“Damon. Damon.” I heard my father’s voice calling me, echoing like thunder in a cave that had no walls.
“Father! Father, please, where are you! ” I shouted into the nothing, my voice echoing so hard it felt like the darkness itself was throwing it back at me.
I was running, my paws tearing across ground that was not really ground, just endless black that swallowed every step.
My chest burned with every breath, my lungs full of fire and the taste of blood, and yet I could smell him, strong and sharp, the scent that had anchored me since I was a boy. My father. I knew he was here, I could feel him, but every time I turned my head there was nothing but more void.
“Damon.” His voice came again.
“Father!” I screamed back, my wolf’s howl bursting out of me, tearing my throat raw. “I hear you, but I cannot find you! Show yourself, please. Please, Father, I am lost. I am bleeding. Darren stabbed me and he said..he said things I cannot bear to believe. I need you to tell me it is a lie. I need you to tell me what is happening.”
My paws kept moving even though I did not know where I was going. My claws scratched against nothing, but I ran because if I stopped, I would fall into myself. My wolf growled inside me, pacing, restless, his fur bristling.
Stop running like a blind pup. “Then tell me where to go!” I shouted at him. “Do you not smell him? Do you not hear his voice?”
I smell blood. I hear lies. This place is not real. This is not the forest. This is not the world we know. This is the place between life and death, Damon, and you are running like a coward when you should be fighting to breathe.
My chest tightened at his words, and I stumbled, my paws slipping on nothing. “So what am I supposed to do? Just die here? Just let him win? Let him take Lyra? Let him carry my name while I rot in the dirt?”
No, my wolf snapped. You are not meant to die here. You are meant to choose. Look behind you.
I spun, and the darkness ripped itself open like claws tearing through flesh. Out of it stepped the thing that froze my blood. A wolf. My wolf. But twisted.
His fur was darker than any night sky, black so deep it swallowed the faint light leaking from nowhere. His eyes were not gold like mine, not even amber—they were red.
I stumbled back, my paws dragging. “What the hell is that? That looks like me. Why does it look like me?”


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