view out the window of the evergreens and the road by heart. She could list every object that sat on the table by the window.
So many people had told her to go home. But she stayed. She stayed, even though it hurt. Because her father had been there for her when she needed him, so she had wanted to return the favor.
He had ceased to be responsive in the last day. It was astonishing to her that even though she had sat in that hospital room for three days straight, even though she had held her father’s hand a thousand times in that endless stretch, she knew when he was going to leave her.
And as she sat down to hold his hand again, he stopped breathing.
Just like she had back then, she started to cry. She always cried at the memory. She figured she always would. The droplets rolled down into her hair. I don’t want to die.
“Neither do I. Very few people honestly do. Even those who think they want to embrace the end of their lives…are merely seeking a change that’s denied them any other way. They choose death because they feel that is the only thing left in their control.” He sighed. “Sorry. I’m getting philosophical again.” He stroked her temple, brushing her tears away with his thumb. “I wish I could do something, Cora. With every ounce of everything that I am, I wish I could. But I’m too weak. Too starved. My link to this world is too weak. If you had the Key, or…” He shook his head. “It doesn’t matter.”
It’s okay.
“No, it’s not.” He chuckled. “None of this is ‘okay’ by any stretch of the imagination.”
But sometimes, intention is what matters. The darkness was starting to come for her again. She couldn’t breathe enough to stay conscious. She tried to fight it off.
“I suppose.” He smiled sadly. “No, no. Don’t try to stay awake. Let it come. Let these moments pass through you. Watch them go like a stream. If you fight it, you’ll hurt yourself. I’d hate for you to lose your mind before the end. But it’s all right if you do.”
I don’t want to die. I don’t want to lose my mind. I don’t—
The periods of blackness had started. Simon sighed. He kept jerking awake as his body flicked the switches back on, hoping for the circumstances to have changed. Life, death, life, death, life, death…it was boring.
It was excruciating.
But it was mostly boring.
He had stopped screaming. At least for now. He couldn’t help it. Sometimes he came out of that deathly place just to find himself already hollering. He yanked on his hands, trying to free his wrists from where they were bound to his waist. If he could just get them loose—if he could just climb up the rope—he could get free.
But it hadn’t worked thirty-eight years ago.
It wouldn’t work now.
And so, he hung there. Blood pounding in his ears. Every muscle in his body aching. At least his ankles had healed…small favors.
Cora had yet to make a noise from down in the pit. There was no telling how far away she was. A hundred feet? Two hundred? Ten thousand? Perhaps she had fallen straight to hell. Perhaps Lucifer himself was now sitting beside her, chatting away with her over a cup of tea.
Why did that make him jealous?
Because if she can love me, she can love the devil himself.
Anger rose in him. He snarled and thrashed, but it did no good. It never did; it never would, but it didn’t stop him from hating everything that had ever happened to him. “Why?” he ground out. “Why make her love me? Why thrust her on me like this? I never asked for her. I never wanted her. You gave me a puppy! Me! I can’t even be trusted with a houseplant.” He didn’t even know who he was shouting at. Harrow Faire? God? The devil? At himself? Like everything else, it didn’t matter anymore. “I didn’t want her. I was happy as I was!”
“You’re lying to yourself again.”
He struggled on the rope until he spun around to see his shadow up on the wall near him. The sun was up, sending rays of cheery amber light streaming into the tower. The observation deck up above had a grated floor, and it cast a checkerboard pattern along the wood wall and stairwell beside him. His shadow was there, with his jagged eyes and frowning toothy mouth. “Shut up, you