AMARA’S POV
Darkness pressed against my eyes, and the air felt cold and thick. I shivered as I tried to sit up, but my arms and legs refused to obey. The room smelled of smoke and something acrid- burning herbs mixed with iron and blood. My lungs burned as I tried to take a deep breath, and panic shot through me.
A memory clawed at the edge of my mind: the palace, my room, Kael… and the shadow. A figure cloaked in darkness. Before I could scream, a pulse of freezing power struck my chest, numbing my body, as if I had been trapped in ice. I tried to resist, but my body wouldn't obey. Only my mind remained awake, painfully awake.
The mark on my arm burned with glowing light but it was smothered. The shadow whispered an incantation under its breath, and I felt myself suspended in the air,
