Chapter 1

I knew she was dead before they found her body.

I had felt it when the bond snapped–an indescribable, unendurable pain that brought me to my knees and tore my throat raw from screaming. I had woken up to Christian stroking my hair. The hospital wing had been filled with injured guardians and Moroi, but I had been allowed a small cot in the corner.

To my surprise, the bright red hair of Ms. Hathaway was the first thing I saw. She was sitting on the floor next to my cot, rocking back and forth slightly. And I knew. I just knew.

"You're awake," she had breathed. "You're alive." I stared at her unblinkingly, waited for her to say it. In all my years of knowing Ms. Hathaway, she wasn't one to shy away from the truth. I needed her to say it.

And she did.

The screaming in my head started then and hadn't stopped since. Even now, in the silence of the church, the volume in my head was deafening. She was dead. She was dead and I was the worst sort of alive, the leftover sort of alive. She was gone. Just like mom, just like dad, and just like Andre. I had so many holes in my life it was a wonder I was even still alive at all.

The service portion of the funeral passed by in a blur. My only thought throughout the service was that Rose probably wouldn't have even believed in half of the things Father Andrew was saying. A few people spoke, but I heard nothing come out of their mouths. Just the ringing infinite loop that Rose was dead. She was dead and I was never going to see her again.

I only realized the church service had ended when Christian and Ms. Hathaway stood, their kind eyes waiting for me to do the same. I didn't. Ms. Hathaway and Dimitri and some of the other guardians left the pew to carry her coffin, squeezing my shoulder and murmuring some kind platitude I didn't listen to. If I had a little more courage, I would have stood up. If I had a little more courage, I would have left with the rest of them to watch her be buried. But I'm weak, and I've always been weak. So I let Christian kiss me on the forehead and tell me to take my time. That it was okay if I wasn't ready to say goodbye yet. He'd be outside with the others when I was. I nodded, knowing it was a lie. I'd never be ready.

As the seconds and minutes and hours ticked away, I felt further and further from alive. A piece of my heart and soul had been ripped out, leaving some sort of husk behind. A husk currently lying on a church pew, breathing in lemon-scented furniture polish and wishing I was dead, too. Even the strain in my shoulders from the hard pew seemed to fade away in the endless sea of pain I was lost in.

I must have gotten dressed somehow and gotten here, though I don't remember it. My parents and Andre's funeral had been a blur as well, though Rose had been the one to dress me and hold my hand and remind me to eat. She was my anchor, always understanding how I was feeling, and knowing when to push me or give me space. She wasn't here to do that anymore. Nobody would ever replace the hole she left.

I had buried people before, which is the worst part. I thought after mom, dad, and Andre that it would somehow get easier to bury people I loved. Like I could build up enough tolerance after a huge loss that my heart would be too strong to crack anymore. But that's not true. It hurts every time. And this pain…. This was hell.

There was no peace in the silence of the church, just as there would be no peace in watching Rose be buried. There would be no peace for me ever again. At least the church was safe. Rose had spent countless evenings in my room, sleeping in my bed. Church was clean of her. It was where miracles were supposed to happen. But I knew this protection was paper-thin. Rose was woven into me, a core part of who I was. Without her, I knew that my threads would begin to unravel. Perhaps they already had.

Through the church walls came a sudden loud whine of an engine, which my sluggish brain couldn't process the source of. I peeled my husk-body from the pew and peered out through the stained-glass window, searching for the machine. I instantly wished I hadn't. It was a bulldozer, the scooper filled with thick grave dirt. It was rolling clumsily over to the open grave, the scooper shedding dirt like drops of blood on the grass.

Of course, I thought. So many guardians and Moroi had fallen that there weren't enough extra personnel to dig the graves by hand. It wasn't fast enough. A hysterical giggle erupted from somewhere within me.

They were burying Rose. They were burying her. There was something different about seeing her coffin and seeing it buried underground, six feet of space separating us forever. I fought the urge to scream at them to stop, but I was frozen. I could only watch as the bulldozer dumped its load of dirt into the six-foot hole that I knew contained her. My best friend. My bondmate.

I could see the backs of a thick circle of people watching Rose's burial. For a moment, I thought about running out of the church, pushing my way through the crowd, and jumping into the pit to lay with her forever. Maybe they'd bury us together and I wouldn't ever have to live a day without her. That was how it was always meant to be.

The crowd was beginning to disperse, and I noted with growing horror that someone would be back soon to check on me. Someone would try to force me to talk and to eat and to see her. To say goodbye. And once I said goodbye, that would be it. It would be over. She would stop being a person and become a "was," become a "body" instead of a person. She wouldn't become my guardian at the end of our final year. Vomit rose in my mouth as I realized that as I grew older, she'd start decomposing. That one day, there would barely even be bones left of the girl who had shared my soul.

Before I realized I had made the decision to run, I was out in the cool night air with no destination in mind. There was no room left in my head for anything other than the pounding, aching pain that grew louder with every heartbeat. My feet were moving faster, away from the sounds of mourners and towards the first quiet place I could think of.

Unfortunately, my pursuit of quiet brought me immediately to the last person I wanted to see–Ralf.