from me by making them difficult to understand to keep from breaking his promise that he’d never lie to me.
“Is that why I’ve been so upset for no reason since yesterday evening?” I demanded. “Because I don’t think it’s coming from me. No, scratch that. I know it’s not coming from me. It’s you. Something’s up with you, and it’s big and it’s bad, and you’re not telling me, dammit!”
“I’m very sorry that this has affected you, Cora,” he said coolly. “I would do anything to spare you the least mental disturbance, if I could.”
I squeezed my eyes shut. If he’d been in front of me right then, it would have been very hard not to punch him. But he wasn’t. I was on campus, and he was...wherever he was. And in such terrible danger that I could taste it.
“Take me home,” I said abruptly.
“What?” he asked, a note of surprise jolting through his stonily neutral tone of voice.
“You heard me. Take me home. I want to be where you are.”
“No, Cora.” The iciness of his words froze my heart over the phone. “You must stay there. I’ll see you on Friday, as we’ve already arranged. Not a moment before.”
“You can’t do this, Dorian,” I said. “Whatever it is that you’re doing, you have to stop!”
“We have no laws, but we have customs, and they are the only thing that prevents the old times, the bad times, from returning,” he said flatly.
Just then, class ended, and students began to pour out of the rooms on either side of the hall, their joking and chatting creating such a din that I had to strain to hear him.
“I know that these proceedings will be difficult for you, but it will all be over soon, one way or another,” he continued. “And then we can attend Hattie and Jean’s funeral in peace and continue to strengthen our side against the enemy.”
I started to protest. “But—”
“No ‘buts,’ Cora,” he said. “I will send for you on Friday. And I will see you. I promise. Whatever it takes.”
He was gone.
Looking pale herself, Clarissa escorted me back to my dorm, and with a quick, meaningless quip, she left me there alone with the shifter guard outside my door.
I paced the empty apartment until I thought I’d wear a track in the carpet. As the time edged closer to six o’clock, I forced myself to slow down long enough to start dinner. I ripped open the frozen bag of a skillet dinner and poured it into a frying pan. And just as I heard Lisette’s key in the door, I doubled over and fled to my bathroom, where I vomited my guts into the toilet.
The pain was a hammer on my body, beating out my brain, flowing down my throat and into my belly, where it sent everything else rocketing up again, over and over again. Never had I felt anything like this before, not even when I’d suffered the conversion that had rewritten every cell in my body. Never could I have imagined that someone could bear this and survive.
“Cora?” Lisette said from the doorway. “Cora, what’s wrong? Can I do anything for you? Get you anything? Call for help?”
I shook my head before another spasm took me, and I leaned over the toilet, not caring that I was clutching its rim in both hands, not caring about anything except the pain that wracked my body—and Dorian.
Dorian, Dorian, Dorian. Something terrible had happened, something unspeakable, and I was helpless in the mere backwash of his pain.
How much more must he be in?
I tried to fumble for my phone, but another wave of nausea struck, and then I was beyond all thought or reason for a very long time. My existence was pared down to nothing but my agony and the spasms that seized me, shot through with terror whenever there was enough of my mind left over to feel anything but pain.
During a brief respite, I came to myself long enough to register the cold rim of a glass being pressed against my lips, water sloshing into my mouth. I swallowed reflexively and then groaned, and my eyes focused on Lisette’s worried
“Is that why I’ve been so upset for no reason since yesterday evening?” I demanded. “Because I don’t think it’s coming from me. No, scratch that. I know it’s not coming from me. It’s you. Something’s up with you, and it’s big and it’s bad, and you’re not telling me, dammit!”
“I’m very sorry that this has affected you, Cora,” he said coolly. “I would do anything to spare you the least mental disturbance, if I could.”
I squeezed my eyes shut. If he’d been in front of me right then, it would have been very hard not to punch him. But he wasn’t. I was on campus, and he was...wherever he was. And in such terrible danger that I could taste it.
“Take me home,” I said abruptly.
“What?” he asked, a note of surprise jolting through his stonily neutral tone of voice.
“You heard me. Take me home. I want to be where you are.”
“No, Cora.” The iciness of his words froze my heart over the phone. “You must stay there. I’ll see you on Friday, as we’ve already arranged. Not a moment before.”
“You can’t do this, Dorian,” I said. “Whatever it is that you’re doing, you have to stop!”
“We have no laws, but we have customs, and they are the only thing that prevents the old times, the bad times, from returning,” he said flatly.
Just then, class ended, and students began to pour out of the rooms on either side of the hall, their joking and chatting creating such a din that I had to strain to hear him.
“I know that these proceedings will be difficult for you, but it will all be over soon, one way or another,” he continued. “And then we can attend Hattie and Jean’s funeral in peace and continue to strengthen our side against the enemy.”
I started to protest. “But—”
“No ‘buts,’ Cora,” he said. “I will send for you on Friday. And I will see you. I promise. Whatever it takes.”
He was gone.
Looking pale herself, Clarissa escorted me back to my dorm, and with a quick, meaningless quip, she left me there alone with the shifter guard outside my door.
I paced the empty apartment until I thought I’d wear a track in the carpet. As the time edged closer to six o’clock, I forced myself to slow down long enough to start dinner. I ripped open the frozen bag of a skillet dinner and poured it into a frying pan. And just as I heard Lisette’s key in the door, I doubled over and fled to my bathroom, where I vomited my guts into the toilet.
The pain was a hammer on my body, beating out my brain, flowing down my throat and into my belly, where it sent everything else rocketing up again, over and over again. Never had I felt anything like this before, not even when I’d suffered the conversion that had rewritten every cell in my body. Never could I have imagined that someone could bear this and survive.
“Cora?” Lisette said from the doorway. “Cora, what’s wrong? Can I do anything for you? Get you anything? Call for help?”
I shook my head before another spasm took me, and I leaned over the toilet, not caring that I was clutching its rim in both hands, not caring about anything except the pain that wracked my body—and Dorian.
Dorian, Dorian, Dorian. Something terrible had happened, something unspeakable, and I was helpless in the mere backwash of his pain.
How much more must he be in?
I tried to fumble for my phone, but another wave of nausea struck, and then I was beyond all thought or reason for a very long time. My existence was pared down to nothing but my agony and the spasms that seized me, shot through with terror whenever there was enough of my mind left over to feel anything but pain.
During a brief respite, I came to myself long enough to register the cold rim of a glass being pressed against my lips, water sloshing into my mouth. I swallowed reflexively and then groaned, and my eyes focused on Lisette’s worried
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