The phone would not stop.
It buzzed against the bedside table, stopped, buzzed again, and kept going. James surfaced through it slowly with his face in the pillow, and his first thought was Maeve. Or Finn. Something about yesterday, about Ciara, about the thing they had left on the table in the founders' room without deciding.
He reached out and turned it over.
The lock screen was full. There were news alerts stacked on top of each other, RTÉ, the BBC, the Irish Times, and the Guild Zero staff channel showing forty-one unread. Messages had come in from people he had not heard from in months. *Are you ok. Are your family ok. James are you all safe. Tell me you weren't in town last night.*
He sat up.
The top alert said: *EXPLOSION AT DUBLIN FESTIVAL. MULTIPLE CASUALTIES.*
The one under it said: *MINISTER FOR DEFENCE FOUND DEAD IN CITY HOTEL. GARDAÍ TREATING DEATH AS MURDER.*
