Ian's POV
I lay still on the bed, the air thick with the taste of iron on my tongue. The blood from my split lip still burned, but it was the bells that held my mind prisoner. The shrill clanging echoed like a war drum in the back of my skull, each ring sharper than the last. But even stranger than the bells, was the silence underneath them. Deep, gnawing. Like the world itself had paused, waiting.
I wasn’t just hearing them.
I was feeling them, inside my chest. They rattled my bones, buzzed in my blood.
My heart thudded against my ribcage like it was trying to tear free. I needed to know. I needed to see what was happening.
But then there was Kaelric.
“Screw him!” The thought burned through my mind like fire.
I’m not going to stay here, waiting like some dumb rabbit because he o
