“Angel?” The silence stretches too long.
Where is everyone?
I search for the portal leading home, but no trace of it anywhere.
Panic claws up my chest. Something inside me is screaming at me to run.
Footsteps echo behind me, and I take off instinctively, like I already know whatever is coming shouldn’t reach me.
I still don’t understand why or how I’m here, running through the woods when a detail catches my eye, and I stop breathing.
How am I back here? Back in the same enchanted forest I escaped.
There’s a weight on my chest I don’t understand, but I know I can’t stop running. Then suddenly, everything fades to black, and I trip, falling to my knees. I brace for the sting… but nothing happens.
How’s that possible?
The darkness slowly peels away, and when I look up, there’s a figure lying on the ground in the distance. I rise carefully,scanning the woods to make sure I’m alone as I move closer—but something about them feels familiar, and my steps quicken. Dread coils tight in my stomach with every step.
No. This can’t be happening. Not again.
“Anxo!”
My heart lodges in my throat as I sprint to him, dropping to my knees beside my mate.
A trail of blood runs down his mouth, and his arm… there’s a gaping wound where it should be, blood pouring out, soaking into the dry leaves beneath him.
My hands shake as I carefully lift his head into my lap, shaking his shoulder to wake him, but nothing happens. I press a hand to his heart, reaching for my Divine to try to heal him, but nothing works.
He stays still. No pulse. No breath.
“Angel, wake up. Please wake up!” A loud, heartbreaking sob echoes through the woods. I don’t even recognize the voice. It sounds so… broken.
I lift my head, searching for help, but the clearing is no longer empty. It’s filled with the bodies of everyone I love. I clutch Anxo tighter as the horror sinks in.
My family is in pieces, limbs twisted, scattered, their blood soaking the soil, guts splattered across the trees.
Everything around me smells like iron and death.
I freeze when I spot Harvey and Grace lying beside each other. Bile rises in my throat at the sight of Harvey, torn down the middle.
He’s dead. They’re all dead.
I turn away with a broken cry at the sight of Grace’s stomach carved open, the horror frozen in her lifeless eyes, squeezing my chest until I can’t breathe.
The weight on my chest turns crushing, and when I look down, a scream rips out of my soul. August is strapped to my chest with a blanket.
His eyes… someone took his eyes. hollow sockets stare back at me, and I choke on a cry, jerking my gaze away.
The world tilts, and my vision blurs before I collapse backward.
When my eyes open again, everything has reset, and I’m running through the woods all over again.
Fear chokes me, my legs trembling so violently I fall to my knees, and when I look up, everything starts playing out again like a loop I can’t break.
The same steps. The same path. The same ending waiting for me.
After a moment of pure panic, the torture becomes so familiar it makes me pause. There was a time I lived like this—but now… my life isn’t like this anymore. I clawed my way out of this. I know I did.
