The darkness receded slowly, lightening a fraction and shrinking back to the first knuckle.
The cell brightened a bit as though a lantern had been lit far in the distance. I looked around—no lanterns.
A hesitant smile lifted the corner of my mouth. A memory threatened to slip free from the chains of my mind, but I couldn’t quite coax it to the forefront.
It would come eventually.
I thought of Ginger’s accident next. The fear I felt when I saw her unconscious, the sluggish thumping of her damaged heart.
Darkness spread like wildfire, drenching my hands all the way to the wrist. Cloying shadows surrounded me like an old friend.
Surprisingly, I could see just fine, the shadows did not impact my vision in the slightest. I might have been able to seebetter, really.
A conundrum.
I took a few deep breaths to slow my heart rate and regulate my emotions. I consciously focused on driving that ink back to my fingertips.
It obeyed.
I squinted my eyes and strained even harder.
The darkness vanished almost entirely, leaving the faintest trace at the very tips.
Satisfaction warmed my chest.
It was just as I had suspected.
The shadows were mine to wield.
The shadows belonged tome.
Hours trickled away as I called the darkness to heel, forced it to obey my commands, wrangled it into submission.
It was a strain. My eyes drooped, begging for rest that I could not give them.
The shadows did not obey entirely, but they did bend to my urging.
A small wisp of inky blackness shooed a curious mouse away before it could get too close. I hadn’t even had to consciously think about that one, it happened reflexively.
My muscles ached with the effort, my fingers moving slowly as though half frozen.
I persisted.
I grew weaker as the morning approached, and the shadows grew more stubborn. It was harder to coax them—they were more malleable beneath the shelter of night.
Only after the orange glow of the rising dual suns finally began to crest the horizon and seep into the dungeon’s tiny window did folk arrive.
I expected Tommins, and that annoying human he always had with him to return for more ridiculous questioning.
My murder ideas hadn’t vanished entirely—if they pissed me off well enough, I could fucking extinguish them.
But they weren’t alone.
I smiled. Ginger was here.
I could sense her approach more thoroughly than everbefore—it was as though a wandering piece of my soul had reunited with the whole.
Her strong heartbeat was a beautiful melody. She walked with more vigor. She was obviously feeling better.
