Page 53 of Hallowed Bones

“Did you think you were?” Reyes asks.

“Crazy people don’t know that they’re crazy,” I murmur. “Right?”

There’s the creak of a floorboard, and I know it’s not Ezra before I look up. Ezra makes no sound when he moves. They’re right—he’s like a wraith. Silent and deadly. The world around wouldn’t dare betray his presence.

It’s Reyes who appears in my periphery and then comes farther into my line of sight, his lips twitching as he looks down at where Lyall is nuzzling his snout against my thighs. “You’re about as crazy as the rest of us,” he tells me, a self-deprecating smile gracing his lips.

“So, insane, then?” Cameron replies, sarcasm lacing his words. “Certifiable?”

“Shut up, Cam,” Reyes and Ezra both bark at the same time. Their response has me stifling a laugh.

Crazy or not, they’re just as normal as I am, I realize. Or, I guess, just as abnormal.

Reyes steps over Lyall’s tail to take a seat in the chair closest to us. “Did you start having dreams and seeing monsters before your parents died?”

The question is innocent enough, but I stiffen at the reminder, flicking my gaze from Lyall and back to his. “How do you know about my parents?”

Reyes steeples his fingers together and rests his elbows on his knees. “We did our research on you, Haven,” he tells me. “We don’t go around telling everyone what we are. We had to make sure that you were what we thought you were.”

My jaw aches with how tightly my teeth are clenched. I inhale a breath and slowly release it, loosening the muscles to offer a reply. “Before,” I confess. “But not by much. It started a few weeks before my eighteenth birthday. A weird dream.”

“Did you tell your parents?” Reyes asks.

I shrug. “This was a year ago,” I remind him. “And the fire that killed them happened not long after the first dreams started. I might have mentioned the dreams to my dad, but if I did, he certainly didn’t tell me about any of this.” I wave my hand in an all-encompassing gesture to the room and the four of them.

My fingers fall back to the wolf in my lap, curling into Lyall’s fur. The steadiness of his heartbeat reverberates against my palm. It’s grounding, the action of stroking him from the top of his skull to as far down his spine as I can reach.

“It’s normal for someone who’s been through a traumatic event to lose some of their memories,” Cameron says. “The mind is an incredible muscle, but its purpose is simple—to keep its host from breaking. Sometimes forgetting is healthier than remembering.”

I close my eyes, not wanting to admit that he could be right. It does make me wonder, though—was there something worse than the fire that night? Did something else happen?

“I don’t even remember getting out.”

The words fall from my lips like they were wrenched out by force—torn straight from the hollow place I keep locked tight behind ribs and silence. They’re pulled from somewhere deep inside of me. As soon as the words are out, I wish they’d remained buried.

Another soft creak pulls my gaze to the corner. Cameron’s there now, in my line of sight as he moves closer and perches on the arm of Reyes’s chair. His stare pins me down, not unkind but unsettling in its intensity.

“Can you tell us about the night it happened?” he asks. “Anything you remember—even if it’s murky—could help.”

It should scare me, that question. But it doesn’t. If anything, it feels like a lifeline in the middle of the chaos clawing around inside me. A distraction from the static of my own head.

“It’s pointless,” I say. “Because I don’t think you’re right. I don’t have powers. I can’t shift or control things or even send those monsters away.” The confession tastes bitter. Like rot. I shake my head, fingers knotting in Lyall’s fur. “I can see things. That’s it. I can’t fight them.”

A low sound rumbles from the wolf in my lap. Lyall shifts, lashes parting to reveal one gleaming eye, his pupils blown wide with irritation. His upper lip peels back in a silent snarl, fangs flashing in the candlelight like he’s pissed off for me.

I meet his stare and raise a brow, completely unimpressed.

He grunts.

“Oh, fuck off.” Even as I say the words, I reach up and scratch behind his ear, because why the hell not? Might as well soothe the giant, murderous furball before he bites someone.

His leg twitches. Just a little. Like some Pavlovian bullshit that makes me want to smile against my will.

Do not laugh. I grit my teeth. But goddamn, it’s funny.

Because the thing currently laid out across me like a goddamn Great Dane in a horror movie is actually a fully grown man—a witch, no less. Probably the same man who flirts like a problem and fights like a monster.

And he’s wagging his tail.