CHAPTER 2

The voice shatters the silence like breaking glass. It's not a voice that should come from anything human—too deep, too resonant, layered with harmonics that make my bones vibrate. It comes from everywhere and nowhere, surrounding me, suffocating me.

I spin around, my hand falling away from the pillar, and that's when I see it.

The shadow is massive, towering between two of the pillars, darker than the darkness around it. It has a shape—roughly humanoid but wrong in ways I can't articulate. Too tall. Limbs that bend at angles that shouldn't be possible. And though it has no face I can see, I feel its attention on me like a weight pressing down on my chest.

"You don't belong here," it says, and the words seem to come from inside my own head as much as from the shadow itself. "Not yet. Not like this."

My heart hammers against my ribs so hard it hurts. I want to speak, to demand answers, but my throat has closed up. All I can do is stand there, frozen, as the shadow moves closer. It doesn't walk—it flows, like oil spreading across water.

"She's waking up," the shadow continues, and there's something almost hungry in its tone. "The wolf inside you. Can you feel her scratching at the walls you've built? She wants out. She wants to remember."

I don't understand. I don't understand any of this. But my shoulder throbs suddenly, a sharp ache that makes me gasp and press my hand to it. When I pull my hand away, I expect to see blood, but there's nothing. Just the pain, radiating outward in waves.

"Leave me alone," I manage to whisper, and the shadow laughs—a sound like grinding stone.

"You can't hide forever, little wolf."

Then I see him.

Another figure, this one human-shaped and solid, standing in the shadows near the pillars to my left. He's far enough away that I can't make out his features clearly, but there's something about the way he stands, the set of his shoulders, that tugs at something deep in my memory.

Do I know him?

The question should be absurd—I'm in a nightmare, none of this is real—but the feeling persists. More than that: I'm drawn to him. Despite my fear, despite the shadow still looming nearby, I find myself taking a step toward this new figure, then another.

"Don't," he says, and his voice is nothing like the shadow's. It's human, male, rough with some emotion I can't name. "Don't come closer."

But I do anyway. I can't help it. Each step feels inevitable, like I'm following a path I've walked a thousand times before. The mist swirls around my legs, and the air grows colder, but I keep moving.

As I get closer, I can make out more details. He's tall, dressed in dark clothes that blend with the shadows. His hair is dark too, falling across his forehead. But his face—I still can't see his face clearly, like there's a veil between us that my eyes can't quite penetrate.

"You shouldn't be here," he says, but he doesn't move away. If anything, he seems as rooted in place as I feel drawn forward. "It's not safe. They're watching."

"Who's watching?" My voice sounds strange to my own ears, distant and dreamlike. "Who are you?"

He doesn't answer. Instead, he reaches toward me, his hand extending through the space between us. I should pull back. Every instinct I have screams at me to run, but I don't. I stand there, transfixed, as his fingers come closer.