***
I awoke to my screams, and my body tearing from the inside out. My throat ripped against my shouts, and my fingers dug into the bed where I was tied down. My wrists tore my restraints, and a man lay on top of me, holding me down.
“It’ll be over soon, Shoman,” he said, but I couldn’t recognize his voice. “Don’t move.”
My vision spiraled, and I twisted my neck as he jabbed my arm with a thick needle. A dense purple liquid filled my veins, and it burned.
I was dying.
“Let me go.” My words erupted on their own accord, but the man didn’t budge.
“Breathe,” he said as the needle struck a bone. “The more you squirm, the more it will hurt.”
I shouted again, but the pain disappeared.
It was so abrupt, I hadn’t moved. I was no longer fighting the man. Now I could see who he was, my father.
“Dad?” I croaked, and his blue eyes flickered over me.
The nurse tapped his shoulder. “You can let him go now.”
He didn’t move immediately. When he did, breath filled my lungs. I gasped, and my body shivered. Why was I so cold? I looked down, and my human body radiated beneath the light. I looked pallid and thin.
“Where am I?” I asked, and my dad collapsed in a chair next to the bed.
“A nursing center in the shelter,” my dad said, rubbing his forehead. A nurse stood behind him with Luthicer hovering by his side.
“And so are Urte and Pierce,” Luthicer said. “You nearly killed them.”
“What?”
My dad held his hand up. “Not now, Luthicer,” my dad said, and Luthicer’s scowl deepened the wrinkles on his brow.
“Excuse me while I attend my other patients,” he said, before he left.
My heart was racing, but it wasn’t from the medicine. “What happened?” I asked, trying to sit up. I couldn’t. “Where are Pierce and Urte?”
My father shook his head. “They’ll survive,” he said. “But only because Urte was there. He was able to block your powers.”
I remembered the pain that consumed me. “My powers?” I hadn’t activated them.
“You were poisoned, Eric,” he said, using my human name as a scorn. After everything, I’d converted. I wasn’t a shade in his eyes. “You couldn’t control them, and it used them against you.”
Fudicia. I raised my arm and stared at the cleared skin. The black slit was gone.
“You’re lucky Luthicer could create another remedy so fast,” he said, and I knew they’d seen my empty necklace. I didn’t even bother defending myself. “When were you attacked, Eric?”
“Last night,” I said, staring at the cement ceiling. “I didn’t think it’d have that much of an effect.”
“It’s the Light, Eric—”
“It was Darthon’s guard,” I said, and my father went ashen.
“What are you talking about?”
“Fudicia,” I said, turning to glare at him. He was still trying to lie. “I know who she is, remember?”
He folded his hands into his lap as if he was holding himself back. “How’d she find you?”
“I was being reckless,” I said. “What else is new?”
“Eric,” he growled. “This is not a time to be childish. You could’ve been killed. You’re lucky you managed to get away.”
I frowned, and my father stood above me. “How did you get away?” he asked, and I locked eyes with him.
“I had help.”
His mouth opened. “You didn’t—”
“I saw her again; okay?” I pushed my elbows against the bed and sat up. “I’m not proud of it,” I managed. “But she’s okay.”
“Okay, Eric?” His voice rose, and the nurse stepped out of the room. “Okay? She’s the third descendant. She could be dead—”
“Where do you think my remedy went?” I didn’t yell back. I had no right to. “She’s alive,” I said. “And the Light doesn’t even know it.”
His crumbled brow rose. “What do you mean?”
“They still believe they killed the third descendant,” I said, taking a moment to breathe. I wiped the sweat from my forehead, and my father blinked.
“Abby?”
I nodded.
He sank into his chair. “That’s the only good news I’ve received out of all of this.”
I stared at him. He looked much older than I remembered. Even in his shade form, his black hair was beginning to gray, and he was starting to develop wrinkles. His shoulders were bonier, and his chest was sunken in. I’d put him through hell.
“I’m sorry,” I said, wondering when I had said it last.
He hung his head in his hands. “Don’t be,” he said. “You’re a teenager; I can’t really expect anything else from you.”
“My age shouldn’t matter.”
“You’ll understand when you’re older,” he mumbled and lifted his chin. “I should’ve known you’d go back to her.”
I sighed. “I won’t do it again.”
“Don’t lie to me, Eric.”
“I’m not,” I said, knowing the truth was more powerful than a lie could ever be. “I broke her heart, and that’s exactly how it’s going to stay.”