“Here’s the thing.” I looked around again. My neck was starting to hurt from so much looking around.

“What?” Miles asked as we rode to the hotel in the car Mary had assisted us in renting.

Gate drove, and it was obvious from the way he kept muttering to himself that we should’ve just taken a taxi, or whatever it was they called them overseas. It had seemed like the safer bet at the time, rather than running the risk of a driver overhearing us speaking of things best kept to ourselves.

I was starting to wonder if we hadn’t signed our own death warrants.

“What the hell is a roundabout?” he asked, panicking. He must have figured it out, though, because we went into it with little trouble and what seemed like a minimal about of honking from the cars around us.

“What’s the thing?” Miles prompted. I’d almost forgotten I’d started speaking, so great was the concern over losing my life. Half a day on a plane, my legs cramping all the while, for us to die in a car accident.

“Oh. I was going to say, here’s the thing: no matter how many times we looked at the maps online, nothing could’ve prepared me for this.” Maps sat still. They didn’t live and breathe. They didn’t speed down the wrong side of the road—to us, at least, if not to the other drivers.

It wasn’t just the driving. We were in a new world. It was one thing to watch the miles of land surrounding our mountain slowly grow over time, dirt roads making way for paved roads, cottages making way for hotels and apartment buildings. Even that had been disconcerting. But this?

I wasn’t sure I’d recognize our childhood home if we drove straight up to it.

Miles seemed to be reading my mind. “What do you think? First thing in the morning?”

“I know I need some sleep,” Gate announced.

“Me, too. I rubbed a hand over the back of my neck and marveled at how discombobulated I was due to the time change.

It hadn’t been that way during the trip over—but that was different. Our ship, stronger than any at the time thanks to the enchantments place on it, took weeks to cross the ocean. I had completely lost track of time during the voyage, but I certainly hadn’t felt the same half-sick, half-exhausted sensation I suffered while racing over foreign roads in the back of a rental car.

“Do you want to make it to the hotel alive?” Miles asked, leaning over the back of the seat in front of him.

Gate ignored him, or pretended to.

I closed my eyes and sank into my thoughts rather than monitoring our progress. It was easier and less nauseating.

We would explore the countryside in the morning. Even half-dead with sluggishness, and still stiff as a board from being cramped up on that damned plane for so long—couldn’t we have sprung for first class?—I couldn’t help but feel a slight touch of excitement when I imagined going back to the cave.

The first cave, the cave that had been my home from the time of my birth. And not just one, but a series of interconnected caverns and tunnels which allowed every branch of that massive original clan to live together while existing somewhat separately. Each branch of the family to itself.

We’d lived together always, us guys and our parents and other siblings. Plus the extended family. I hardly remembered most of them anymore, not even the sisters who had made my life miserable the way only sisters could. Their faces were nothing but a dim memory for me. I didn’t even know if they were alive anymore—no matter the reason for our losing the heartbeat, if the clan had perished or what, I didn’t know if the rest of my family had managed to survive prior to that.

“Do you ever think about them?” I queried, without opening my eyes.

“Who?” Miles asked.

But the way he settled back against the seat told me he knew exactly who I meant. It wasn’t like us to discuss our feelings or memories or anything that really mattered. But chances were, we’d have to start talking about things soon.

“You know who.”

“Honestly? I don’t. Not anymore. Is that wrong, do you think?”

“I don’t know. It probably isn’t. It’s been a long, long time. We’ve had our own lives, apart from theirs, for a long time. Much longer than the amount of time we spent with them.”

“I suppose.” He fell silent for a moment before saying, “What do you think we’ll find out?”

“I’d rather not think too much about that,” Gate piped up from the front seat.

“I’m in agreement. It’s better not to let our imaginations get away with us.”

We already had. It made no difference if I warned us against it when we’d harbored opinions and concerns for weeks, ever since Pierce first noticed the absence of the heartbeat. How could any of us hope to keep our thoughts from running away after that? It could only mean one thing, probably: the death of the clan.

Perhaps I was being a bit morbid.

Who would do it? There were groups out in the world whose existence I never would’ve dreamt of. Like the group who’d blackmailed Carissa into delivering Cash’s blood by kidnapping Tommy. The poor boy had recovered well enough from the ordeal—he was resilient, for sure—but Carissa still woke up screaming at least once a week, reliving the nightmare of finding him gone.

None of us had been aware of that group’s existence until that point. It was one thing to know our blood was potent, special, but another to find out there were others who were just as aware. And willing to stop at nothing to get their hands on it.

Had our original clan fallen prey to them? Or a group like them? Or perhaps they’d been killed flat-out, simply for the fact that they existed? No matter how I warned myself against jumping to conclusions, it didn’t matter. I’d already jumped. I’d practically leaped.

So had they. It didn’t matter how they denied it. We all had ideas about what we would find. No wonder none of us was in any hurry to get started. If the clan was gone, no more, there would be no reason to rush.

And we might be walking straight into our very deaths.