“Gotta love all that blood magic I unintentionally fused you with every time I shoved Hyde back in the box,” Talbot mumbles, while getting comfortable on the ground. “Curse-breaking gypsy freak monster. It’s like you try to call for attention, even while you clearly attempt to blend into the crowd. Devious monster indeed.”

“Anyway,” Violet cuts back in, “she’s her and I’m me. We’re not the same people. It’s very important you know that.”

“I’ll play whatever game you want, sweet monster,” Arion says, smile still fixed to his eternally happy face.

Anna sighs with clear romantic bliss etched on her face, as she floats above him in her original underwear ensemble.

Violet exhales in annoyance.

See? Constant contradiction.

“Women really are just as fucking complicated as I’ve always thought,” Damien observes aloud, seemingly lost in genuine thought, as he studies Violet and Anna.

“Especially the young ones,” Talbot states in agreement.

Violet spins on her heel, and we all watch her start walking away, shaking her head as she goes. Her face is burning red, because this is genuinely embarrassing for her.

She’s still Violet.

She has that insanely disconcerting monster—to put it mildly—inside her, but she’s still Violet. She can’t even bring herself to really look at me yet. She keeps focusing more on the other three, because she’s always the most worried about what I’m going to have to say.

Possibly because I’m the one who’s supposed to be in charge of this forever-long shit show.

“Wow,” Damien says, shaking his head in mild disbelief, even as his own grin becomes more blissful with each passing second.

“Where’s the vampire beta? I need her help with something,” Talbot says, lifting from the ground.

Arion snatches him by the collar, pulls him back, and slings him against the wall. “If you’re referring to Shera, you need to know one thing: If she’s harmed while in your presence, I’ll deliver your head to Damien.”

Damien shrugs. “Fair enough. I’ll fight him on it when you’ve given me a reason to care that much,” Damien tells him. “For now, I don’t trust you enough to put my hat in the ring with this fast fucker.”

Talbot smirks at Arion with so much arrogance that it makes me immediately uneasy.

“No need for threats, Mr. Vampyre,” Talbot says, far too at ease under Arion’s threatening look.

Arion’s eyes narrow in suspicion.

“The vampire has my protection, simply because she’s too stupidly brave to stay alive on her own. I can respect the loyal type, given the many times I’ve been betrayed. I’m also the protective type. I’m a damn good beta that way,” Talbot says, removing Arion’s hand from his shirt with some strained effort.

Arion doesn’t strain, which proves he’s not resisting too much. Still, I watch and analyze Talbot’s every move.

Talbot turns and leaves, and Arion waits until we hear the door shut before he speaks.

“I really don’t trust him, and he’s much stronger than he looks. Not to mention, he’s a blood magic witch, as well as an incubus, who has—”

His words cut out, and we all stare at the floor. Two of us stare with shock. Two of us stare with shock and horror.

Idun’s body is sliding across the floor. Well, at least her torso from the neck down to her waist. The triplets are giggling as they walk beside it, somehow rolling it across the ground.

I think.

Or maybe Idun is rolling it where they told her to go?

Look away for one damn second, and something else is already happening. I need a fucking moment to process at least one motherfucking thing before the next thing happens.

“My head hurts,” Emit says to me.

“I hate that you’re the only one I can relate to in this moment,” I tell him very honestly.

“Same,” he answers, taking a step back when Idun’s legs come inching by.

“Maybe we should worry about Talbot later and focus on our all-powerful girlfriend for a little while,” Damien suggests, scratching his head when Hansel and Gretel start throwing breadcrumbs at Idun’s legs.

“Where’d the bloody vampire go?” Emit asks.

Hell, I didn’t notice him missing.

I start to go, when I see Clyde’s severed body inching by in the same fashion as Idun’s, only his head getting bounced around like a soccer ball…

His eyes are wide and furiously bloodshot.

His flesh is burned.

His teeth are all missing…

“Surely you didn’t think Idun was the only one who was going to have to take a fall,” Anna states, suddenly appearing right in the middle of the three of us.

“Daddy Neopry was right by her side, patting her on the head like a good pet, and goading her along every step of the way. Everyone blamed you for that monster. Violet saw things differently,” Anna says, rubbing her hands together with glee.

I want to argue, but…can’t really argue. Clyde’s fucking terrible, but the only one who pays him any mind is Idun. To us, he’s a washed-up has-been who never-really-was.

Cold.

Jaded.

Cruel.

A man who kept his soul after he’d already blackened it with stains of the darkest, most selfish of sins.

Arion’s a compassionate priest all over again by comparison to Clyde.

But Clyde’s mostly powerless without Idun.

I take a step back, examining the entire scene. Clyde, the proudest man who never could understand he was nothing and nobody, the man who hated his children for being embarrassing, and the man who supported every vile act Idun ever committed with the utmost pride, has his eyes frozen in terror.

At the risk of it sounding like a bad pun, he looks like he’s…seen a ghost.

“It’s been a very busy twenty-four hours,” I decide to say.

Warily, I follow Emit and Damien. They’re following a convoy of severed body parts that is moving down the hallway. It’s embarrassing the way we creep behind the scene with wild confusion and baffled intrigue.

She’s turning us all into jokes. Even I feel more ridiculous than I’ve ever felt.

Idun’s a fucking joke.

Idun’s. A. Fucking. Joke.

She’d never allow this. Her heart’s intact. She’s still conscious.

She’d have already brutally tortured us all before she’d let this happen. Only Violet’s in the business of letting things happen.

If Idun could stop this, she’d have already done it.

“This is really happening,” Emit says, echoing my thoughts.

I’m sharing a wavelength with the fucking mongrel, while he’s naked and perched at a lean.

The barbarian is the only one struggling alongside me to truly take this in.

The world truly has ended. It ended last night, and now it’s starting all over. It’s also spinning in a completely different direction.

“Yes. Yes, it is,” I murmur in response.

Somehow, though I’m not sure how, we turn the corner and realize we’ve lost the convoy. Almost immediately, children’s laughter echoes down the hallway, and another trail of breadcrumbs appears.

Even though we can no longer see them, Idun’s and Clyde’s shared fear is palpable from here, though the apples are slowly masking the scent. We follow the breadcrumbs all the way to a distant stairwell I never noticed on the blueprints.