Darkness wasn't a flood.
It was a breath—soft at first, almost gentle—curling around my ribs and sliding under my skin.
Then it began.
Quietly.
Insidiously.
Like ink in clear water.
I felt her slipping away before she even let go.
Her warmth faded.
Her voice dimmed.
Her presence in the bond flickered like a dying ember.
"Lyra—" I tried to say.
Her name tasted wrong in my mouth.
The darkness pressed deeper.
A voice—smooth as thick oil—whispered at the base of my skull:
Good… let go.
My vision blurred.
The ground tilted under my feet.
Shadows crawled across my skin, seeping into my exhausted spirit. My body felt carved out, half-burned from the lightning I'd held too long. The darkness… soothed that pain. It didn't heal. It smothered.
Pressed soft hands over everything raw and trembling in me.
Tired, it murmured.
So tired. Let me carry it.
A memory peeled away.
Not violently.
Simply… slipped.
The sound of someone laughing—bright, sharp, infuriating, comforting.
Gone.
A sudden ache stabbed my chest.
Confusion.
Loss.
What memory did I lose?
Another memory tore free.
A smile.
A pair of eyes glowing in the dark.
Wings unfurling under moonlight.
Who was she…?
The ache deepened.
I grabbed for the memory—instinctual panic lashing through my ribs—but the darkness placed a soothing hand over my frantic mind.
Shh… you don't need it.
"But—" I didn't even know what I was trying to say. "Why does it feel… wrong?"
Because you cling to things that weigh you down, Mortimer's voice crooned.
I'm removing your chains.
Chains.
I had chains?
I couldn't remember.
Another piece of me vanished.
Someone teasing me.
Arguing with me.
Standing beside me.
Their touch a long-forgotten dream…
A strange, hollow panic flared.
Why did I care?
Why did the absence itself hurt if I didn't even know what I'd lost?
"What is happening to me?" I rasped.
My father's shadowed form watched impassively. "Clarity," he said. "Mortimer frees you."
"I don't feel… free." My voice cracked. "I feel—empty."
Mortimer chuckled.
Emptiness is simply space waiting to be filled.
Memories ripped faster now.
Someone's wing brushing mine.
Someone's breath against my neck.
Someone's voice saying my name.
Gone.
Each loss hollowed me.
Carved out my insides.
Took something warm and replaced it with cold.
I tried to say a name.
It dissolved on my tongue.
A bond—burning, loud—dimmed.
Flickered.
Faded to a dull ember.
Then the light all but vanished.
Only darkness remained.
A name I couldn't remember fell out of my grasp like ash.
Someone screamed my name—desperate, broken.
I didn't know the voice.
Shadows wrapped around my mind like vines, squeezing out the last traces of warmth. I gasped, claws digging into the dirt to steady myself as the world blurred in black and red.
One final memory tried to cling—
Violet light.
A kiss that tasted like goodbye.
A whisper: I love—
The darkness ripped it away.
I exhaled, empty.
The storm inside me died.
When I lifted my head, a girl stood a few feet away.
Blood on her face.
Wings torn.
Eyes wide and shining with—
Grief?
Her breath hitched when I met her gaze, as if my looking at her caused pain.
Something twisted in my chest.
An instinct.
A flicker.
A whisper of—
You should know her.
But I didn't.
I stepped toward her, slow, unsteady.
Her knees buckled.
Her hand rose slightly—as if reaching for something already gone.
My voice cracked.
"…Who… are you?"
Her face broke.
Her tears fell.
And something deep in me twisted violently, like a buried instinct lashing against chains.
Why did her crying feel like it was happening inside my chest?
Why did I want—
No.
Why did I almost want—
to wipe her tears away?
I stepped back as if burned.
Emotion had no place in me anymore.
The shadow coiled proudly around my spine.
Mortimer purred in satisfaction.
Good. You are almost mine.
Her whisper came out strangled.
"Rai…"
The name hit something in me—a spark deep under the darkness.
It flickered.
Almost warmed.
But the shadows smothered it instantly.
The warmth died.
Dead.
Coldness flooded in to replace it.
I stared at her—the trembling shoulders, the eyes swollen with grief, her hand half-reaching toward me like she couldn't stop herself.
Nothing in me recognized her.
Nothing in me cared.
The ache lingering in my chest wasn't love.
It was residue.
A glitch.
A mistake the darkness would finish carving out soon enough.
Mortimer's presence filled my skull.
She is a threat to your ascension, he murmured.
Kill her.
Lightning crawled across my fingers, icy and sharp.
Her tears fell harder.
And I felt nothing.
Nothing at all.
I lifted my hand toward her.
Power gathered.
Shadow coiled.
Her lips trembled in a sob—
And I stared at her the way you'd look at a stranger on a battlefield.
Cold.
Detached.
Unmoved.
Because that's exactly what she was.
A stranger…