It’s fucking amazing…but just for a moment, the freedom is a taunt.
The weight returns.
I fight and fight, but something wraps around my throat, pulling me down from the forest and back into the abyss. It’s that black oily film again. It drops over my eyes and coats my brain. Every time I try to breathe, the film stretches, molding to my face like a second, unwanted skin. It tastes acrid and wrong.
“Come back to me, baby, I need you so badly.”
The voice is a pinpoint of light in the sludge. I want to move in that direction, but the oil is too thick, turning my blood to lead. I’m tethered to the fog, a prisoner of a darkness I don’t understand.
Fight. Pack.
Right, I’ve got to focus. It’s my job to create a wall between my people and anything that will hurt them. I need to break free.
“Wake up soon, my love.”
I focus on the sound of the voice, the unexpected words…and I shove.
Fuck. I’m through. Through the veil.
Cracking an eyelid, it’s hard to know where I am.
Everything is blurred. Sounds, sights, sensations.
But I can focus on the hand touching my brow. Cool fingers. I want to lean into the touch, but I don’t even have the strength to raise my neck.
“Shh, don’t struggle, Tally. You’re going to be alright.”
The smell of mold and sweat, the humid heat, the constant shouts and banging are familiar. Quo. I’m in Quo.
I don’t want to be here. I want to be back in the wild, green trees. I want to be the shadow with teeth again.
A shadow.
With teeth.
21. AURORA
Time crawls by with a painful slowness.
I spend the afternoon mopping Tally’s brow, then moving through my regular series of pliés, tendus, and relevés.
Reach. Stretch. Breathe.Forget that I’m in a cage.
Forget that a de Vaux will be back any moment to trap me with his constantly watching eyes.
The air is saturated with the scent of unwashed bodies and the usual chemical tang of the block, but there’s something else. An ominous foreboding.
A storm is brewing.
My heart lurches as a body appears in the outer doorway again.
But it’s just Layla. She rounds the corner carrying a dented metal tray. Behind her, Sky is clutching a plastic jug of water like it’s a holy relic. Her eyes are wide, darting around, constantly scanning for danger.
“Shit, Lay, you made me jump.”
“Good to see you too, Barbie,” Layla huffs, her mouth in an unhappy line. “How’s the boss?” She slides the tray through the narrow gap at the bottom.
I wish I had a better report for her. “He still hasn’t woken up properly, I don’t get it.”
