Harith had been frozen in place, unable to move, unable to think, ever since the woman—no, the thing—vanished from sight.
It had looked like Paige at first. Same eyes. Same voice. But then her face had twisted—subtly at first, like a glitch on an old screen—until she was someone else entirely. Someone much worse. Someone he had buried.
His mother.
She had smiled at him—tenderly, almost lovingly—and then drove the blade straight into his side.
Now, his back leaned heavily against the cold, damp wall of the corridor, one shaking hand clutched around the hilt of the knife still embedded in his torso.
His breaths came in painful bursts, as if he were trying to breathe through a throat full of sand. The sound of his heartbeat thundered in his ears—too loud, too fast, too wrong. It didn't feel like fear. It felt like something was replacing it. Something beyond his comprehension.
