Chapter 196
DANE
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I sat in my cell, feeling the sick glow of its walls pulse in time with the pounding of my head.
Heavy, my limbs were dead, it was as if even my body was too much for me to handle, too much weight in the world.
Then the air changed. Chilled and different, the weight of the Nameless filled the air. He laughed low, and twisted my
stomach.
“Ah, Dane,” his voice disturbed my ears. “Shall we begin?”
I didn’t answer. My jaw was held tight, face fixed into the burning shadows in front of me.
“You’ve held up admirably,” the Nameless went on, his voice showing mockery. “But no one resists me forever. Let’s see how far you can bend before you break.”
It darkened and darkened, until it swallowed me whole. And then, the memories started.
Memory One: The Day I Lost My Family
I was back in the woods behind my childhood home. Heavy smoke filled the air; the sharp smell of burning wood and flesh
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“Dane!” my mother’s voice came in panicked desperation.
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I ran toward the sound because heavy legs, like moving through quicksand, flamed around me, the screams of my pack everywhere.
I found her at the edge of the clearing. Her body was laying over my younger sister. Soaked in blood her dress was covered and her breathing shallow.
“Run,” she whispered, eyes glassy yet fierce, “Run, and don’t look back.”
Frozen, my heart pounding in my ears, I said, “No, I can save
you!
“You can’t,” she said, her voice shattered. “Dane, please. Protect
her.
But before I even had time to move, the shadow creatures descended–ripping through the scene with ruthless efficiency. I screamed, but no sound came forth.
The memory dissolved, leaving me gasping in the present. My hands shook, fists clenched.
“You failed them,” the Nameless whispered, a voice of venom in my ear. “You let them die.”
“Shut up!” I shouted low and harsh and weak.
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Memory Two: The Betrayal of Aurora
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The scene changed, shifting and I was on a cliff, moonlight casting long shadows in the rough ground. Aurora stood before me, her eyes wide with betrayal.
“You promised,” she whispered, her voice breaking. “You said you would never let anything hurt me.”
“I had no choice!” I screamed, my voice shattering.
“You had a choice,” she said, and her voice was as cold as ice. “And you choose yourself.”
Heavy with the weight of truth, her words fell hard against my chest. I reached out to her, but she was gone into the night, in darkness where no moon came.
“See?” said the Nameless. “Even she can see you are a failure.”
I willed myself to breathe, closing my eyes. “This isn’t real,” I muttered. “This isn’t real.”
Memory Three: The Children
I was in the Broken Ridge packhouse, surrounded by laughing and gisting children. My twins ran up to me, jumping from ear
to ear.
“Daddy!” they chorused, holding my hands between their small palms.
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I bent dowmandswept them into my embrace. They felt so reall because of the waumithaand their laughter.
Then, darkness. Deirlaughter turned into screams as their small bodies were pulled from my hold.
“No!” I roared after them.
The shadows enveloped them and their wails went out of earshot. I fell onto my kness, weeping without control.
“You could never save them either,” the Nameless said with his tone filled with satisfaction..
Memory Four: The Chains of the Nameless
I could barely breathe before another memory came crashing
down on me
This was another memory. It hadn’t been from my past–it was
now.
I was back in the Nameless’s lair, the chainssglowing bright against my skin. The weight of them pressed me into the ground, their energy sapping every ounce of strength that I had.
“Why do you fight?” the Nameless asked, his shadowwylform growing over me. “You will never win.
I looked up at him, my vision blurred from tears, from exhaustion. “Because I have to,” I whispered. “Because they
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need me.”
He laughed; his voice was deep, a threatening sound that seemed to echo through the chamber.
“You’re nothing but a pawn,” he said. “A weak and broken. pawn.”
“You thought i will keep on chasing you,no i’m too smart and omniscient for that ”
Then–something changed.
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And so it had to be, for the Nameless still laughed in my brain, a light shone faintly there in that part of the room, soft, hardly to be discerned, yet an invitation.
I crawled there, every movement an effort. I reached and it shone brighter; its warmth cut through cold darkness.
The chains at my wrists and ankles stirred and flared in a wild display of runes before dimming again as I approached it.
Light wrapped itself around me, and I was standing in a huge, moon–drenched meadow.
There was a figure before me. Her hair rolled down her back like a fall of silver, and her eyes shone with soft, ethereal light.
“Who are you?” I called–my voice shaking.
She smiled wistfully, and in her eyes deep sadness showed. “I
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am a part of you, Dane. A part you’ve long forgotten.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, my heart shaking in my chest.
“You carry within you the essence
the essence of the Moon Goddess,” she said easily. “Her strength runs through your veins.”
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The idea was so wild and ridiculous that, whirling, I stumbled a backward step. Impossible. I am but.
“You are more than you know,” she cut in, her tone even. “But the Nameless fear you because of that. He wants to break because he understands what you are capable of.
you
Ironically, it was she who instilled in me that sense of hope and dread. For if she were right, then there was still a chance, remote though it was, meaning that I could still strive for it and somehow make it through.
“What am I to do?”
Believe in yourself, she said, and her voice was immediately so far. “And remember, you are not alone.”
The light was gone, and I stood back inside the cell. The chains. still clung to me, but somehow their weight felt a little less than
before.
I clenched my fists as resolution burned inside me.
The Nameless laughed again, and this time it didn’t shatter me.
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I muttered,
“I’ll show you, I’ll show you what I am capable of.”
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