Darby and I lay on her bed while I rocked her to sleep with my arms locked around her. My mind tried to process everything, but it was just a spiraling mess of puzzle pieces that didn't fit together. How could any of this be happening? Darby was only nine. She should be devouring Before Merlin's Beard books and even pining over stupid floppy-haired boy "singers". Not raising dead things in the attic and sporting her first death tattoo.
I pressed my mouth into the warmth of her hair to keep my lips from trembling. My own tattooed arm wrapped around her middle. As soon as Ica had vanished from the school, Darby had gone limp, and I finally scrambled out of the hole to her side.
"I was standing outside next to Dad and looking for you. And then I wasn't," she'd said with a frown puckering the space between her normal blue eyes while I walked her out of the school. "What happened?"