But nothing happens. Just like it hasn’t for the past three meal trays.
Itdidthough. The proof lies in those clustered pieces beneath my bed.
I needed to keep those molded bits visible so that I don’t forget it really happened. Because whatever Una is doing to me is making my mind jumbled and my truths harder to see.
I know that magic was real. Just like I know there’s something crawling in my head. Una can say there isn’t, but thereis.
I feel it. Feelthem.
Like they know I’m thinking about them, the things suddenly squirm, making my neck crick and my skin shiver unpleasantly.
I want these fucking thingsout.
I curse at my hands, at my magic, at this gray cuff around my ankle.
Although I don’t remember all the details with perfect clarity, I know I released power and rotted the bread. I know my hands went slick with dots of liquid gold while I was furious and lashing out.
Even though I’m not screaming and pacing, it doesn’t mean I’m not angry. That anger is still there, waiting just below the surface. It’s the silt beneath the sea. The sharp teeth beneath the rabid foam.
But there’s something stopping it from rising up. Something more than just this cuff at my ankle. I just don’t know what it is. I don’t know why I was able to do it in the first place. Or why I’m here.
Why can’t I remember anything?
Panic starts to spiral in my gut, but I can’t let it. I can’t be swept up, or I fear I’ll drift away completely.
So I keep trying. For hours.
I lose track of time within the confines of this cell. Lose awareness of everything else but what I’m trying to do. Of the magic I’m trying to call.
I feel it there, so why won’t it come?
The green window begins to peel back the night, and daylight lightens the cell. It paints a lawn across my floor. Grass growing where roots can’t sprout.
Gritting my teeth, I squeeze my eyes shut.
Focusing. Grounding. Gripping myself from the inside with a forceful clutch.
“I am Auren Turley,” I whisper.
I know that with innate certainty, and so long as I have this truth, I can find the rest.
Iwillfind the rest.
And I think the key to doing just that is piled upon the floor in decayed crumbs.
Closing my eyes, I take a deep breath and forget about being trapped. Instead, I embrace the calm tingle of morning as the sunlight breaks in. In meditative quiet, I rummage through the deepest parts of me until I uncover my festering fury.
It’s ready, just waiting for me to call to it.
So I do.
I let it warm me, and as soon as I tap into it, the burn begins to spread. Surprise catches my breath, but I force myself to focus. My shoulders snap back, jaw tightening, teeth biting.
“I am Auren Turley,” I say, firmer, louder this time.
It doesn’t matter that there’s no one but the dark to hear. I say it again. And again. I let the warming ire heat my words until they singe my lips.
Within that flaming mantra, I think of the way that rotting power felt. The way it streamed from my slick palms and infested the doughy lump.
