EMBER’S POV

“THEY WERE QUIET.” The scream tears out of him, the gold in his eyes BLAZES, the claws punch through on both hands, and the chair creaks under the force of his body going rigid. “They were so quiet, and I still found them and the boy LOOKED at me, Ember, he looked at me right before I—”

He can’t finish. The sound that replaces words is something I hope I never hear again as long as I live.

The sound of a man’s soul hitting a wall it can’t survive, and the impact echoes through every room he’ll ever walk into for the rest of his life.

He...