Lahat ng Kabanata ng Midnight Bride: Kabanata 61 - Kabanata 66

My senses are all wrong. They’re warped and twisted like mirrors in a nightmare. Colors are too sharp. Sounds are too loud. Every flicker of light cuts through my head like a blade. I don’t know what that woman did to me. Her name was Seraphine, I think, if that’s even her real name, but whatever poison she poured into my mind is working.And it isn’t good.My breath comes fast and shallow, but I can’t slow it down. My lungs feel too small and my body is too big. My skin is too tight, like I’ve outgrown myself and the seams are threatening to rip. There’s a fire crawling just beneath my flesh, something angry and ancient thrashing to get out. It coils like smoke through my chest and burns behind my eyes.I can’t control it.Everything inside me pulses with a need I don’t recognize. Not hunger. Not thirst. Not even rage. It’s something worse. Something primal. Something that doesn’t think or reason. It only feels.My claws dig into the floor as I crouch low. Whatever material they used

Darkness surrounds me. I’m not sure where I am or what just happened. But I feel happy and free.There’s no pain or sound. Only the slow unraveling of light.I float, not in the way leaves fall, but like a memory slipping from a dream. My body is behind me now, somewhere distant and mute. Ahead, a vast stillness stretches wide before me, painted in colors I can’t name. Stars pulse like quiet heartbeats. There is no time here. No breath. Only the feeling that something final has happened.Am I really dead?I should cross the line. I could have. But something tugs at me, pulling me back.It isn’t fear or unfinished duty or vengeance. It is warmer, deeper. A gravity that speaks in a voice of a single name.Kendric.His name is a tether wrapped around my spirit, burning with sorrow, love, and a pain so deep it splits the void. I can feel him. His grief is like storm clouds brewing on a hot summer day. Somewhere, far beneath the evil that separated us, he is screaming my name. Holding my b

Being alive feels awkward. We neither should be. I also expect to go feral any moment, but it never comes.It’s like us dying reset everything and now we are out in this world alone with most thinking we are dead.The witches tell us to go back, and so after a few hours at the river, we reluctantly agree.The youngest one takes us to a car and drives us all the way back to Valeria’s home pack. When we arrive, it’s dark, and oddly, no one notices us pulling in. If they do, they don’t leave their homes.That night, after we shower and find clean clothes to settle into bed, I dream. Not of memories. Not of home. Of the space between.It’s changed. Darker now. The stars flicker. The golden light is dim and something waits. It watches me with ember eyes.I speak. "Who are you?"No answer. Only pressure. Presence.My soul flutters like a dying flame. Then it speaks.“You are mine now.”I wake, choking on air, waking Valeria as well.“What was that?” She asks, her voice frantic.I nod. "Some