Pain arrived before memory did, but light came with it. Pale white light flickered against the cave walls in uneven pulses, rising and fading like something struggling to breathe. Azaliyah’s eyes snapped open to stone above her and cold moss beneath her palms. Every bone in her body ached. Her throat tasted of smoke. When she forced herself upright, the world tilted hard enough to make her grab the ground.
A few feet away, Camron knelt with one hand braced against the floor and the other pressed to his chest. Threads of silver-white energy moved beneath his skin like trapped lightning, flashing through his neck, shoulders, and arms before dimming again. His torn shirt hung in strips, exposing claw marks, blood, and strange glowing cracks that looked less like wounds and more like somethin
