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Finally, he stands and claps a hand on my shoulder. Guilt punctures through the numbness. I should tell him I love him. That I appreciate him trying to keep me from losing myself. I should have him tell our younger brothers I’m sorry.

But the words stay buried, and he walks away.

I rise. The thrones loom heavy with a legacy that I was never suited for. Unfortunately, I’m my own person, despite what I’ve been born into. I was built to unravel. To break things, including myself.

I step to the edge of the stage and drop down with practiced grace.

Home is a haunted place, a manor filled with generations of leaders and their ghosts. I cannot become the next king of this doomed dynasty.

There is only one way to silence the grief and the burden.

I must join the ghosts of Highstone Manor.

Morning light burns when I exit the safety of the building, and I remember, instantly, why I prefer being below ground. It shouldn’t be this bright so early. The fog won’t last long before it’s scorched away, but the humidity will strangle what it leaves behind.

Still, I want to embrace the beauty of my town one last time, so I brave the journey and drag out my despair. Away from the river, boots grinding into the steep path carved through the bluff. Painted Lady Victorian homes jut out of the rock on either side, gaudy relics of a place that once prided itself on its sense of class.

When I make it to the top of the bluff, I pause and look back. The entire town could have been mine, if I wanted it. Every last building. Each one of its citizens pledging their lives to me. But responsibility bores me. Give me the adoration, the reverence, the worship. Spare me the chores.

I only wish I could see how they’ll suffer my loss. How they’ll reel from the passing of Edwin Harold Crotavere, mere weeks before turning thirty-five, whose life burned so fiercely even Death will need time to understand what he has taken.

Oh, that’s good. I should have left it in my note.

The sky brightens over the river, splashing sick blues over the lush greenery of the woods, tearing holes in the darkness I cherish. Even the birds flock here to fuck, starting up their obnoxious little chorus, shrill enough to drill behind my eyes.

The church is impossible to ignore. It was built to be noticed. A gothic monstrosity with its stained-glass windows and pointed arches, trying too hard to pretend it belongs among the cathedrals of France. I’m grateful for the woods shielding our home from its sanctimonious stare.

Mist curls around the cemetery as I enter. I pick my way through the lonely graves, careful not to step on anyone. Our family mausoleum rises from the ground in all its grandeur, built for a family that can’t even rot quietly. More than twice the size of the others and overly opulent. Fit for the kings and queens who rest there. My mother, for instance.

A weeping angel stands next to the door, forever shedding tears over the loss of the Crotaveres. What a tragic fate.

I pull on the locked door as though it will welcome me in. A space in there is waiting to be filled. My fingers wrap around the metal in my pocket, and the revolver emerges. I’m ready to stain the family name in a way that belongs solely to me.

The deadly calm is interrupted by a breeze that doesn’t rustle any leaves. The corn behind the cemetery stands still. Only a wisp of wind crosses my face.

I turn towards the strange current.

And she rises.

A girl pushes up from a grave like an apparition forced out of the earth. She glows pale and trembling in a tattered cotton gown. Dawn splits its first rays around her, pushing her forward like she belongs to me. Her naked body is a silhouette beneath fabric covered in the muck of whatever battle she fought to get here.

For a second, I think death has finally come for me in a form I can worship. She’s an angel fallen to earth, here to save me whether she knows it or not.

Long dark hair clings to her face. Gray eyes shine with a hidden ferocity that glints like a blade. Those delicate hands stained with blood reach out to me, shaking. Tears carve clean tracks through the dirt on her cheeks.

She looks wrecked and dragged through hell, like every good thing the world denied me.

“Help me.” Her voice breaks on the plea and cracks straight through my chest.

I forget the gun in my hand, the plan I came here with.

For the first time in longer than I can remember, the misery goes quiet. There is only her.

This girl is what I would have prayed for if I still believed in anything. A celestial creature forced into flesh and suffering. Sent to me, of all people. Wings clipped and bloody.

A moment ago, death was the only certainty in the world. Now it’s an afterthought.

Awe chokes the words in my throat. I step towards her anyway, captivated by the exquisite tragedy of her, by the obscene way her pain makes her shine.