Mira studied her. There was no fire in her hands now, but a tension ran through her shoulders. The hard edge of authority remained, but something softer had crept in beneath it.
“Very well.” She nodded once.
Rynna didn’t wait. She turned.
“See me tomorrow, before training,” Mira called after her.
Rynna raised a hand in silent acknowledgment but didn’t look back. Couldn’t.
She was losing her damned mind. Again.
The thought repeated as she ran, boots hitting stone, the slope blurring beneath her. Like her steps could outpace the rift splintering inside her. Like she could outrun the silent echo of rock crushing into flesh. Of Kaelith’s body, limp and unmoving in her arms.
What is wrong with me?
If the thought of one irritating man bleeding out could unravel her, how in all the worlds was she supposed to finish this Mission?
Chapter seven
Shewasdrowning,trappedin a thundercloud.
Green light sliced through the dark, flaring behind her eyes as something vast and ancient twisted through her ribs.
She couldn’t scream. Couldn’t move.
The air reeked of static and rot, and scraping voices clawed at the edge of her mind, rising in a frenzied, wordless chorus.
Gold flashed. Talons stretched wide, caught in the web. Then pressure, slick and cold, drove between her ribs before it closed around her heart like a vice, sucking.
Her body arched, suspended mid-air, not by gravity but by something moist and humming.
Her nerves sang with fire. Every heartbeat heaved agony like iron hooks.
Lightning swelled. Her soul fractured open.
The orb pulsed.
A shape leaned in—shadow and teeth—and then another. And another.
She tried to surface, to remember, to rise, but there was only light and pain.
Endless and empty.
She bolted upright, limbs flailing against the shadows crawling over her skin.
Where am I?!
Her hands clawed through the darkness, pushing at the lingering presence, as if she could tear it off before it swallowed her whole.
“No!” The word ripped free as she twisted sideways, caught in a tangle of sheets and sweat. Her body jolted off the edge of the bed, shoulder first, before gravity yanked her the rest of the way down—directly on top of the man sleeping below her.
She landed hard, an elbow driving into his sternum, punching the air out of him in a startled grunt. Her other hand struck his shoulder, still raking at the air as he jerked awake beneath her.
“Rynna?”
She barely heard him, toes scraping across the rug, searching for leverage that wasn’t there. Her heart pounded, ribs constricted around the drumming as her eyes strained for focus, drawing shapes from the dim room—starlight through an open window, a small table, a simple hearth.
“Where am I…” Fists drove into the supple folds of the thin blanket next to the man, gripping the fabric like an anchor in the dark.
