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LIORA

T he darkness thickens around us, pressing against my skin like unseen hands, coiling into my bones like whispers of a past I do not remember.

The presence does not attack. It does not lunge for my throat, does not tear through my flesh as it has tried before. It does something worse. It speaks.

“Purna.”

The word curls through the stale air, curling in my lungs, settling deep. I hear it in a way that isn’t exactly sound, a name that isn’t mine but feels like it does. My fingers twitch as something cold slithers through my veins, an unease I cannot place, cannot explain.

Dain stiffens beside me. His breath comes sharp and jagged, his entire frame rigid, poised, ready for something.

The voice speaks again.

“Amara.”

A tremor runs through me, deep and violent. The name slams into my ribs like a blade, slicing through something I did not even know existed. A wall. A dam.

Memories that are not mine press against my skull. I see flashes, fingers tracing ancient symbols, magic burning in the air, a voice chanting something I cannot grasp. A woman stands before me in the haze, but I cannot see her face.

The stone beneath my feet turns unsteady.

My hand flies to my chest, clutching at the frantic hammering of my heart. My pulse is too fast, too wild, as if my body is trying to tear itself apart from the inside.

“No,” I rasp. “That’s not my name.”

A slow, insidious laugh fills the space around us, a sound that carries across the cavern walls with something that has waited too long.

“Oh, but it is.” The dark presence slithers closer. Its voice presses against my skin, threading through my thoughts, weaving doubt into my very being. “You are Amara.”

The world tilts.

I stumble, my legs weak, my breath ragged. My head shakes too hard, too fast. I force my voice through the rawness of my throat. “No, you’re lying.”

But even as I say it, I feel the wrongness in my own words.

Why does my skin crawl with something familiar?

Why does my blood thrum as if it has always known?

I turn to Dain, desperate for an anchor. I expect to see fury, or maybe disbelief.

Instead, I see horror.

His golden eyes are locked onto me as if I am something monstrous, something he cannot unsee. His breath is uneven, sharp, his chest moves too fast, too erratic. The hard lines of his face are carved from something close to panic.

He stares at me like he knows exactly what this means.

Like this is something he never wanted to hear.

My mouth goes dry.

“You recognize that name,” I say, my voice thin, barely steady. “You—” I hesitate, the words heavy on my tongue. “I’ve been asking you about it. You knew her, didn’t you?”

Dain’s jaw tightens.

The flickering torchlight catches on the sharp edge of his fangs as he exhales, slow and controlled, the kind of restraint that looks like it might snap at any second.

He doesn’t answer.

He doesn’t have to.

His silence says everything.

I step toward him, reaching for his arm, for anything that will ground me. “Who was she?”

Dain flinches before I even touch him. His wings twitch as if resisting the urge to pull away.

“Tell me,” I press, my pulse erratic.

Nothing.

He says nothing.

The dark presence fills the silence for him.

“Oh, he knows, little one.” The words slither between us like a knife’s edge, slow and deliberate. “But he will not tell you. He does not need to.”

A sharp pulse strikes through my skull.

I clutch my temples as the air around us thickens, pressing against me. Something ancient stirs beneath my skin, clawing its way up.

Memories that do not belong to me.

A woman standing on the cliffs, magic circling her hands, chanting words that make the very world tremble. The sound of stone cracking. The roar of something winged, furious. A promise spoken in a language I cannot name.

My vision blurs.

I stumble back, shaking my head, gasping, drowning in something I cannot understand.

Dain moves without thinking, his hands gripping my shoulders, steadying me. I collapse against him, panting, the vision still pressing down.

“Liora.” His voice is raw, his breath hot against my ear.

I look up at him, searching his face for something, anything to make sense of what is happening to me.

But when I meet his gaze, my stomach drops.

He is no longer looking like I’m Liora.

He is staring at me as if am someone else. Something he was meant to destroy.

My throat tightens, my hands shaking as I push him back.

“I am not Amara,” I rasp.

Dain does not respond.

He only stares, silent, unreadable.

I swallow against the panic rising in my heart. “Say something.”

His claws flex.

His wings shift, his entire body coiled in restraint.

He takes a step back.

A sharp ache lodges itself in my heart.

My pulse skips, my breath catching as he pulls away from me like I am something tainted.

“No.” My voice shakes. “You don’t believe this, do you?”

His fingers twitch at his sides, his expression locked in something dark, unreadable. His eyes flicker with something vicious, torn, lost.

His voice breaks.

“What are you? Who the hell are you?”

A tremor racks through me.

“I’m me,” I whisper. “I’m Liora.”

His gaze darkens.

A muscle jumps in his jaw. His fangs glint in the torchlight, his wings spreading just slightly, as if preparing for something.

A warning. A threat.

My breath comes too fast, too sharp. “You don’t mean that.”

He does not move.

He does not speak.

He bares his fangs at me.

The dark presence laughs, but I do not hear it. I hear only the ragged, broken sound of my own heartbeat.

Dain steps forward, slow, deliberate. His claws flex, his gaze burning into mine.

I stumble back, my body screaming at me to run.

But I don’t.

I stare at him, and I understand.

This is not Dain, the monster who saved me.

This is Dain, the monster who was meant to kill me.