One day, Skyler Dross knew, they would've gone too far. She'd always felt Lulu's gravity, ever since that first day in a rowdy seaside tavern. A flashfire temper that spoke nothing of the danger beneath amber eyes, laying quiet and still until the right input awakened it from its slumber.

They'd barely scratched the surface of each other's psyche. Their dance had always been shallow, born out of curiosity, recklessness, danger. And Skyler had known it would only be a matter of time before one of them pushed too far, stepped over some invisible line.

She'd never thought it would be her.

Lulu's invasion of her mind and the nightmares that had come along with it, Skyler knew had been instinctual - but it'd happened all the same. This, what had just happened, what Skyler had done, had been a momentary decision, tequila-born and equally as wise. A nightmare where a nightmare had been due.

Captain Dross wouldn't go back to the festivities that night. She'd go out to sea, far away from land, and brush her fingers over her aching forehead. She'd deserved it. And in the quiet of the stars and the sea she'd think to herself.

She's alive. She's alive. I didn't kill her. She's alive.

Skyler wouldn't have been able to live with herself otherwise.

Lulu Flint