Chapter 7 · He Saved the Wrong Things

I wake up not knowing where I left my keys.

That's the thing that hits first. Not the stone floor under my back or the cold or the fact that I'm still wearing yesterday's blood. It's the keys. I had keys. I think. To something. A door. My door.

I can't remember what the door looked like.

"You're doing that thing again." Nyx is standing over me. His avatar's shadow falls wrong—too sharp, too many angles. "Where you try to hold onto something that's already gone."

I sit up. My head pounds. "How long was I out?"

"Fourteen minutes. You died to the Shade-Sworn pack on the north ridge. Quick death. Clean." He tilts his head. "You didn't fight back."

"I was tired."

"You were testing if I'd let you stay dead."

I don't answer that. Mostly because he's right.

He crouches down beside me. His coat drags on the ground. Up close I can see the way his textures glitch when he moves—little skips in the render, like he's fighting the game engine just to stay coherent. "What did you lose this time?"

"Nothing important."

"Liar."

I meet his eyes. Gold. Bright. Wrong.