never seen. "Keep close," he whispers, and I nod, and my eyes go everywhere at once—every shadow, every sound, every corner he might be standing behind.