The name hit harder than the explosion.
Aria.
Not Lyra.
Not Luna.
Not the names I had lived with.
Aria.
The corridor stayed dark.
Completely dark.
No torches.
No emergency lights.
Nothing.
Only the silver glow leaking through the broken wall ahead of us, pulsing like a living wound in the stone.
Rylan’s grip tightened around my wrist.
I could feel his pulse through the bond—fast, controlled, dangerous.
“Stay behind me,” he said.
But I wasn’t listening.
Because I couldn’t breathe properly.
The thing in the wall was still there.
Half-formed.
Half-present.
Like reality itself couldn’t decide whether to allow it to exist.
It tilted its head slightly.
Studying me.
And then it smiled again.
That same unsettling recognition.
As if we had met before.
As if I had forgotten
