Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil

by V.E. Schwab

“How did he die?” she asks. The widow’s smile widens. “Slowly.”

“A name is like a dress. It might be by nature pretty or plain, but it is the person wearing it who matters most.”

“Strange, isn’t it?” she says. “The more you taste, the more you want.”

“One can be alone without feeling lonely,” she muses. “One can feel lonely without being alone.”

“Don’t be me, Bones. Just be you.” The bonfire crackles. Alice swallows. “But I don’t know who that is.” “That’s okay.” Catty cracks a smile. “You’ve got all the time in the world to find out.”

drink. “One thing you learn when you live as long as we do, is that nothing’s permanent. Who you were isn’t who you have to be.”

Until she drops something small and bloody in her lap. It takes Charlotte a moment to realize what it is. A human heart. “The one who said please,” says Sabine before tossing two more down on top, “and the two men he’d already told.” Charlotte stares down in horror at the three hearts, nested like bloody little bodies in the bowl of her skirts.

Why does Charlotte stay? That is like asking—why stay inside a house on fire? Easy to say when you are standing on the street, a safe distance from the flames. Harder when you are still inside, convinced you can douse the blaze before it spreads, or rushing room to room, trying to save what you love before it burns.

But Giada isn’t alone. Charlotte has never felt vertigo, or the sickness that comes over bodies at sea, but staring at the woman on Giada’s arm she feels something like it, the sudden loss of balance, the nauseous rocking of a world unmoored. Sabine.

Fear and panic begin to bubble up, but instead of shoving them back down, Alice lets them boil over, spill into the air around her as she tips the last of her mother’s grave dirt into one of the glasses, and pours the blood over the top.

“Sorry, I’m tired … What did Mum used to say?” A sigh. “I know, you don’t remember … something about tired minds being good soil for bad thoughts. How the best thing you can do is go to bed. Bet I’ll wake up, and feel brand new.”