She chomped down hard enough to crush bone, yet I kept it wedged between her teeth with grim determination. Better she bloody my flesh than hers. Then I whipped my head down and sank my fangs into her neck, sucking her blood for everything I was worth.
Marie began bucking as though she’d morphed into a prizewinning bronco. I held on, sealing my mouth over the punctures and swallowing her earthy-tasting blood as fast as I could. Her struggles became more frenzied, and instead of trying to throw me off, she smashed us into the wall. We went through, and while I succeeded in keeping my mouth clamped onto her neck, she raked her arm across the ragged side of an exposed beam before I could stop her.
The small cut it made was enough.
As soon as her blood was exposed, an ear-splitting howl sounded, originating from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. Then pain crashed into me with agonizing waves. For a few moments, I couldn’t think past the anguish as dozens of Remnants tore into me with the ferocity of sharks during a feeding frenzy. Marie took advantage, shoving me back and dislodging my hold on her neck.
Then I remembered how to make it stop. Marie must’ve realized my intention. She grabbed me, trying to shove her hands into my mouth as I had done to her. My need to escape the pain made me stronger, though, and I wrenched my head away.
“Back off,” I rasped, ripping my fangs into my wrist.
Blood dripped in a scarlet trail down my arm, but the Remnants continued to tear into me. Marie seized her chance, wedging her arm between my teeth to keep me from drawing more blood. I tore at it with the same viciousness she’d shown me, but all she did was drag us out of the hole she’d made in the wall. Once back on the staircase, she shoved me onto the steps, leaping on my back to hold me there. With her strength and the Remnants’ assault, I couldn’t free myself.
“I warned you, Reaper,” she growled over the shrieks her creatures made. “You should have left when you had the chance.”
If I had any doubt that she intended to kill me, that erased it. Despair raked me as Bones’s face flashed in my mind. We’d gambled that I’d be able to call the Remnants off if I drank Marie’s blood in order to absorb her power. I’d manifested her abilities immediately last time, but if I had them now, her control over them was too strong.
The Remnants increased their assault, growing stronger as they fed from my pain. Katie’s face streaked across my mind next, her features hazy because the only time I’d seen her face-to-face I hadn’t been interested enough to memorize them. A fresh wave of agony coursed through me, but this had nothing to do with the Remnants’ ripping me apart from the inside out.
Now I’d never be able to tell her how sorry I was that I’d missed the first seven years of her life. Or let her know that Madigan couldn’t hurt her anymore, and that there was more—so much more!—to this world than the ugliness she’d been shown. Or tell her that while she might be alone now, she had not been abandoned, and though she was different from everybody else, in my eyes, she was perfect in every way . . .
That all-encompassing pain stopped. Its absence cleared my mind enough to see shattered glass at the bottom of the staircase. For a second, I was confused. I’d broken in through the door, not the window—
Bones.
I felt his pain before I saw him rolling on the floor covered by the same Remnants that had been tearing into me. With a snarl, I tried to fling Marie off, but a new batch of Remnants appeared, ravaging me with a fresh assault.
“No!” I tried to scream, though with Marie’s arm still wedged in my mouth, only a gurgle came out.
Suddenly, Marie’s movements became sluggish, as though she’d been encased in cement and was trying to break through. Realization dawned, and with it, hope. Bones was using his power on her. Despite the pain that threatened to break my mind as well as my body, I seized the opportunity, flinging myself away from the ghoul queen.
Marie’s arm ripped from my mouth, leaving hunks between my fangs that I spat out. Before I could bite down on my own flesh, however, she shoved her other arm between my teeth, moving so fast that she must have shaken off Bones’s power.
“Kill him,” she roared, her free arm still bleeding from my fangs.
The Remnants began tearing into Bones with greater fervor, increasing in number until I couldn’t see him anymore. I couldn’t hear him, either. The howls they emitted were too loud.
Determination rose so forcefully that it numbed me to the pain. I would not fail my daughter, and I would not—would not!—watch Bones die again.
I didn’t try to throw Marie off this time. Instead, I grabbed the arm she’d shoved between my fangs and pulled with all of my strength.
It tore free, hitting the staircase with enough force to coat it in red. I didn’t pause to savor her scream, but bit my lip hard enough to tear it open.