I felt the wail in my throat, in reverse. It was tangible, and the sensation was eerie. Downright creepy. It was like swallowing smoke, if smoke were sharp. Prickly, as if it were bound in thorns.

When I’d swallowed all but the thinnest, most insubstantial thread, I felt a smile spread slowly from the corners of my mouth to my cheeks, then into my eyes. I heard only a ribbon of sound, so faint it could have been my imagination. My shoulders slumped as an odd peace filtered through me, settling into each limb. I’d done it. I called up my wail when I needed it, and restricted it on my own terms.

I opened my eyes, already grinning at Harmony. But my grin froze, then shattered before my gaze had even focused.

Harmony smiled back at me, curls framing her face, her dimples piercing cheeks that should have been rosy with good health and good cheer. But now they were gray. As was everything else. A hazy, foglike filter had slipped over my vision while I was modifying my wail, like my eyes had been opened farther than should have been possible.

The Nether-fog. A veil between our world and the Netherworld.

A female bean sidhe’s wail allows her—and any other bean sidhes near enough to hear her—to see through the fog into both the human world and that other, somehow deeper one simultaneously. Or to travel from one to the other.

My head turned, my eyes wide with horror. I wanted to learn about the Netherworld, but had no interest in going there!

“Kaylee? It’s okay, Kaylee. Do you see it?” Harmony’s words were smooth and warm like Nash’s, but bore none of the supernatural calm his could carry. Harmony and I shared a skill set, and while Nash’s voice could soothe and comfort human and bean sidhe alike, ours summoned darkness, and heralded pain and death.

Nash and I were two sides of the same weird coin, and I didn’t like wailing without him.

My heart galloped within my chest, skipping some beats and rushing others, unable to find a steady rhythm. My palms dampened with sweat, and I rubbed them on the threadbare couch cushions, both to dry them and to anchor myself to the only reality I understood. The only truth I wanted any part of.

“Kaylee, look at me!” Harmony stroked my hand as she leaned to the side to place herself in my field of vision. “This is supposed to happen. I’m right here with you, and everything is fine.”

No-no-no-no-no! But I couldn’t speak as long as that last thread of sound still trailed from me. I could only glance around in panic at the fog layering Nash’s house like a coat of dust too fine to settle. It hung in the air over Harmony’s battered coffee table and old TV, darkening my world, my vision, and my heart.

My pulse raced, and each breath came faster than the last. I knew the pattern. First came the gloom, then came the creatures. I’d seen them before. Beings with too many or too few limbs. With joints that bent the wrong way, or didn’t bend at all. Some had tails. Some didn’t haveheads. But the worst were the ones with no eyes, because I knew they were watching me. I just didn’t know how….

Yet no creatures appeared. Harmony and I were alone in her house in the human world, and somehow alone in the Netherworld.

With that realization came the calm I craved. My tension eased, and my wail faded, thoughts of Emma’s death melting into my memory to be used again when they were needed. Or better yet, forgotten.

The haze cleared slowly, until Harmony came into focus. Her hair looked more golden than ever, her eyes much brighter than I remembered in contrast to the drab shades of gray that had covered her moments earlier. “You okay?” she asked, forehead pinched with worry.

“Yeah. Sorry.” I rubbed both hands over my face, tucking my own limp brown strands behind my ears. “I knew it was coming, but it still scared the crap out of me. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to that.”

“Yes you will.” She smiled and stood, motioning for me to follow her into the kitchen. “It gets easier with practice.”

That’s what I was afraid of.

Harmony waved an arm at the round breakfast table, and I pulled out a ladder-back chair with clear finish chipping off the back and one missing rung while she headed for the oven. The timer blinking above the stove was counting back with thirty-eight seconds to go, and it never failed to amaze me how Harmony always knew when it was about to go off. That timer had never once interrupted one of our lessons, and none of her treats had ever come out over-or underdone.

Unlike the cookies I’d baked two nights earlier.

“There’s soda in the fridge.” She slid her hand into a thick glove-shaped pot holder and pulled the oven door open.

“How ’bout milk?” I like milk with my chocolate.

“Top shelf.” She pulled a glass pan of brownies from the oven and slid it onto a wire cooling rack on the counter. I took a short glass from the cabinet over the sink and filled it with milk, then sat at the table again while she poured one for herself.

“So, explain to me why I needed to learn to do that?” I sipped from my glass, suddenly grateful for cold, white milk, and all things normal and this-worldly.

Harmony shot me a sympathetic smile as she slid the carton onto the top shelf of the fridge, then swung the door shut. “It’s mostly to help you learn to control your wail. If you can manipulate it on your own terms, you should be able to avoid screaming your head off in front of a room full of humans.”

Because humans tend to lock up girls who can’t stop screaming. Trust me.

“But other than that, it’s helpful to be able to peek into the Netherworld when you need to. Though, I wouldn’t suggest trying it unless you have to. The less you’re noticed by Netherworlders, the easier your life will be.”