CHAPTER
FORTY-NINE TRISTHE DEATH SERUM smells like smoke and spice, and my lungs reject it with the first breath I take. I cough and splutter, and I am swallowed by darkness.
I crumple to my knees. My body feels like someone has replaced my blood with molasses, and my bones with lead. An invisible thread tugs me toward sleep, but I want to be awake. It is important that I want to be awake. I imagine that wanting, that desire, burning in my chest like a flame.
The thread tugs harder, and I stoke the flame with names. Tobias. Caleb. Christina. Matthew. Cara. Zeke. Uriah.
But I can’t bear up under the serum’s weight. My body falls to the side, and my wounded arm presses to the cold ground. I am drifting. . . .
It would be nice to float away, a voice in my head says. To see where I will g
