Then, a mechanical shriek cut through his screams—the high-pitched sound of metal buckling and glass shattering deep within the layers of his clothes.
The destruction hit me instantly. Blinding agony exploded in my left shoulder. It was a structural failure, a savage tearing of muscle stripping away from the bone.
I screamed, clutching at the source of the pain, vision cracking into a spiderweb of fractures. Through the haze, I saw the sigil on the youth’s neck flare—a final, brilliant crimson flash. Then, like a filament in a broken bulb, it burned out, leaving behind nothing but blackened skin.
The creature collapsed. The shadow tendrils around Dane’s neck dissolved into mist. The stolen blue-white light in his veins sputtered and died. He was just a broken vessel on the paving.
My legs folded. I hit the ground hard, hands skidding on the wetstone. The rain bit into my skin. Across the yard, the wolf’s form blurred, shivering and shrinking until the beast was gone.
In its place, Dane lay crumpled on the ground. Human. Too still.
“Dane,” I rasped.
I dragged myself towards him. My body was made of lead; every inch was a battle against gravity. The alley listed sideways, the ground tilting beneath me.
My vision tunnelled. The last of the wild magic drained out of me, scouring me clean, leaving nothing but exhaustion in its wake.
A presence stirred at the alley’s entrance—a chill severe enough to slice through the fog in my head. I looked up, blinking against the grey. A shadow stood there, darker than the rest. Or maybe it was just my mind firing its last sparks. Before I could focus, the figure was gone.
I reached Dane. His face was ash-pale, his lips tinged with blue.
I brushed his cheek. His head rolled slightly under the pressure, heavy and slack. I watched his chest, desperate for a rise, a shudder, anything to break the stillness.
His eyes were half-open, fixed on the damp brickwork. Glassy. Unfocused.
“Dane?” I rasped.
The only answer was the rain.
My vision blurred, greying at the edges. I couldn’t tell if the silence came from him or if my own senses were finally failing.
I slumped forward, my ear pressing against his chest. I listened for a heartbeat, but the world went black before I could find it.
NINE
Riven
The light in the dream always arrived first. A clinical white. But the pressure hit before the glare—a suffocating crush that pressed against the base of my skull, dense and unforgiving. It was the feeling of being watched by something vast enough to swallow the room whole.
I was ten years old again, strapped to a table that smelled of cold iron and old blood. The faces above me were blurred behind masks, voices muffled by the whine of machinery. They didn’t speak to me; they spoke to the data.
“Subject stabilised. Prepare for extraction.”
I tried to scream, but the terror froze the sound in my throat. I could only watch as the device descended—a sleek, silver construct vibrating with a hungry, unnatural frequency. It lowered towards my chest. To the left. Directly over the heart.
The metal pierced the skin. It hooked into the core of what I was and pulled.
Then the room exploded.
A shockwave hammered the air, blowing out the masks andbuckling the steel walls. The scientists screamed, scrambling over one another as thick smoke filled the space.
I was free. But the sensation didn’t leave. That tension at the base of my skull remained, observing the chaos with a detached, terrifying patience.
Before I ran, I reached for the thing buried in my chest. My fingers—small and bloodied—wrapped around the metal protruding from my skin. I yanked it loose. The sound was wet and terrible, a tearing of gristle and soul.
It came free in my hand. Heavy, dripping with liquid darkness.
Air rushed into my lungs, harsh and raw.
