Ipressed my back against the cool stone wall and let my gaze drift to the long glass windows of my borrowed room.
Borrowed. Technically the chamber was mine. But since I was being held here against my will, I wanted nothing of it.
Outside, rain fell in a hypnotic downpour, blurring the world beyond into a water-colored smear of blue and green.
Sound was muted in here, and the air hung still and heavy, untouched by the storm's chaos. The silence pressed against my ears. All I could hear was my heartbeat and my own shallow breathing.
The world outside looked as fractured as I felt.
Each raindrop felt like a tiny reminder of time slipping away, and I found myself wondering if even the sky could sense the emptiness inside me.
A new day had dawned and I didn't know how to move past this feeling of doom. I didn't even know if I could.
I kept thinking about how I'd landed myself in this mess again. And yet… I was certain I wouldn't have done anything differently.
When I thought back to seeing Arielle in the woods days ago, I knew it would’ve gone against my nature to turn her away. Especially with what had been waiting for me at the house. With Thayden. I’d wanted something to hold on to. Something different from what everyone had been telling me.
Arielle had given me that.
It hadn’t been in me to turn my back on anyone. Not her. Not the Bloodsworn. Not Wolfe.
And that was the problem.Thatwas my downfall.
I’d never considered the possibility of things going this wrong.
The only thing I’d imagined was being trapped somewhere on some magical plane, then fighting my way back home.
But in a sense, that was exactly what had happened.
I washere… and my family were in the mortal lands, waiting for me to come home.
I couldn’t imagine how worried they must be. Each day that passed, they’d search the horizon waiting for my return.
And beneath that worry was something darker.
Thayden.
We had four days before he returned.
And I wasn’t going back. I was trapped here.
I’d left my family knowing there was a risk, and I’d taken it anyway.
On top of that, my memory would reset in twenty-one days.
That’s all the time I had before I lost the new memories I’d formed this month. And who knew what I’d be waking up to. A world where I had no family anymore.
I’d be stuck here in my fifteen-year-old mind, with no grandmother or mother to care for me or explain what had happened. There would be no Emabelle to ground me and no one I could trust.
As it stood now, there wasno one. I couldn’t even trust the air I breathed. Everything here answered to Wolfe Nightblade.
I hadn’t spoken to or seen anyone since the meeting yesterday. Arielle had come by to check on me in the night, but I pretended I was asleep.
I didn’t want to talk.
I was certain she knew I was awake, but I didn’t care.
Nothing mattered.
