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Prologue

Jasmine

Three years ago

Grumbling, I yanked up the sheet. It did nothing to stop the chill across the back of my neck. I’d shoved my lower leg out of the covers before I went to sleep, and now, with it still hanging out, goose bumps prickled over my skin. I slid my foot back under and reached for my quilt, then remembered it was mid-July and my quilt was folded on the chest at the foot of the bed—because I didn’t need it.

Adrenaline spiked through my body, my heart thumping hard in my chest.

I squeezed my eyes shut tighter. Everything was fine.

Just go back to sleep because this isn’t happening. It can’t be.

We were traveling to Roxburgh early in the morning to help my cousins with something involving our family cemetery. I needed a good night’s sleep.

Perhaps I was asleep? Maybe this was a nightmare?

A whisper. Close to my ear. I froze, terror seizing me by the throat, and I choked down my scream. Not a nightmare. I’d prayed to the mother every single day, ever since Zinnia received her gift. I prayed that if she gave me one, it would be different, and then I received my empathic powers—and I thought I was in the clear…

Another whisper. Closer. More urgent. Desperate. My eyes snapped open, and I cried out, recoiling until I was pressed against the wall.

My room was crowded. There were at least ten of them. Souls. All trying to tell me something. Some whispering, some shouting, others unable to do anything but show me, like a grizzly game of charades. Battered and bruised. Insides on the outside. Missing limbs. Mouths open in soundless, tortured screams.

I closed my eyes, covered my ears, but they were relentless. Wishing them away wasn’t going to work. They weren’t going to stop. Logically, I knew that.

Zinnia knew how to control it. She’d mastered her gift, using magic and sigils to quiet the noise, but when a soul was persistent, there was only one thing she could do—listen. Make them feel heard. But I didn’t want to. I didn’t want any part of this. This wasn’t a gift; it was a curse. A living hell. Yet I knew, deep down to my soul, there was no escape from it. The only way to make them go away was to hear them out.

I was breathing so hard, I was on the verge of hyperventilating, and the tight band of fear around my chest wasn’t going anywhere. Slowly, I lowered my hands from my ears and opened my eyes. The ghostly figures swarmed forward, crowding me. I wrapped my arms around myself, sucking down desperate breaths, trying to hear what they were saying.

They were talking over one another, but their fear and horror came through loud and clear.

“P-please, one at a time,” I said, but they weren’t listening. It was as if they’d been waiting for this very moment, waiting for me to acknowledge them, and they were afraid if they didn’t get it out now, they’d never get the chance again.

Ren.

The name filled my mind until it became almost a chant.

Tell Ren. Tell Ren. Tell Ren.

Over and over again, amid their whispers and cries, Ren’s name was said. These souls, they had a message for Ren—my cousin Willow’s familiar.

Their words, the images, rolled into one, and the message became clear.

“I u-understand,” I said, trying to get them to stop.

They didn’t. They came at me over and over again, battering my subconscious with everything they were feeling, that they’d felt during the most horrific moment of their lives. Sharing with me on repeat their grizzly deaths.

I was right there with them. I gasped for breath. “Stop, please. You can stop now. I’ll tell him.”

Their screams grew louder, more urgent, more panicked. Darkness crawled in from the corners of my vision. My heart that had been racing so fast seemed to suddenly stop. I gasped and grabbed for my chest. Thump. My heart took a sluggish beat, followed by a long pause. Thump. Another pause, longer this time. Thump.

The blackness swam forward, my sight fading.

Darkness. Quiet pressed in.

Then there was nothing.

“Jazzy?”