Page 51 of A Dusk Of Stars

She laughs again.No, you’re not.

The words make me grit my teeth and I find myself trying to get closer to the bars, but they just recede further into the darkness. “Well,” I say with angry exasperation, “I won’t be until you choose to stop this charade and show me your face.”

I can show you my face,she says simply, and it knocks the air out of my lungs all over again, when I see the bars get closer and a silhouette becomes visible behind them. In silent wonder, I watch the animal appear, having to look way way up to meet its glowing, narrowed eyes. The largest, most dangerous lookingwolf I’ve ever seen, with eyes of burning ice and a smirk on its face.

Showing my face to you won’t help,she says mockingly,because you want to stay blind. You’re not ready for any of the things that will happen to you. And I’m way too old to be into chit-chat. I suggest you leave me alone.

She turns to saunter back into the shadows, leaving me fuming. “You know,” I yell after her, “I think I preferred it when you didn’t talk to me.”

She lets out a low chuckle.Your wish is my command. This,she says as she stops for a second, not turning back to look at me,is so you’ll learn your place.

“What is?” I demand, fear worming its way into my voice.

Everything turns pitch black and I remain standing there, the darkness turning more and more unsettling with each second.

I start looking around and seeing more nothing.

“Hey,” I yell out, my fear only growing when I hear the desperation in my voice, “let me out.”

Nothing happens. Except, I could fucking swear that the darkness grew even more absolute.

There’s this tightness in my chest as my mind starts buzzing like crazy. Am I stuck here?

No no no.

The tightness intensifies. It travels up to my throat.

My eyes rounding in fear, I start gasping for air, one hand flying to my neck and one blindly trying to find something to grab onto.

***

What makes me come to, it’s like a shock that goes through my entire body.

“Novak,” I hear a voice boom with an urgency that almost snaps me out of it.

But there’s this surge of power, sparking like electricity, that’s rushing through my veins and keeping me standing on my feet, looking high up at the sky even though all my muscles are limp.

The starry night sky, that’s what I’m staring at, with rounded eyes and pounding heart, as I let the violent current keep going through me.

I can do nothing but keep staring, my mind buzzing trying to figure out whether this is what it could feel like, a moment before you die.

It feels like an eternity and I wonder if it’ll ever stop because it hurts, but then the current slows down, and I start to breathe again — heavily, my muscles tensing as my body starts slumping to the ground.

Two strong hands catch me midfall, hooking themselves under my armpits as my head falls to my chest. Slowly, they start lowering me onto the ground. I let my wobbly legs bend in the knees until I’m kneeling, this strange sensation drawing my eyes to the palms I’ve pressed against the ground at my sides.

There are sparks shooting off the tips of my fingers.

My eyes rounding, I move to get up, but my body won’t let me. I’m tense and aching all over.

Just a moment ago, there was such fear coursing through my body. Now, I’m in the strangest haze ever.

I lift my palms to my thighs, slowly flexing my fingers and feeling the current rushing through them.

“Come on,” the voice urges me just as a hand holding a bottle of water appears in my line of sight. “There’ll be time for that later.”

I stop flexing my fingers, but I don’t reach for the bottle. I don’t even look up. I just lazily shake my head, transfixed by the sparks.

I know it in a way that requires no thinking. My animal rejected me. Scorpio didn’t.

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