Somewhere in between the realms. The spiritual realm where avelyn will have to either fight for her life or die.
Avelyn stood barefoot in the middle of it all.
Nothing felt real.
Not the air—too sharp, too still.
Not the earth beneath her feet—if it even was earth. It crackled beneath her like crushed glass coated in frost. It shimmered. Shifted. Faded beneath each step.
The sky above? It churned like bruises bleeding into silk. Colors she couldn’t name, all colliding, folding, blooming in silence.
Alone.
"Hello?" she called out, her voice sounding smaller than she'd expected. "Is anyone—"
Nothing.
No answer. No wind. No sound at all. Just that bone-deep silence that gnawed at her ribs and made her spine cold.
This wasn’t life. It wasn’t death.
It was the place in between.
The
