Page 82 of Demon Monster's Little Human

I run.

34

LIORA

The darkness thickens around us, pressing against my skin like unseen hands, coiling into my bones like whispers of a past I do not remember.

The presence does not attack. It does not lunge for my throat, does not tear through my flesh as it has tried before. It does something worse. It speaks.

“Purna.”

The word curls through the stale air, curling in my lungs, settling deep. I hear it in a way that isn’t exactly sound, a name that isn’t mine but feels like it does. My fingers twitch as something cold slithers through my veins, an unease I cannot place, cannot explain.

Dain stiffens beside me. His breath comes sharp and jagged, his entire frame rigid, poised, ready for something.

The voice speaks again.

“Amara.”

A tremor runs through me, deep and violent. The name slams into my ribs like a blade, slicing through something I did not even know existed. A wall. A dam.

Memories that are not mine press against my skull. I see flashes, fingers tracing ancient symbols, magic burning in the air, a voice chanting something I cannot grasp. A woman stands before me in the haze, but I cannot see her face.

The stone beneath my feet turns unsteady.

My hand flies to my chest, clutching at the frantic hammering of my heart. My pulse is too fast, too wild, as if my body is trying to tear itself apart from the inside.

“No,” I rasp. “That’s not my name.”

A slow, insidious laugh fills the space around us, a sound that carries across the cavern walls with something that has waited too long.

“Oh, but it is.” The dark presence slithers closer. Its voice presses against my skin, threading through my thoughts, weaving doubt into my very being. “You are Amara.”

The world tilts.

I stumble, my legs weak, my breath ragged. My head shakes too hard, too fast. I force my voice through the rawness of my throat. “No, you’re lying.”

But even as I say it, I feel the wrongness in my own words.

Why does my skin crawl with something familiar?

Why does my blood thrum as if it has always known?

I turn to Dain, desperate for an anchor. I expect to see fury, or maybe disbelief.

Instead, I see horror.

His golden eyes are locked onto me as if I am something monstrous, something he cannot unsee. His breath is uneven, sharp, his chest moves too fast, too erratic. The hard lines of his face are carved from something close to panic.

He stares at me like he knows exactly what this means.

Like this is something he never wanted to hear.

My mouth goes dry.

“You recognize that name,” I say, my voice thin, barely steady. “You—” I hesitate, the words heavy on my tongue. “I’ve been asking you about it. You knew her, didn’t you?”

Dain’s jaw tightens.

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