Chapter One

CHAPTER ONE

ALIX

There's a box of room-temperature Pinot Grigio sitting on the nightstand of my hotel room, next to my wedding rings and my silent, near-dead cellphone. I reach over, and turn the plastic spout on the side of the box, filling my Marriott-branded water glass all the way to the brim.

The wine tastes like depression. Like "fuck you." Like three liters for $11.99 at the gas station down the street from my hotel.

Fumbling drunkenly for my phone, I check again to see if I have any texts or missed calls. Nope. Nothing has changed in the three minutes since I last looked, and I don't know why I thought it would. I open social media and robotically scan my feed, scrolling past all the people I went to high school with, and their perfectly posed happily-ever-afters. Even worse, are the relentless ads for strollers and baby toys.

See? Even my algorithm knows I'm a mess; twenty-eight, married and childless, probably heading for divorce.

My targeted ads are working as hard as the family photos from former friends to remind me that I should be grown up by now. I should have my life together. I shouldn't be lying on my back in a cheap airport hotel, getting drunk by myself.

I guess no one told the algorithm that three hours ago, my life fell apart.

My own happily ever after came crashing down around me when I walked into the small music store I run with my best friend, Jenna, and found her fucking my husband up against my desk.

I stared at them, completely dumbstruck and weirdly, the only thing I could think about was how they were getting cum all over my keyboard. Is nothing sacred anymore?

Then, Jenna looked up at me. We made eye contact over my husband Ryan's shoulder, and in that moment I knew I'd lost everything. My husband. My best friend. My job–since there's no fucking way I'm running a business with the woman who betrayed me. And, most painfully of all, I lost any shred of dignity I had left.

Happily-ever-afters are bullshit.

My phone vibrates, and I look down at it too fast, causing my head to spin and my wine to slosh out of the glass and onto the ugly red and gold hotel bedspread. I'm expecting to see a text from my husband, Ryan, or maybe an apology from Jenna.

No such luck.

"Mom" flashes across the screen, and I groan audibly. I shouldn't answer–not when I've been drinking, and definitely not after what happened today–but I do, anyway. "Hello?"

"Hey, hun," my mom says too cheerfully.

I lean my head back against the headboard, closing my eyes. Why? Why did I answer?

I would rather chew glass than tell my mom what happened. Invariably, she will manage to make my devastation about her. Like, this is my fault. Like, my husband cheating is a reflection on my mother's failure to raise me right.

"Alixandrea?" Mom asks. "Are you there?"

I squeeze my eyes shut tighter. "Yeah, I'm here."

Mom pauses, and I hear the sound of her lips smacking. "Are you alright? You sound off."

I sound drunk, is what she means. Ooph.

I sit up straighter, and push one, long brunette curl out of my face. "I'm f-fine. I was asleep when you called."

"Oh. Well, I'm sorry to bother you, then, but it's important. Nana had an accident today.."

I sit straight up in panic, and drop my glass so that it spills all over my lap. Sticky, lukewarm wine soaks through my jeans and into my panties. "Fuck!"

"Alixandrea! Don't be vulgar," my mother chastises, sounding scandalized.

"Sorry," I mumble, using the edge of the hotel bedspread to mop up my lap. "I was just, um, startled. What happened to Nana? Did she fall or something?"

"No, nothing like that," my mother says, her tone tight and disapproving. "She just…well, it became very clear at her book signing this morning that she's really getting too old to be making public appearances."

I frown. Technically, my mom is a stay-at-home-wife to her second husband, Kevin. In reality, she travels often, acting as a second assistant and caregiver to my famous-author grandmother.

My Nana is Isabelle Reading, world-famous author extraordinaire. The mother of modern fairytales, and the peddler of happily ever after. Her most famous book, A Kingdom of Thorns, is a pop culture phenomenon, which has followed me everywhere I go for my entire life.

Unfortunately, growing up surrounded by stories of magic and true love hasn't done shit to give me my own happy ending.

"What happened at the signing?" I ask, forcing my wandering mind to stick to the topic at hand.

My mother gives a long suffering sigh. "I'm sure you'll see the whole thing on social media later. I'll send you a link. Watch it when we hang up."

My eyebrows raise. God, what could have happened that was bad enough to summon the keyboard warriors? "Okay…" I say uncomfortably. "But is Nana hurt?"

"No, not physically," mom scoffs, sounding annoyed. "But I'm worried she shouldn't be living alone anymore. I've decided to move her into a nursing home."

My head spins. This is not the sort of conversation to have when I've just drunk a third of a box of wine, and I can't remember all the appropriate questions to ask. Where is the nursing home? Is there anything I can do? Instead, I chew on the inside of my lip and ask: "What about her house?"

Mom sighs. "Well, we're obviously going to have to sell it."

"What does Nana think about that?"

Mom brushes off the question like it's nothing. "She's not capable of making that decision right now.

"Hmmm. If you say so."

Nana is one of the last eight residents of a rural Pennsylvania mining town. It's almost literally a ghost town, since a mining accident back in the eighties caused a huge underground fire that made the land completely uninhabitable. No one is allowed to move there, and for the last forty-ish years the government has been trying to incentivize the last of the original residents to move. It's a liability, I guess, for anyone to stay there. But even after my grandfather died, and Nana made all kinds of money from her books, she's never been willing to move.

I doubt she'd agree to leave now, but I guess it's my mom's decision, not mine.

"Anyway," Mom continues briskly. "I was actually hoping you could help out."

"With what, exactly?"

"Nana is staying with me for a few days until we can find her a retirement facility, so of course I can't leave the city right now. I was wondering if you could possibly head over to the house? I need to know what kind of condition it's in, and someone will have to sort through Nana's papers and things."

I furrow my brow as I stare at the slatted curtains of my hotel, and the shitty view of the dark parking lot beyond. "I don't know, mom…"

"Alix, please," Mom whines. "Don't think of it as a favor for me. It's a favor for your grandmother."

I chew on the inside of my lip. Mom and I aren't close, but I have to give her credit for knowing how to appeal to my better nature. She only uses my preferred nickname when she wants something, and she knows I love Nana and would do anything to help her.

Also, I think as I glance around my cheap hotel room, my mom might not realize it, but she couldn't have called at a better time. I don't have any job to get to in the morning, or a husband who will wonder where I've gone. All I want is to escape, and this trip would be the perfect opportunity.

"Sure," I blurt out impulsively. "I'd be happy to help."

"Really?" Mom sounds equal parts shocked and relieved.

"Yeah. Except…" I wince, embarrassed. "I can't afford the plane ticket."

My mom waves that away as if it's nothing–and to her, it probably is. "I'll get you a ticket. Do you think you could leave tomorrow morning?"

"Sure," I say again. "Whatever you want."

She pauses, as if suddenly remembering something. "Don't you need to ask Ryan?"

I grimace, and frantically search for an excuse for why my husband's opinion on my sudden trip doesn't matter. "No, Ryan won't mind. He's picked up some new hobbies recently that I'm sure will keep him busy."

"Alright," mom says distractedly. "If you're sure."

I assure her that I will be at the airport bright and early tomorrow morning, and we hang up. I take another large swig of wine. I already half-regret agreeing to go. hate Pennsylvania–hate being within 100,000 miles of my home town–but as of today, I think I hate Chicago more. "It's better than staying here," I mutter out loud. "And you're doing a favor for Nana."

Without thinking, I grab for my phone again and unlock the screen. My heart leaps when I see the tiny red "1" next to my text icon, and I immediately dive in, hoping for a message from Ryan.

Disappointment crashes over me, when I realize it's just the link my mother sent me earlier. I guess I may as well watch it now, when I'm suitably drunk. Whatever it is will only seem worse in the morning.

I grimace as I open the link, taking in the 3,000+ comments and 1.5 million likes and shares. It's a short video, clearly shot from someone's cell phone. The text across the top of the video reads: "I saw Isabelle Reading melt down at North East Fantasycon."

Oh God. This is going to be bad, I can feel it.

In the video, my grandmother is sitting at a long rectangular table on a small stage. Even in this grainy footage, it's clear to see that Nana is beautiful. She looks barely sixty, instead of her real age–88. Her long silvery hair is pulled back in a low ponytail, and she's smiling widely. There's an interviewer sitting adjacent to her, and in the background I spot Nana's personal assistant, and my mother, both tapping away at their phones.

Someone taps on a microphone and the interviewer introduces Isabelle Reading, celebrated author of the world's best loved fantasy romance: A Kingdom of Thorns. I fast forward ten seconds, too anxious to wait.

"I'm sure you get this question all the time," the interviewer says excitedly. "But where did you get the idea for the world of Ellender?"

"A dream," I mutter automatically. "She had a dream about a beastly prince in a castle made of roses, and started writing the book the next day."

It's an answer I know well. One I've heard Nana give at least a hundred times, if not more.

But, this time, she doesn't.

Nana looks out into the crowd, squinting as if she's blinded by the bright lights. Her wide smile falters, and she reaches up to shield her eyes. Am I seeing things, or is she swaying slightly? After a long moment of silence the interviewer repeats her question.

Nana's smile slips, her expression darkening. "I saw it."

The interviewer keeps grinning. "Yes, you first saw Ellender in a dream, right?"

"No," Nana says a bit sharply. "I saw it with my own eyes."

There's an outbreak of whispering in the crowd. The interviewer furrows her brow in confusion. "Yeah, I'd imagine it must seem real to you after all this time. It's been fifty-five years since your first ever book was published, that's a whole lifetime!"

Nana glances sideways at the interviewer, but it's as if she's looking through her, not at her. "It was real," she says, more urgently this time. "I barely escaped."

"Right," the interviewer says, her smile faltering slightly as she tries desperately to regain control of the interview. "So–"

Nana cuts her off. She stands abruptly, her chair screeching backwards across the stage. Her voice rises with anxiety. "He's coming. He's coming for me."

Out of the corner of the frame, my mother darts onto the stage. Mom bends down in front of Nana, whispering urgently to her before grabbing her arm and trying to pull her away from the microphone.

"You don't understand!" Nana's voice trails off as mom pulls her further away from the mic. "The fire won't stop him forever. The beasts are coming! He's coming!"

I close the app with a click, not wanting to see any more.

For a moment, I stare in shocked silence at the dark phone screen. What the absolute fuck was that?

Suddenly feeling completely sober, put down my wine and roll onto my side. A shiver of dread travels up my spine. I close my eyes, but I can't seem to get the sound of Nana's terrified voice out of my head.

He's coming. The beasts are coming.