Page 32 of The Scars of War (Of Ruin and Fire #1)

A breath beyond death, and the darkness isn’t empty. It’s heavy. Pressing in on every edge of me like it’s always been there, waiting.

Until a voice, sounding soft and beautiful, echoes in the darkness. "There you are." It’s an older, familiar voice, one I’ve heard. Beneath the soft tone, it grows colder and darker as the worlds continue to ripple around me.

And then…the sound of a blade drawing across soft skin.

The scent of smoke curls around me, bitter and old.

The thunder of wings, beating violently, knocking the breath from my lungs.

A scream claws its way from my throat but is torn away before it reaches my ears, swallowed by reality unraveling.

The veil tears like flesh, like the world itself is being skinned open.

I fall again, into the darkness. Back into the silence, until I’m back in the place that remembers me .

Oblivion is both the womb and the grave. The thing that comes before the first heartbeat and after the last breath. She doesn’t just kill; she unmakes, leaving a blank space where something once mattered. She’s the scream at the end of the world, and no one hears it .