Page 67 of A Touch of Madness

Her eyes—no longer void-black pits of endless hunger, no longer filled with that cruel, hollow mockery—find Sylvie.

And for the first time, they are hers.

No abyss. No darkness. No echo of something ancient and wrong peering through the cracks of what she used to be.

She sees her.

She knows her.

And Sylvie’s breath catches, not in fear, not in pain—but in sheer hope.

Lara.

The room feels different now.

Not because the magic has faded—because it hasn’t, not fully. The walls still hum with residual energy, the runes carved deep into the stone still flicker with the last vestiges of power. But the weight of it, the unbearable pressure, the darkness pressing in from all sides—it's gone.

I don't realize I'm crying until I taste salt on my lips.

I can't seem to move. Can't seem to breathe. The entire world has shrunk to the girl in the chair, bound by iron and magic, her wrists raw where the restraints held her in place.

My sister.

I take a step forward on unsteady legs, my limbs trembling, exhaustion curling into my bones, heavier than anything I have ever carried before. The weight of this moment presses into my chest, an unbearable thing, making it nearly impossible to inhale.

I want to say her name, but I don’t have the breath to do it.

Lara is slumped forward, her body utterly still, her dark hair spilling over her face in tangled waves, still sweat-stricken. And for a horrible, gut-wrenching second, I think I’ve failed. That the magic burned through her, consumed what was left, leaving nothing behind.

Then—a breath. And another.

Another.

A slow, shuddering inhale, deep and uneven, her chest rising in the dim light. Her fingers twitch against the arms of the chair, nails scraping against the iron as though testing if she is still here, still alive, still something more than the thing Solstice twisted her into.

And then, she moves.

It’s not sudden. Not dramatic. Just a slow, aching tilt of her head, strands of dark hair falling away from her face as she blinks open her eyes.

The breath in my throat locks.

Because they’re not black anymore.

Not void. Not empty.

Lara’s eyes—my sister’s eyes—are staring back at me.

I let out something between a sob and a breathless whisper, my hands trembling as I take another step closer. My pulse is a frantic, stuttering thing beneath my skin, my magic stirring weakly inside of me, sensing the shift, sensing the change.

She’s here.

She’sreallyhere.

“Lara,” I whisper, my voice breaking, and the moment her name leaves my lips, something in her face crumbles. Her body shudders, a sharp, gasping inhale ripping from her throat, her fingers clutching at the armrests like she doesn’t know how to ground herself, like she isn’t sure if she’s real. Her cracked lips part, but no words come out, just a soft, pained sound, something fragile and lost and human.

It is the most beautiful thing I’ve heard in my entire life.

I fall to my knees before her, unable to stand any longer, my hands hovering, hesitant, afraid that if I touch her, if I reach for her, she will vanish like a wisp of smoke.

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