The first thing I heard was silence.

That eerie, unnatural silence that creeps in just before something bad happens. The mist had thickened outside the crumbling house, curling in through cracks in the stone walls like pale fingers. Even Dante had gone still, his body a coiled spring of tension.

We’d stayed too long. The Russians had regrouped.

His hand found mine—strong, steady, a lifeline in the suffocating dark. “They’re coming,” he murmured.

“How many?” I whispered.

“Enough.”

The word carried a weight I couldn’t name.

---

He moved to the window, peering out through the cracked shutters. I stayed crouched where I was, my pulse pounding like a drum....