Eternal is the Night (The Cursed Realm Saga #1)

Chapter 1

When Everything Changed

ANNA

“How are you doing?”

There it was. The question that started every therapy session.

The clock’s hand ticked like the battery was dying. It was going to be a long hour.

Michelle cleared her throat, snapping my attention back on her—she was still waiting for me to answer. Shrugging, I shifted uncomfortably on the stiff sofa. It was probably the same one that came with the house when they converted it into a therapy office: an estate sale, no doubt.

She was still waiting for a reply. I guess my shrug didn’t cut it.

“I’m fine.”

Michelle adjusted her glasses as she observed me, flashing a tight-lipped pity smile before she looked at her notes.

“I’d like to pick up where we left off last time,” she said, tucking a loose strand of her short dark hair behind her ear.

My hands twisted as I dug fingernail beneath fingernail.

“Now,” she said. “What were you and your mom fighting about?”

I flinched as the image of my mom came to mind.

I still couldn’t believe the court ordered me to attend therapy.

This was my twenty-eighth session since January, and my third therapist. Only two more sessions to go.

Two more hours of hell. I glanced at the clock, waiting for the second hand to hit twelve.

One hundred and forty-six minutes remaining.

Her pale skin and lifeless body were still there, just as vivid as the first day I was forced to sit down and talk about the worst day of my life. I doubted another one hundred and forty-five minutes and forty-three seconds would change that.

I stuffed down the emotions trying to climb out of their cellar and fixed my gaze on a framed landscape of the mountains above her right shoulder. Without effort, I summoned the lines I’d repeated many times.

“I was upset because I’d found out she lied to me about my dad being dead,” I said.

At least, that was part of it. But not the whole story. I’d never tell anyone that.

The pages of her notebook crackled as she flipped through them.

A twitch in one eye forced them both shut as I stretched my neck, my thick blonde hair slipping from the knot at the back of my head.

“What made her tell you the truth?” Michelle asked.

“How should I know?” I snapped, breaking my contact with the painting and looking anywhere other than at the woman asking me the questions that I’d already asked myself a thousand times.

My mom’s bright blue eyes flashed in my mind; her expression twisted with grief. I saw the same eyes every time I looked in the mirror.

That was why she’d told me the truth about my dad being alive, because of the pain she’d felt after hearing the scathing words I could never take back.

But that was a guess. I couldn’t read minds. And it didn’t matter. I didn’t know anything about her or why she’d made the decisions she did. The only thing I was sure about was that she hadn’t told me the truth about anything—until that night.

I shoved the memory away, focusing intently on one blade of the blinds that jutted out haphazardly from the rest.

“And she still never told you his name or anything about him?”

A false smile slipped across my face as my head swung side to side like a pendulum.

She drilled me some more, clarifying details repeatedly.

I mean, seriously, how many times could I confirm the same shit?

“And the other man that was there that night. Was he still in the room?” she asked.

Trying to shove my hands into my jean pockets, I scowled. Why were they so small? Who could actually use these?

Looking up, I caught her stare and yielded with a small sigh.

“No, Derrick was already gone. I don’t have any idea how she knew him.

They seemed about the same age, but I never knew them to be together.

They were close, like old friends, and he was my mentor.

He taught me how to use a sword and defend myself.

I straight-up asked her if he was my dad.

She told me he couldn’t be. And for the eight hundredth fucking time: He. Didn’t. Kill. Her!”

A worried look had set into her expression—the kind that said I should be in a padded room. “Anna, I know you had a bond with this man, but we have to consider all of the options.”

I rolled my eyes. “You mean the only option the FBI could come up with? Fine, but I’m done doing this. I don’t care if Sasquatch himself sends me to court-ordered therapy again, I’m not coming back.”

But we both knew that was a lie. The court documents cited that if I missed more than one session in a row I could be recommended for inpatient treatment.

Silence stretched between us. Her glasses clinked on the table where she placed them, and she pinched the bridge of her nose.

“Anna, just a few more questions and I’ll tell them you’ve been cleared so you can skip the last two sessions.

I know the questioning has been relentless, and I’m sorry for what you’ve been through.

A murder and a kidnapping are enough trauma for any one person.

The whole town was shaken by what happened.

The fact that no one was ever caught is causing a lot of discord behind the scenes. ”

So, torturing me was the solution? Being cleared from therapy was a pretty big carrot to dangle.

“Fine.”

The corner of her mouth tightened, and for a moment, her expression became glassy before she picked up her spectacles and placed them on her face again.

“Do you know why your mom didn’t want to tell you about your dad?” she asked.

My neck ached from sitting as I experimented with angles to lessen the intensity whilst still avoiding Michelle. “She seemed to think that it would put me in danger.”

“Were you? In danger?”

A hollow laugh escaped my lips. “Apparently.”

“What about before that? Was anyone ever sneaking around? Any phone calls you heard her talking on?” she pressed.

I shook my head. “She didn’t have a cell phone.

The only person she ever trusted was Derrick.

My mom trusted no one, and I mean no one.

The mailman couldn’t deliver packages to the door.

But Derrick? I don’t know. They had a weird relationship.

I sensed she had feelings for him, but they never seemed to be anything more than friends, if that. ”

A hollow ache was forming in my chest. I’d wanted them to be more than that. I wanted a family photo on the mantle. Movie nights where we all sat on the couch and ate popcorn. But that never happened.

“Do you think she had a credible reason to be afraid?” she asked.

Shifting uncomfortably, I shook my head.

“I mean, now I do. But back then? No. I thought she was paranoid. Maybe something happened to her as a child, I don’t know.

It never felt rational to me—her fear. I know she was trying to protect me, or at least I thought she was. But from what, I have no idea.”

I took a breath, but it didn’t come easily. It was like a half-breath—the kind that doesn’t give you enough air. The kind that makes your chest hurt.

“Have you had any more hallucinations? Minor ones or ones like you had that night?” she asked.

Black stretches of shadows crept like claws across my field of vision.

Shuddering, I shook away the feeling of emptiness before it took hold of me.

The candle flickering into flames of its own accord crossed my mind fleetingly before I buried it deep, along with the many other oddities about my life.

“No, nothing.”

Michelle’s glasses lowered as she tilted her head down, watching me closely.

I didn’t yield. We weren’t going to talk about that. Or anything else.

“You said a few more questions, and you’d sign off on my sessions,” I said, my voice hard.

Her lips pursed. “Yes. One more question, and I will. The missing year. Has anything come back? Anything at all?”

For the first time, I truly considered her question. It had been three years since I went missing, with no explanation of how I vanished or even came back. A whole year with no memory of it, and the last two I’d been back here in Watauga County.

I wished I was holding back, but there was nothing—the entire year after that night was gone. Not a wisp of memory remained. Like no time had passed.

“No, nothing,” I whispered. “Just waking up back at the cabin.”

“Okay,” she said, forcing a smile and nodding. “Thank you, Anna. I know that isn’t easy. Are you still taking the test for your GED soon?”

“I took it,” I said. “Passed.”

“That’s great,” she said, smiling. Her expression became more serious. “Anna, are you happy with your life?”

I stared at her, my lips drawing inward. What kind of question was that?

“My life is what it is,” I said. “I’ve accepted that.”

“You’ve mentioned that sometimes it’s hard to engage with your friends.”

I glanced out of the window. The view of the forests around the city, nestled peacefully in the mountains, used to be comforting. But that peace was a lie. There was an evil hiding within their beauty that I’d never unsee.

“Anna?”

Rain started beading down the window.

“You also said you felt guilty. Do you still feel that guilt you spoke of?” she asked

That night crawled from the shadows. A cold from deep within rose through my core to strangle me. A scream sounded in the recesses of my mind, distant but piercing.

“Anna?”

That was it—this was my atonement for what happened.

Ignoring Michelle’s concerned look, I stood up. “You’re out of questions.”

Michelle’s expression collapsed into disdain, but she nodded anyway.

I headed for the door and gripped the doorknob in my hand, but suddenly, I stilled.

I couldn’t move.

I couldn’t walk out of here without acknowledging the truth—a truth I was terrified to say out loud. Terrified that I’d never atone for what happened.

Finally, the words escaped me like whispers from a grave.

“Of course, I still feel it. I killed my mom.”