Chapter 16 · Names on the Wall

The first name hit the station wall hard enough to crack three dead screens at once.

NORA VANE.

Big white letters. Clean. Bright. Way too calm for a tunnel full of screaming ghosts.

I stared at it from the edge of the platform, one hand locked around the old iron rail beside me. The rail was freezing. So cold it burned my palm.

Then the name repeated.

NORA VANE. NORA VANE. NORA VANE.

Every black screen in the station blinked alive. Ticket machines. Ad panels. The busted arrivals board over Platform Three. Even the little map display by the maintenance closet.

My name was everywhere.

"Well," Vera said behind me, because apparently she had decided this was a normal thing to say around a nightmare subway station. "That answers one question."

I turned on her so fast the ghosts nearest me recoiled.

"What list is that?"

Vera stood ten feet away with salt fire crawling over her gloved fingers. Her coat had been ripped open at one shoulder. Blood darkened the sleeve underneath. She looked pissed, tired, and way too interested in the screens.

"The active ledger," she said.

"That means nothing to me.