One second I’m on my knees on the cold floor, Arthur’s hand in mine, the ghost of the First Regret’s scream still echoing in the hollows of my bones. The next, the floor is gone. I’m taller. The air hits my face from a different angle. My—his—heart is a slower, heavier drum against ribs that aren’t mine. A deep, throbbing ache blooms in a limb that doesn’t exist, a phantom fire licking up from a hand that was never mine to lose. His corrupted arm. I feel the echo of its loss like a fresh amputation.Arthur.The thought is my own, but it rings in a foreign skull. I look down and see his hands, the familiar scars, the broader palms, clenched white-knuckled on the floor. I try to move them, to unclench the fists, and for a terrifying second, nothing happens. They are his. They are mine. They are not listening.Then the floor rushes up again, or I fall into it. The perspective lurches, dizzying, nauseating. I’m back in my own body, smaller, my own heartbeat a frantic bird against my ribs.
続きを読む
