SAGE

Visions?

The word sat wrong in my chest. Like a lie dressed in something holy. If what I had seen were visions, then death had a cruel sense of narrative.

Because the only time the world had ever opened itself to me like that—the only time reality bent and peeled back its skin—was when I was dying, or felt depressed enough.

I laced my fingers together. Visions… No. I had struggled. I had fought my way back from the edge with teeth and instinct and something deeply unnatural screaming inside my ribs.

Blood had been the first thing. Always. The thirst. Not gentle. Not poetic. It tore at me,...