5. Wren
WREN
Hands.
Too many hands.
Clawing. Grabbing. Pulling. Pressing.
Something heavy pins me down. My lungs ache for air. I try to focus—but my thoughts are syrup, thick and sluggish, dripping through my fingers no matter how hard I try to hold on.
Cold seeps through the fabric of my outfit. Dampness curls around my limbs. Grass beneath me. Outside, I realize dully. I’m outside.
I fleetingly wonder how I got here. Where here is, before the thought slips away. My mind drifts again. In and out. Maybe I black out. Darkness wraps around me, thick and absolute. Are my eyes open? I can’t feel my face. Can’t feel anything.
Voices spin in circles. Distant. Warped. All jumbled. I scrunch my face, trying to separate them, to understand. It’s only when one speaks above the others, his voice loud yet commanding, that actual words penetrate the thick fog surrounding my brain.
I don’t know the voice.
No, wait…
I do know the voice.
A single name is dredged from the depths of…somewhere. Pulled from somewhere deep in my subconscious.
Ronan.
I don’t know why I know it. Where from or how. And yet, I recognize it. Know to my marrow that it is Ronan’s voice.
His deep, demanding baritone coils inside me like a hook in my chest.
Disoriented and confused, I force my eyes open, blinking into the darkness.
Streetlights flicker. No—are those stars?
I can’t tell. Everything swims, the edges of my vision fuzzy.
Something drags across my shoulder, but I can’t seem to turn my head to look.
A rich and smoky scent seeps into my awareness.
Almost…comforting? But no, whatever is happening right now is wrong.
I can sense that much. Can feel that innate, primal awareness that I’m in a dangerous situation. That I’m not safe.
Panic spikes in my chest.
A shadow leans over me, blotting out twinkling spots of light. Blue eyes flash in the dark, pulling my focus and anchoring me for a moment before my eyes roll back in my head.
My next flicker of consciousness brings with it a glimpse of glowing wings. I’m encased in warmth, wrapped in a cocoon. Safe. Protected. The lulling of motion makes it impossible to focus. To remain in the land of the conscious for long. Then the world fractures.
Grass becomes concrete. Concrete becomes carpet. Carpet becomes ice.
Faces blur.
A moth glows.
White hair glints in the dark.
Blue eyes.
Hands brushing my face.
Everything tangles. The night. The faces. The fear.
I try to scream, but only air comes out.
Then everything shifts once more. The darkness is replaced by glaring lights that leave black spots in my vision.
I clench my eyes shut before slowly peeling them open, one hand raised against the blinding light.
The fog in my brain has cleared, and as I blink into my surroundings, I find myself standing in the empty carcass of a hockey arena.
Banners overhead drip the Serpents’ colors of emerald green and matte black instead of BSUs comforting bermuda blue and silver.
My mother’s voice booms over the announcer’s speakers, deafeningly loud as it echoes off the walls.
Her tone is sharp and cold as she rattles off expectations like they are bullet points on a to-do list. Contracts flutter down from the rafters, the sharp edges of pages slicing into my skin until blood drips down my arms. I try to cover myself, but they rain down heavier, each one cutting away at me until I fear there will be nothing left.
That I will have given all of myself to my mother’s demands.
Somewhere behind me, I hear footsteps approaching. Three sets. Slow and certain.
Spinning, I see them. Ronan, Lucian, Silas. Only they’re as tall as the rafters, eyes glowing in the dark.
They stalk closer, but I can’t move, can’t breathe.
Hands again. Blue eyes. Storm eyes. The moth. All of it.
I’m trapped.
Caught between the night that broke me and the life I can’t escape.