Page 27 of Echoes From the Void (Shadow Locke Shifters #3)

Chapter 26

Dorian

Temporal fractures splinter around us as Matteo cradles Frankie’s unconscious form. Truth hits me with the force of broken time as I watch them.

Frost spreads beneath us, each crystal formation a perfect replica of time breaking down. Through our pack bonds, I feel them register the change—even Frankie, barely conscious, her shadows reaching curiously toward my temporal distortions.

“The void,” the words tear from my throat as I watch frost patterns dance with lingering traces of their combined power. “It’s not just darkness or corruption. It’s time itself breaking down.”

The temporal fractures around me pulse, my curse responding to their raw power. For one terrifying moment, I feel it weaken. Feel time flow normally again. Feel myself become...young.

Terror rips through me as memories flood back—not centuries of knowledge, but twenty-two years of pretending to be more than I am. The curse doesn’t make me ancient and wise. It just lets me pretend.

“I need to—” Frost crackles violently around my feet as panic claws up my throat. Time splinters in my vision, showing multiple versions of myself—the scholar I pretend to be, the student I really am. “I have to?—”

“Dorian?” Bishop steps toward me, Guardian marks flaring at my obvious distress.

But I’m already backing away, Uncle Everette’s warnings echoing in my head: never let anyone close enough to break the curse. Never let them see the truth. Never let them know you’re just playing at being immortal.

I don’t turn around, watching frost crystallize ancient knowledge. “Not now, Uncle E.”

“Oh right, because your existential crisis clearly outweighs centuries of preserved knowledge.” His reflection appears in the ice, distorted through temporal fractures. He’s carrying a golf club, of all things, its metal gleaming against his rumpled tweed.

“Why do you have?—”

“Thought I’d get some putting practice in while waiting for you to finish your dramatic breakdown.” He studies the frozen floor like it’s an interesting course challenge. “You know, most people your age just get drunk and make questionable decisions about their hair.”

“Most people my age,” frost spikes form with each word, “don’t have to worry about accidentally breaking reality.”

“No,” he agrees, positioning his ball. “They just think they do. Being twenty-two is basically one long panic attack about the future anyway.”

Through pack bonds, I feel Frankie stirring, her shadows reaching instinctively for my temporal distortions. Even unconscious, she tries to fix what’s broken.

“They can break my curse,” the words taste like frost and fear.

“Probably.” The golf ball skids across perfect ice. “Question is—why does that terrify you more than staying cursed?”

Time splinters around us as truth hits: “Because the curse makes me special. Makes me matter. Without it, I’m just?—”

“A remarkably intelligent, incredibly uptight young man with concerning organizational habits?” His ball sinks into a crack in the ice. “The horror.”

I watch my fractured reflections—scholar, student, liar, fraud. “You don’t understand. If they try to neutralize my curse, the temporal backlash could?—”

“Could what?” His voice sharpens like ice. “Hurt them? Like the corruption they just absorbed? Like the void eating reality while you hide in my library having a quarter-life crisis?”

Frost spreads faster as panic rises. “That’s different?—”

“Is it?” He turns to face me fully, power crackling beneath his disheveled exterior. “Those twins just proved they can absorb and neutralize corruption itself. They might be our only chance at stopping the void. And you’re worried about losing your special snowflake status?”

His words hit harder than any temporal shift. Ice cracks beneath my feet as decades of carefully constructed identity fracture.

“If something happens to them because of me...” My voice breaks as time splinters around the truth.

“Something’s going to happen to all of us if the void isn’t stopped.” Everette’s reflection multiplies across the ice, each version showing a different temporal possibility. “The question is—are you going to help them figure this out, or are you going to hide in my library pretending your personal crisis matters more than reality falling apart?”

Frost patterns shift with my silence, forming equations I’ve spent years pretending to understand. Through pack bonds, I feel Frankie fully awakening, her confusion at my absence a physical ache.

“They’ll have to absorb so much corruption.” The words emerge like broken glass. “The void, my curse, everything that’s breaking... it could destroy them.”

“Probably.” Everette’s eyes soften though his voice remains sharp. “But that’s their choice to make, isn’t it? Just like staying cursed would be yours. If you ever stop having panic attacks in my library long enough to actually talk to them about it.”

Time fractures settle slightly as understanding seeps in. The curse doesn’t make me special—it just lets me hide from being ordinary. From being young. From being afraid.

“When did you get so wise?” Frost recedes from the nearest bookshelf.

“I didn’t. I’m just old enough to recognize when someone’s being a dramatic little shit.” He collects his ball, tucking it away. “Also, you’re not the first twenty-something to have an identity crisis in my library. Though you are the first to literally freeze the rare books section.”

A laugh escapes, surprising us both. “Sorry about that.”

“No, you’re not. But you will be when I make you defrost everything by hand.” He heads for the door, then pauses. “You know what’s actually special about you, kid?”

“My perfect organizational systems?”

“The fact that you’re young enough to help them change everything.” His smile turns knowing. “Now go be heroic or whatever it is you kids do these days. And Dorian?”

“Yeah?”

“If you freeze my first editions again, I’m making you catalog the entire demonology section. By hand. In Latin.” He starts to leave, then adds softly, “Being young isn’t a weakness, you know. Sometimes it’s exactly what the world needs.”

Through the pack bonds, I feel their continued worry. Feel Frankie’s shadows searching. Feel time itself waiting for my choice.

Maybe being twenty-two and terrified is exactly what I need to be.

Ice melts beneath my feet as I let the truth settle. Not just about my age or the curse, but about what the twins’ power really means. Through our pack bonds, I feel Frankie’s shadows still searching, growing more urgent with each passing moment.

Time fractures around me one last time, showing all my possible selves:

The scholar I pretend to be, weighted with artificial wisdom.

The student I really am, terrified but brilliant in his own right.

The person I could become—young enough to change everything, old enough to understand why we must.

My frost patterns shift, forming one final equation across the library walls. The same one Helena Vale wrote when she first discovered how corruption spreads through time:

Truth breaks curses.

Love breaks barriers.

Choice breaks destiny.

“Well, that’s unnecessarily dramatic,” I mutter, watching the frost begin to thaw. “Though I suppose hiding in the library having an existential crisis while reality collapses isn’t exactly subtle either.”

Through our bonds, I feel the exact moment Frankie fully wakes. Feel her shadows reach for mine with that instinctive need to fix what’s broken. Feel her power—pure and untainted—brush against my curse.

Time shivers.

Reality holds its breath.

The void pulses at the edges of everything.

And I...

I stop running.

“Alright,” I say to the empty library, to time itself, to the terrified twenty-two-year-old I’ve been hiding. “Let’s go save reality. After I defrost these books.”

Because maybe being young and scared and real is exactly what the pack needs. Maybe stopping the void doesn’t require ancient wisdom—just the courage to be authentically ourselves.

Even if “ourselves” means being a slightly neurotic grad student with too many books and not enough answers.

Besides, I think as I head back toward the medical wing, someone needs to explain the temporal mechanics of what the twins just did. Preferably before they accidentally break time worse than my curse ever could.

Though first, I should probably apologize for freezing half the library.

Again.