Prologue

The dreams always started the same. A dark room. Blood red curtains. Peering out from behind them, looking into the shadows. The figure of a man, furiously writing. They always ended the same way too. With death. Each time it was different, yet somehow she could remember them all with great clarity.

Jeers and screams and taunts. Loud voices, getting louder and louder. Then, the stones. Everywhere. Her knee, her toes, her chest, her ears. Pain. Explosions behind her eyes. Oblivion.

Whispers in the silence. The soft slicing noise of an oar cutting through water. A tower, silhouetted against the midnight-blue sky. A violent push. A splash. Hands scrabbling near the surface, desperate for something to hold onto. Lungs compressing, heart beating wildly. A weight on her leg. Pulling her under

Lying in an earthen coffin. Showers of dirt falling on her, like rain. The sun, disappearing behind the brown clumps of earth. Cocooned in an airless hole, 10 feet underground.