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Micah's fingers closed around my throat before I could even say his name.
His hand wasn't strong. Not really. He was shaking too hard, his wrist cut raw where the black chains dug into him. But fear gave him enough. My back hit the stone floor, and the air punched out of me.
"Micah." I grabbed his wrist. "Hey. Hey, it's me."
His eyes were black.
Not dark brown. Not shadowed. Black all the way through, like somebody had poured ink behind them.
"Don't let her near me," he rasped.
The words weren't aimed at me.
They were aimed at Elias.
Then Micah's grip slipped. He jerked like the chains had yanked every nerve in his body at once, and he crashed sideways across my legs.
"Micah!"
I caught his shoulders before his head hit the floor. The black chains around his chest clattered against the stone. They weren't normal chains. They moved when nobody touched them. Little metal links crawling over his shirt like bugs.
Elias dropped to one knee beside us.
"Move," I snapped.
"Nora—"
"I said move."
He stopped with his hand half raised.
Blood ran down the side of his face from where I'd hit him earlier. Good. Let it sting.
Behind him, Vera stood near the broken ritual circle with one hand tucked inside her long black coat. Like this was a meeting she had scheduled between lunch and dinner. The room smelled like old ash, wet stone, and the copper stink of blood.
The gate was behind her.
Or what passed for a gate.
A split in the air. Taller than a door. Wider than it had been ten minutes ago.
Gray light leaked through the crack, cold and flat. Faces pressed against the other side every now and then. Not clear faces. Just mouths. Eyes. Pale hands dragging over something I couldn't see.
And whispering.
Not to Elias.
To me.
Nora.
I clenched my teeth.
Micah made a broken sound in his throat. I looked down fast.
His eyes were brown again.
"Micah?"
He stared at me like he didn't know where he was. Then he saw my hands on him.
His whole body locked up.
"No." He tried to scramble backward, but the chains pulled tight. "No, no, no. Don't—"
"It's okay," I said. "You're okay. I'm here."
"Don't touch me."
That landed worse than the throat thing.
I pulled my hands back slowly. "Fine. Okay. I won't touch you. Just breathe for me."
He laughed once. Tiny. Ugly. "You always say that when you're scared."
"Yeah, well, I'm scared now. So breathe."
His eyes cut toward Elias.
"Why is he here?"
"Long story. He sucks. We'll get into it later."
Elias's jaw tightened.
I didn't care.
Micah looked at Vera, and every bit of color drained out of his face.
"She has Daniel," he whispered.
I looked at Elias.
He didn't deny it.
Of course he didn't.
Vera smiled at Micah like he had said something clever. "Daniel's fine. For the moment."
"Where is he?" Elias asked.
His voice was low. Too low.
Vera's smile stayed put. "Still asking questions like you have leverage. That's adorable."
"Where is my brother?"
"Alive." She tipped her head toward Micah. "Unlike some people who will not stay that way if we keep wasting time."
The chains on Micah's ribs tightened.
He gasped and doubled over.
I was on my feet before I thought about it. "Stop that."
Vera looked bored. "I didn't do anything."
"Bullshit."
"The chain responds to stress. The boy is frightened. You should probably stop making him frightened."
I took a step toward her.
Elias caught my elbow.
I ripped free. "Don't touch me either."
His hand dropped.
For one second, I saw it on his face. Not anger. Not even surprise.
He expected it.
That made me want to hit him again.
"You knew," I said.
"Nora—"
"You knew Micah was tied to your family. You knew they were looking for him. You knew something was wrong with me too, and you just kept feeding me half-answers like I was supposed to say thank you."
"I knew there was a chance," Elias said.
"That's not better."
"I didn't know Vera had found him."
"You brought her to us."
His eyes flashed. "I spent three months keeping her away from you."
"And how'd that work out?"
The room went quiet except for the gate.
It sounded like breathing now.
Slow. Deep. Wrong.
Micah curled around himself on the floor. "Nora."
I dropped beside him again, keeping my hands visible. Not touching. "I'm here."
He looked at me, then past me.
"The dead people are loud," he said.
My stomach turned.
"You can hear them?" I asked.
His mouth trembled.
"Not like you. I don't hear words. I hear..." He swallowed. "They scream when it opens."
Vera's expression sharpened for half a second.
Elias noticed too. I saw it in the way his shoulders went still.
"What opens?" I asked.
Micah shook his head hard.
"The thing behind her," he said.
He pointed toward the gate without looking at it.
The gray light pulsed.
Every candle around the ritual circle blew out at once.
I jumped. Couldn't help it.
Darkness swallowed the room, except for that leaking cut in the air.
Then something whispered right beside my ear.
Not my name this time.
Run.
I spun around.
Nobody there.
Just stone walls. Rusted pipes. Old chalk marks under a smear of blood.
Elias had moved closer to me. Not touching. Smart man.
"Did you hear that?" I asked.
"No."
"Someone said run."
Vera let out a tired breath. "The dead love drama. Don't listen to them."
"Funny," I said. "Coming from a woman holding a ghost door open."
"I'm keeping it controlled. There is a difference."
"Sure. And I'm the mayor."
She ignored me and looked at Elias. "You have until sunrise. Bring the ring to the circle. Bring the girl. Let the gate settle into its proper anchor, and Daniel walks out breathing."
My fingers went to the ring before I could stop myself.
The silver band sat tight around my thumb.
Elias had put it there in the alley after the blackout started. A cut on his palm. A cut on mine. Blood pressed together while he told me it was the only way to keep the ghosts off me.
Three days, he'd said.
Three days tied to him.
I hadn't known he was tying me to this.
"Take it off," I said.
Elias looked at the ring.
Then at me.
"I can't."
"Try harder."
"Nora, if I break the pact wrong—"
"What? I die? Micah dies? The city fills up with dead people? Pick one."
His mouth pressed into a hard line.
That was answer enough.
I laughed, because the alternative was screaming. "Wow. Great. Nice job explaining the terms."
"I was trying to get you through the night."
"By lying?"
"By not letting Vera find you."
"She found me anyway."
Micah flinched at my raised voice.
I shut up.
For him.
I crouched close again. "Sorry. Sorry. I'm not mad at you."
He didn't look convinced.
That hurt too, but I swallowed it.
"Can you stand?" I asked.
Micah stared at the chains around his body. "They won't let me leave."
"We'll figure it out."
"No." His gaze slid toward Elias. "He knows."
I looked up.
Elias had gone pale under the blood and grime.
"What does he know?" I asked.
Elias said nothing.
"Elias." My voice came out flat. "What does he know?"
Vera answered for him.
"Your brother isn't merely attached to the gate, Nora. He's holding one side of it shut."
Micah's breath caught.
"Shut up," Elias said.
Vera smiled. "You were going to tell her eventually, weren't you?"
"I said shut up."
The lights over the ritual circle flickered once, then exploded.
Glass rained down.
I threw an arm over Micah's head. Tiny sharp pieces hit my sleeve and bounced off the stone.
Elias stepped in front of us, one hand raised toward Vera.
The mark on his palm glowed red.
Vera's smile faded.
"There he is," she said softly. "I was wondering how long you'd pretend you were still harmless."
"Undo the chains."
"No."
"Undo them."
The air around Elias's hand twisted. The gray light from the gate bent toward him, stretching thin like smoke caught in a vacuum.
The chains around Micah rattled.
Vera's eyes narrowed.
"You really want to do this while Daniel is still breathing because I allow it?"
Elias froze.
There it was. The leash.
Vera saw it too. She smiled again, smaller this time.
"That's what I thought."
I looked from Elias to Vera.
He'd told me enough about Daniel to make the guilt make sense. Seventeen years old. A ritual. A choice. His little brother or another boy.
He'd saved Daniel.
Someone else died.
Now Vera had Daniel in a cage somewhere, and she knew exactly where to press.
I hated that I understood his face.
I hated him more because I did.
Micah started whispering.
At first I thought he was praying.
Then I heard the words.
"Don't look at it. Don't look at it. Don't look at it."
His gaze was locked on the gate.
I moved into his line of sight. "Micah. Look at me."
He didn't.
"Micah."
The gray split in the air widened with a wet tearing sound.
A hand pushed through.
Not all the way. Just fingers. Long, gray fingers with nails ripped down to black stubs.
They scraped across the stone floor.
Vera took one slow step back.
That got my attention.
She wasn't scared of much. But she was scared of that.
"Close it," Elias said.
"I'm trying," Vera snapped.
"You're feeding it too much."
"The key is unstable."
Micah cried out as the chains jerked him backward.
His nails scraped stone. I grabbed his forearm on instinct.
The second my skin touched his, pain shot up my arm.
Not a cut. Not a burn.
A whole memory slammed into me.
Micah at eight years old, sitting on the kitchen counter with chocolate frosting on his nose.
Micah at fourteen, pretending he wasn't crying after Dad's funeral.
Micah three nights ago, standing under a streetlight in the blackout, staring at something behind me.
Then another memory crashed over it.
Not mine.
A little boy screaming inside a white chalk circle.
Elias, younger, on his knees with blood on both hands.
Daniel crying for him.
A woman saying, Choose.
I tore my hand away with a gasp.
Elias stumbled too.
He grabbed the side of his head like he'd been hit.
Our eyes met.
He'd seen it.
He'd felt Micah's memory through me.
"The pact," I said, breathing hard. "It shares memories now?"
"It shouldn't," he said.
"Well, it does."
Vera looked suddenly interested. "Oh. That's new."
"Don't," Elias warned.
"You blood-bound her without knowing what she was." Vera laughed under her breath. "Elias, you really are your father's son. Always grabbing the knife first, then checking who it's stuck in."
"What am I?" I asked.
Nobody answered.
The hand on the floor twitched.
Micah screamed.
The chains snapped tight and dragged him another foot toward the gate.
I lunged after him.
Elias caught me around the waist.
"Let me go!"
"Nora, don't touch him!"
I fought him hard enough that my shoulder popped. "He's my brother!"
"I know."
"Then let me help him!"
"You can't."
I twisted around and shoved at his chest. He didn't let go.
"Why?" I yelled. "Why can't I touch my own brother?"
Elias's face broke for one ugly second.
Not physically. Worse.
Like he had the answer and hated every piece of it.
Micah was on his knees now, pulled toward that gray opening. His hands clawed at the floor. Blood streaked under his nails.
"Nora," he sobbed.
I stopped fighting Elias.
"I'm here," I said.
Micah looked over his shoulder.
His brown eyes were gone again.
Black. Empty. Terrified.
"Get out," he screamed. "Get out of here! Don't let her near me!"
The gate answered with a roar of voices.
Elias's grip locked tighter around me.
"Micah!" I shouted.
My brother pointed at me with a shaking hand.
Not at the ring.
Not at Elias.
At the center of my chest.
His face crumpled as he whispered, "It's not opening for me anymore."
The gray light spilled across the floor and crawled over my boots.
Micah's finger kept shaking.
"Nora," he said, staring at my chest like he could see through bone and skin. "It's already open inside you."
Something knocked from behind my ribs.
Once.
Hard.
Then again.