The house by the water burned behind us.
Not like a candle.
Not like the clean, controlled flames on an altar.
It burned like a memory trying to become real again.
Heat chased us down the narrow hall while smoke crawled along the ceiling in black waves. Luca’s hand was around mine, not dragging, not owning, just anchoring me to the one direction where the air had not yet turned poisonous.
"Water," he said.
The word came rough.
His wound had opened again.
I could feel it in the way his grip changed. Not weaker, exactly. Luca Valenti did not seem like a man who knew how to be weak. But there was a difference between strength and blood loss, and I had learned enough tonight to know the second one had started winning.
"You heard your mother," he said. "Run toward the water."
"I heard
