Lorelei

The first explosion shook me out of a restless sleep.

I sat up in bed, my heart already pounding, my ears ringing with the force of it. For one terrible moment, I thought it was the fire again—that I was back in that burning room, choking on smoke, watching death creep toward me.

But this was different. This was louder. Closer. Wrong.

Another explosion followed, and this time I felt it through the floor, through the walls, through my bones. The window rattled in its frame. A ...