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It’s no good, I know that. There’s no door there anymore.

My mind presses in on me as the memories try to push forward. Sinking to the floor of the cell that is so familiar to me, I pull my legs up and wrap my arms around them as I stare at the familiar crack in the dirty and blood-stained stone floor. The memories reach their sharp and jagged claws for me, and I forcefully push them back.

This is a level in the Choosing. I have to calm down.

I force myself to take three deep, calming breaths. Ideally, I should do more, but I don’t have it in me.

I need to get out.

I have to get out.

I can’t be here.

Not again.

Not again.

Shit, I’m panicking again. Forcing myself to take more calming breaths, I refuse to let any of the words filter through my mind again. Finally feeling slightly more grounded, I stand up. Before I can fully straighten up, the chains clank, and I stare in horror down at the manacles wrapped around my ankles and wrists.

These are the ones that he had specially designed. They’re wide, three inches or so, and have hundreds of needle-like spikes on the inside that dig in and make me bleed. Already, there is blood pooling underneath them. Then there’s the worst part of them, etched in a deceptively pretty script, is the name Ink on one and Neith on the other. He had been watching me long enough to know that Van called me that at one point, and that I was still fond of it.

Not anymore.

That name is associated with pain, so much pain and death in all manner of ways. Every way that he could think of to kill me, he tried. He was obsessed with my pain and what it could do for his magic.

Through sheer fucking determination, I don’t fall into the pit of extreme panic that is trying to pull me under.

I need to get out of here.

Feeling a tiny bit more aware, I look around the cell. If I can find one thing that isn’t the same as my memory, then I can use that to anchor me, and I can get out.

I have to get out.

I will get out.

Then I hear it, the sound that shatters all of the delicate calm that I had gathered. The slow, steady footsteps echo through the dark, damp stone corridor that leads past the many cells that are only occupied by the dead and rotting corpses of his previous victims.

My heart pounds in my chest, and I freeze as the humming fills the air. The same tune, jagged, but upbeat, far too happy for the situation that I’m in.

“Ink darling, what shall we do today?” the voice that haunts my memories and my nightmares taunts. “Maybe we’ll go with the saw? Or the blow torch? It’s been a while since I used that one. Choices, choices.”

I freak out and lose all grip on my calm. Blood drips down my hands and soaks my bare feet as I pull against the manacles, desperately trying to free myself. I’m no longer aware of how I got here, or why I’m here. All I remember is what comes next.

The footsteps get louder, and my panic heightens even more.

“Ink, Ink, Ink,” he says happily, before he goes back to humming.

“Trial!”the voices scream at me.

The fact that they’ve said something to me and they never have before shocks me into stilling, and I frown. They have spoken to me, and this isn’t the first time.

Trial.

I’m in the Choosing. This is a trial.

If it’s a trial, then it’s not real. I need to find the door I need to get the fuck out.

My whole body is shaking with fear, but the footsteps are slowly getting closer. I need to get out.