Page 65 of A Touch of Madness

A moment ago, Sylvie stood in this very place, just beyond the threshold of this chamber, her hands trembling at her sides but her voice clear, unyielding.I’m ready, she had said, though I had seen the ghost of hesitation flicker behind her eyes. No one had questioned her. No one had told her she should reconsider, not because we agreed this was wise, but because we knew it would not matter. There was no changing her mind. Not on this. Not when it came to Lara.

And so we oblige.

Not because we believe this will work. Not because we do not fear what it will cost.

But because she is the one asking it of us.

Because she has chosen this path, and I—despite every part of me that wants to take her away from all of this, despite the part of me that has already imagined a future far from this place, a world where none of this has to matter—I cannot deny her. Not when her hands are already stained with the weight of everything she has done to bring us here.

Not when I love her the way I do.

A love that surpassed every lifetime before this one and will continue to do so for all of eternity.

The three elder witches, along with Ravenna, Rebecca, and Nicole, stand at the perimeter of the sigil now, their robes dark, their fingers twitching with latent energy as they prepare the ritual. Rebecca and Nicole exchange a look, one of quiet reassurance, though there is tension in their shoulders, an uncertainty that lingers even as they school their expressions into careful masks.

Dorian shifts beside me, his stance loose but ready, his eyes gleaming with something unreadable. He does not speak, but I know him well enough to sense the discomfort rolling beneath his calm smokescreen. He has seen what Lara has become. He has witnessed her unhinged, reckless, dangerous. He knows what it means if this does not work.

And then there is Sylvie. She is and will always beeverything.

She steps forward, her combat boots brushing against the edge of the sigil, her breath even, measured, though I can hear the faint hitch beneath it.

She is afraid. Not of Lara. Not of what she must do.

But of failing. Of pouring every last piece of herself into this spell and finding there is nothing left to bring her sister back.

But she does not waver.

The air shifts as she takes the ceremonial blade, its silver edge catching the dim light, and I want to stop this.

I want to reach for her wrist, to pull her away, to tell her she does not have to do this, that she does not have to bleed for a sister who is already lost, that she is not obligated.

But I resist the urge to move. To stop her and end all of this before it can begin.

I watch as Sylvie presses the blade to her palm, dragging it slowly across her skin. The scent of her blood blooms in the chamber, rich, potent, alive—and something inside me snarls.

Not in hunger. Not in the way blood usually calls to me.

But in fear—an emotion I have had less than a handful of times in as long as I can remember.

The first drop of her beautiful crimson blood falls, striking the center of the sigil carved into the floor, and the magic reacts instantly, the runes surging to life in a brilliant, blinding glow. Lara jerks against the restraints, but it is not in pain. It is something else.

Something expectant.

A slow, delighted smile spreads across her lips.

“Oh, Sylvie,” she murmurs, her voice curling around the chamber like a whisper from the depths of something long buried. “You really do love me, don’t you?”

Sylvie ignores Lara’s incessant games and mockery, her expression set, her focus locked onto the sigil as the witches begin the incantation, their voices low, rhythmic, filling the air with a language so old it feels like the walls themselves are listening.

The moment the magic takes hold, Lara’s body tenses, her back arching slightly against the chair. A shuddering breath escapes her lips, something between a gasp and a laugh.

And then she screams.

It is not the sound of pain, not the cry of a creature suffering beneath the weight of something unbearable. No, this is a sound of resistance, of something fighting to remain exactly as it is, of darkness refusing to be torn from the body it has rooted itself within. The torches flicker violently, the runes etched into the walls surging to a near blinding brightness, reacting to the battle now waging inside her.

Lara convulses, the restraints biting deeply into her skin as she thrashes about wildly, her body bowing against the weight of the magic trying to force her humanity back into the hollowed-out space where it once resided. A pulse of black energy bursts from her form, an unseen force slamming against the runes, fighting back against the incantation pulling her toward something real. The chamber shakes with a malevolent force—one that should never be reckoned with.

She is fighting it.

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