The Unlikely Resident of Room 313

Chapter 33

 "Are you alright, sweetheart?"

Racing out of the shadows, Roy wrapped me into a hug without missing a step. I was huddled in a corner of the courtyard just outside the building, the ambulance lights flickering red and white along the window panes of the north-side atrium, EMTs wavering in the smudged windows in bumbling yellow specks.

I was fine. Dr. Jordan on the other hand, he was alive, but that gash and how hard he fell—

I shuddered and made myself smaller against the cold planes of Roy's chest. "We need to find Zara," I said, voice hoarse. "She made the sign fall on him. I mean, I think she did. There's something stuck to her. The dark cloud that we saw at the hotel... I think it's doing something to her."

"I thought it was just a ghost taking interest," Roy admitted. I couldn't help but feel irritated at how dismissive he'd been the day I pointed it out; it was like a cloud of oil over her head. I remember sensing the way it was affecting her. Maybe if I hadn't been so wrapped up in my parents and took some time to investigate, Dr. Jordan would be okay. He'd be an insufferable asshole. But he'd be a healthy, insufferable asshole.

Hearing the thought, Roy pulled away and frowned at me. "We can't be certain it was Zara."

"I'm pretty certain," I countered, and that irritation grew more vicious. "Psychics' intuition. I know we have much bigger fish to fry, but we can't ignore this. What if that thing is connected to the Dark Man?"

There was a nagging feeling in the back of my mind that the thing that clung to Zara came from the same murky otherness that spawned the Dark Man. Not necessarily a part of him; but something related. Something that, if left unchecked, could rot into what he became.

Pulling away, I hugged my arms to my hollowing chest. "I don't want history to repeat itself, Roy."

Beside me, Roy looked ill. Or at least, as ill as a dead person could look. There was a pang of remorse there, and the sudden, violent buzzing of my phone yanked me back from the edge of spiraling.

It was Melody.

"Hello?" I answered. A commotion echoed from the other end. "Melody?"

"What is wrong with you?" Melody's shrill voice said. "Zara!"

I jumped to my feet. "Melody? Melody!" The sound of glass shattering and heavy objects falling answered. And then something else—a breathy, hissing, inhuman laugh that crackled through the receiver and poured icy fear right down my throat. It was half Zara and half demon. And it laughed more when Melody's pained moan followed another hissing snap, the call ending with a deafening click.

"Melody is in trouble!" I said, taking off towards Woods Hall without another thought. My legs were on fire. My brain felt like it was on fire. I didn't know if the twist in my stomach or the tension in my shoulders meant I was going to throw up or breathe fire. Please, oh, please, let her be at the dorm.

Did I have an idea of what to do when I got there? No. But I didn't care. I refused to let anything happen to Melody. In fact, I forbade it. I hoped that whatever lingered behind the Veil could sense it.

Roy shimmered into view ahead of me. His expression was half horror, half madness, and he glowed yellow in the bright sunlight. Behind us, ambulance sirens screamed, and my stomach rolled from the sickening deja vu. It was like the sirens were plucked straight from the morning they found Roy dead in Room 313.

He held his hands up in surrender. "I really admire the determination, sweetheart. But you need to slow down. We don't know what we're walking into."

I stormed past him. "Then help me figure it out, Roy. You're the one who can teleport, remember? Tell me what it is. Get me information. I'll die if something bad happens to Melody."