Chapter Ten
1889 Words
— Dani
I try to sleep.
I really do.
I lie on my side.
Then my back.
Then my stomach.
Then I curl into a ball and try to breathe the way Dr. Hale showed me.
Nothing works.
Every time I close my eyes, I see the fire twisting into a wolf’s head.
I see Alana’s face when she thought my wolf was clawing its way out of my skin.
I feel the way the air changed — thick, electric, wrong.
And underneath all of it…
I feel Alaric.
Not physically.
Not even emotionally, not really.
Just the echo of him — the way his presence steadied me earlier, the way his heartbeat cut through the chaos like it was the only real thing in the room.
I hate that it helped.
I hate that I needed it.
I hate that I can still feel it.
I flip onto my back and stare at the ceiling.
The cabin is quiet. Too quiet.
The kind of quiet that makes every thought louder.
What if I project something in my sleep?
What if I phase out of the bed?
What if I wake up and I’m not… here?
I squeeze my eyes shut.
Stop.
Stop thinking.
Stop feeling.
But my body won’t settle. My mind won’t settle. My energy won’t settle.
I toss.
I turn.
I breathe.
I fail.
Hours pass like this — restless, tangled, heavy.
At some point, I hear footsteps in the hallway. Slow. Careful. Familiar.
Alaric.
He pauses outside my door.
I hold my breath.
He doesn’t knock.
He doesn’t open it.
He just stands there for a moment — long enough that I can feel the weight of him through the wood — and then he walks away.
My chest tightens.
I don’t sleep.
Not even for a minute.
---
The sun isn’t even fully up when I give up and sit on the edge of the bed, exhausted and wired at the same time. My head aches. My eyes burn. My body feels like it’s buzzing under my skin.
I pull on a sweater and step into the hallway.
The cabin is quiet, but not empty.
Alana is curled on the couch, wrapped in a blanket, staring at nothing. She looks like she didn’t sleep either.
Dr. Hale is at the kitchen table, writing notes in a leather-bound journal, her glasses perched low on her nose. She looks up when she hears me.
“Good morning,” she says gently. “Did you get any rest?”
I shake my head.
She nods like she expected that. “It’s alright. We’ll take it slow today.”
Alana glances at me, her expression soft but wary. “Hey.”
“Hey,” I whisper back.
Then I feel it — a shift in the air behind me.
Alaric.
I turn.
He’s leaning against the doorway, arms crossed, eyes on me. He looks like he didn’t sleep either — hair mussed, jaw shadowed, tension radiating off him in waves.
“You ready?” he asks.
No.
Not even close.
But I nod anyway.
Dr. Hale closes her journal. “We’ll start with the first test in a few minutes. Emotional threshold. Nothing intense. Just observation.”
My stomach twists.
Alana pulls the blanket tighter around herself. “I’ll stay out of the way.”
Alaric pushes off the doorway, his gaze steady on me. “You’re not doing this alone.”
Something warm flickers in my chest — unwanted, unsteady, dangerous.
I look away.
Dr. Hale stands. “Let’s begin.”
And just like that, the day starts — the day where I find out how much of me is still mine… and how much is something else entirely.
Dr. Hale leads me to the center of the living room, where she’s arranged a small setup on the coffee table — a candle, a notebook, a small speaker, and a bowl of smooth stones. It looks harmless.
It doesn’t feel harmless.
Alaric stands near the wall, arms crossed, watching me with that unreadable expression he wears when he’s trying not to feel something too strongly. Alana sits on the far end of the couch, wrapped in a blanket, eyes wide but determined to stay.
Dr. Hale gestures for me to sit.
I lower myself onto the rug, legs crossed, palms resting on my knees. My body feels heavy and jittery at the same time — like I’m made of static and exhaustion.
“Alright,” Dr. Hale says softly. “We’re going to begin with something simple. A mild emotional cue. Nothing overwhelming.”
I nod, though my throat is tight.
She picks up the small speaker and scrolls through something on her phone.
“We’ll start with sound,” she explains. “Music can evoke emotion quickly, but gently. I want you to listen. Just listen. Don’t fight the feeling. Don’t chase it. Just observe.”
Observe.
Right.
She presses play.
A soft piano melody fills the room — slow, wistful, familiar in a way that makes my chest ache. It’s the kind of music that feels like memory, even if you’ve never heard it before.
My breath catches.
Dr. Hale watches me closely. “What do you feel?”
I swallow. “Sad. I think.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. It just… feels like something I lost.”
Alaric shifts behind her, but he doesn’t speak.
The music swells — gentle, aching, beautiful.
My eyes sting.
Dr. Hale’s voice stays calm. “Good. Stay with it. Don’t push it away.”
I try.
But the sadness grows — not sharp, not overwhelming, just… deep. Heavy. Like a weight settling in my chest.
The air around me hums.
Not violently.
Not dangerously.
Just a soft vibration, like my emotions are brushing against the world.
Dr. Hale notices immediately. “Dani. What’s happening?”
“I don’t know,” I whisper. “It’s… warm. Like the air is warm.”
Alana leans forward. “I feel it too.”
Alaric straightens. “Hale.”
She lifts a hand to silence him, eyes still on me.
“Dani,” she says gently, “look at the candle.”
I turn my head.
The flame flickers.
Normal.
Then—
It stretches.
Just slightly.
Like it’s reaching toward me.
My breath stutters. “It’s moving.”
Dr. Hale’s voice sharpens. “How?”
“Toward me,” I whisper. “Like it’s… listening.”
Alana gasps softly.
Alaric takes a step forward. “Dani—”
The flame snaps back to normal.
The hum in the air fades.
The sadness drains out of me so fast it leaves me dizzy.
Dr. Hale immediately kneels in front of me. “Dani. Look at me.”
I do.
Her eyes are steady, but her pulse is racing.
“What did you feel right before the flame moved?”
“I— I don’t know. Just… sad. And tired. And… open.”
“Open how?”
“Like… like the music was pulling something out of me.”
Dr. Hale exhales slowly. “Alright. That’s enough for now.”
Alaric’s voice is low, tense. “That wasn’t an illusion.”
“No,” she agrees. “It wasn’t.”
Alana whispers, “Then what was it?”
Dr. Hale doesn’t answer.
Because she doesn’t know.
And that terrifies me more than anything.
---
— Alaric
The moment the candle flame snapped back to normal, I felt something in my chest loosen — and something else tighten twice as hard.
Dani’s shoulders sagged, her breath shaking, her eyes wide and glassy. She looked like she was barely holding herself together.
And I couldn’t move.
Not toward her.
Not away from her.
Not anywhere.
Because if I moved, I wasn’t sure what I’d do.
Hale is still kneeling in front of her, murmuring something calm and clinical, but I can barely hear it over the pounding in my ears.
That flame moved.
It didn’t flicker.
It didn’t bend.
It reached.
Toward her.
Like it recognized her.
Like it wanted her.
And that terrifies me more than anything else that’s happened today.
Dani swallows hard, her voice barely a whisper. “I didn’t mean to do anything.”
Hale answers gently, “I know.”
But I can see the truth in Hale’s eyes — she’s rattled. She’s trying to hide it, but I’ve known her too long. She’s seen something she can’t explain.
Something she didn’t expect.
Something she’s afraid of.
Dani looks down at her hands, trembling. “I just felt… sad. And tired. And open.”
Open.
The word hits me like a blow.
Because I felt it too — the moment her emotions shifted, the moment the air changed, the moment the flame reached for her. It was like the room itself leaned toward her.
Like she was pulling everything in.
Hale stands slowly. “That’s enough for now.”
Dani nods, but she looks like she might break apart if anyone touches her.
Alana whispers, “Dad… what was that?”
I don’t answer.
Because I don’t know.
And I hate not knowing.
Hale turns to me. “Her threshold is lower than I expected.”
No.
Not lower.
Different.
But I don’t say that out loud.
Instead, I force my voice steady. “She needs rest.”
Dani flinches at the word, like she knows she won’t get any.
Hale nods. “We’ll continue later. Carefully.”
Alana slips out of the room, pale and shaken.
Hale follows her.
And then it’s just me and Dani.
She doesn’t look at me.
She doesn’t move.
She just sits there on the rug, staring at the candle like it might betray her again.
I take a slow breath. “Dani.”
Nothing.
I step closer — not too close, not enough to overwhelm her, just enough that she knows I’m here.
“You did well.”
She lets out a humorless laugh. “I made a candle move.”
“You didn’t lose control.”
She looks up at me then — eyes tired, scared, searching.
“I don’t know what’s happening to me,” she whispers.
I do.
Not the details.
Not the name.
Not the lore.
But I know the feeling.
The pull.
The resonance.
The way the air reacts when she feels too much.
I know it because I feel it too.
I kneel beside her, careful, slow. “Whatever this is… you’re not facing it alone.”
Her breath catches.
For a moment — just a moment — the air hums again.
Warm.
Soft.
Familiar.
Then it fades.
She looks away quickly. “I’m scared.”
I swallow hard. “So am I.”
Her head snaps toward me, surprised.
I don’t take it back.
I don’t soften it.
I let her hear the truth.
“But fear doesn’t mean you’re broken,” I say quietly. “It means you’re changing. And we’ll figure out what that means.”
Her eyes shine, but she doesn’t cry.
She just nods.
And I stay there beside her, close enough to steady her if she slips, far enough not to trigger anything else.
Because whatever is happening to her…
it’s only the beginning.
And I’m not sure the rest of us are ready for what comes next.
---
- Writer
