The boss died with one hand still reaching for me.
I kept moving. Three sidesteps, a backward roll, another attack that struck nothing. Only when the body stopped did I loosen my grip on the controller. The health bar was empty. Even the music had changed; without the drums, I could hear a delivery truck reversing below my window.
VICTORY
I leaned forward. Seventy-two hours, and I still didn't want to blink through whatever came next.
TRUE ENDING—
The line stopped there.
I waited with my thumb over the menu button. My coffee had gone cold again. The damp towel on the radiator was beginning to smell, and somewhere below, in an otherwise ordinary Chicago street, the truck finished backing up. I thought I remembered those same three beeps from yesterday. I had probably been sitting here then too.
Save first.
The menu wouldn't open. I pressed the button again, harder, as pain began to gather beneath my breastbone. I meant to put the controller on the desk. There was a glass beside the keyboard, and I reached for that instead, catching the rim badly. Water ran under the keys.
My phone was just beyond it. I woke the screen and tried to touch the emergency-call icon. A wet thumbprint appeared beside it.
I tried again.
Something hit the floor. The controller, I thought, although I could have sworn I'd put it down.
---
When I reached for the desk, my hand closed on a fold of cloth.
I lay still with it in my fist. Dark beams crossed a high plaster ceiling, their edges caught in red lamplight. I tried sitting up and felt a sharp pull beneath my ribs. The room tipped; I shut my eyes until it steadied, then looked again for the monitor. There was a curtain where it should have been.
My phone wasn't there either.
I put two fingers against my throat. The pulse was fast enough that I lost count and started over. While I was counting, words appeared above the bedclothes.
HOST STATUS AVAILABLE
I closed my eyes. Opened them. The words remained. I blinked until my eyes watered, then held one hand behind the letters. They stayed in front of my fingers without throwing any light on them.
That was when I noticed the hand.
Long fingers, clean nails, a thin white mark along the inside of the wrist. I turned it over and looked for the kitchen burn near my thumb. There was no burn. The thumb itself was too long. I bent it, slowly at first, then several times in a row. It did exactly what I wanted.
I pulled the blanket back. A bell cord hung beside the bed. Across the room were a wardrobe, a washstand and a mirror angled away from the door. I could reach the washstand if I held on to the furniture. Whether that was a good idea seemed less important than getting something cold against my face.
The carpet swallowed my feet. Using the bedpost, then the edge of a table, I made it across. The jug was heavier than I expected and the first splash went down my sleeve. Black silk darkened at the cuff. I drank from my hands; the water tasted faintly of metal, and some of it ran down my chin.
In the mirror, a boy stood dripping over a basin.
Black hair, pale forehead, violet eyes. I knew that narrow mouth. Even before I remembered his name, I saw an academy courtyard, blood in the joints between white paving stones, and the dialogue box asking whether I wanted to reload.
Cedric Valdrake Arkhen.
I brought a hand to my mouth. He did it too. I touched the glass over his face and left a wet print there.
No.
Cedric was seventeen. I was twenty-two. I had rent to pay and a phone lying on the other side of a spilled glass of water. I tried to hold on to those facts while his face looked back at me.
Some routes had let him grow older. In others he'd lost his title, or kept it right up to the point where it failed to save him. There was a guide to his endings. I'd skipped most of it because his deaths weren't relevant to my run.
The words above the bed changed, drawing my eyes away from the mirror.
IDENTITY RECORD: CEDRIC VALDRAKE ARKHEN
ORIGINAL FATALITY SLOTS: 47
CLEARED: 0
I read the number twice. Then I looked at the zero, as though that might be the part I'd misunderstood.
COMMENTARY: Familiar conduct is advised.
I was still staring at it when the door handle moved.
My shoulders drew back. My chin lifted, although all I wanted was to bend over the washstand again. An older attendant came in carrying a folded garment. He glanced at my wet sleeve and the puddle around the basin. His eyes passed through the lettering without stopping.
"My lord. Shall I call for assistance?"
He held the garment a little tighter. I didn't know what happened to a man who asked Cedric an unwelcome question. I didn't know whether this was one.
"Leave it."
He stopped where he was. I pointed to the garment, and he laid it on the bed, smoothing a fold with the side of his hand.
"His Grace expects you at dinner tomorrow. The usual hour."
Tomorrow gave me a little room to breathe. Then I remembered the Duke.
"Send someone when it is time."
The lamp hissed while the attendant considered that.
"Of course, my lord."
He bowed and went out. I waited until his footsteps had faded and another door closed farther down the corridor, then crossed the room and turned the key.
The mirror had shown almost nothing of the doorway. I moved out of its line and tried the lock again. Solid. Beyond the high windows, a wall enclosed a dark garden; past it were lights in buildings I couldn't name. I pressed my palm to the glass and said my street number under my breath. I still knew it. I could picture the cracked pavement outside, the truck squeezing past the parked cars.
Nothing moved beyond this window.
The lettering followed when I turned away. I would have to look at it properly. I would have to do something before dinner. For now, I dragged a chair to the door and wedged it under the handle, then lay down where I could watch it.
The Duke could probably break the chair without slowing down. At least I would hear it.