Chapter 58
Ariana knew the bond was gone.
That was why the voice should not have been there.
She stood still in the dark, breathing slowly, trying to keep herself steady as the silence pressed around her. This place had no wind, no warmth, no sound that belonged to a real world. It only had stillness. The kind that waited. The kind that listened.
Her chest still hurt from the break.
Not from a wound she could touch, but from the place inside her where Kael had always been. Every time she thought of him, the emptiness answered first.
That should have made this easier.
It should have made it impossible to be fooled.
But when the voice came, low and familiar, everything inside her stopped.
"Ariana."
She froze.
For one terrible second, she could not breathe.
The darkness in front of her shifted slowly, not violently, not like an attack. It moved with purpose, drawing itself together piece by piece until a shape stood there.
Tall.
Still.
Watching her.
