CHAPTER 358: AWAKE

The tunnel swallowed her whole.

Nysha moved by feel more than sight, the shadows stretching before her like fingers, probing cracks in the stone. Each step echoed with uneven weight, her body too small to bear the burden, her core bleeding power she shouldn’t have used.

The cocoon floated beside her, shrouded in tendrils that pulsed faintly as if stitched from her veins. Inside, Lindarion looked less like a warrior than a corpse dressed in blood.

Too still. Too cold.

Nysha clenched her jaw and forced the shadows tighter, weaving them again where they frayed. She had never held a body this way before, she could bind wounds, cradle fragments of flesh, but this was different.

The sword had eaten him hollow, and she was trying to sew him closed with string that wanted to snap.

Ashwing scuttled down her arm, claws clicking against her sleeve, tongue flicking nervously at the cocoon. She stroked his scaled back with one trembling finger.

"I know," she whispered, breath white in the damp air. "I know."

Behind them, she could still feel the humans’ eyes. She didn’t need to turn. Their footsteps followed, clattering, uneven, like a herd pushed through slaughter pens. She smelled their sweat, their fear, the tang of old blood caked into dented armor.

She hated it. Not their presence, but the way they clung together, whispering like carrion birds waiting for her to stumble.

Monster. Witch. Demon.

The words weren’t spoken, but they pressed against her ears anyway.

She wanted to scream at them, tear the air apart with the truth: Yes, I am. Yes, and still he chose me. But the thought caught in her throat, bitter, because even she wasn’t sure if that was true.

Why did he choose her? He could have cut her down that night in the ruins. He should have. Instead he let her bind him, drag him from death, chain his shadows to hers.

Her fingers pressed harder into the cocoon.

’Don’t you dare leave me with the answer unspoken.’

The tunnel curved into a wider chamber. Not carved, natural. A hollow in the earth where water once pooled. The ceiling hung low, jagged with dripping teeth of stone, but the air was cleaner, freer than the smoke-choked cavern behind.

She staggered into the center and let her knees fold. The cocoon lowered with her, shadows softening their grip until Lindarion rested on the ground. His head lolled to the side. His hair clung to his face, matted with blood.

Nysha pressed both hands to his chest. Not for comfort. To feel the faint rise beneath her palms.

It was there. Barely.

Her throat cracked with the sound she didn’t want to make, something too close to a sob. She bit it back hard, teeth clamping until copper filled her mouth.

The commander arrived seconds later. His armor scraped the stone as he ducked inside, men trailing behind. They fanned out along the walls, eyes never leaving her.

Ashwing hissed. His small body arched, wings flicking open though they were too stunted to carry him. Nysha curled a hand around him, forcing him still.

The commander studied her. His face was stone, but the cut above his brow dripped fresh down his cheek, and the way his left arm hung stiff told her he was closer to breaking than he let on.

"Is he alive?" His voice wasn’t soft. It wasn’t cruel either. Just hard. The kind of hard that never bent, only broke.

Nysha didn’t look up. Her palms pressed firmer against Lindarion’s chest, feeling the weak rhythm beneath. "Yes."

A pause. A scrape of boot against rock. Then: "What are you?"

There it was again. The knife in the dark.

She didn’t answer.

His silence waited. The soldiers behind him shifted, whispers like vermin in the cracks.

Finally Nysha lifted her head. Her hair clung damp to her cheeks, her eyes burning brighter from the strain of holding the shadows steady. She met the commander’s gaze.

"What does it matter?"

The words struck harder than she meant. Her voice shook, but the echo filled the chamber anyway.

The commander’s jaw tightened. "If you’re what I think you are, you’ll doom us all by standing here."

Nysha’s shadows flared before she could stop them. The cocoon pulsed. The soldiers recoiled, steel half-drawn.

"Then you shouldn’t have followed me," she hissed, every syllable raw.

The tension snapped taut. For a heartbeat, the cavern was on the edge of war.

Then Lindarion coughed.

It was weak, broken, but it was sound. His body spasmed once, blood spilling from his lips. Nysha’s hands clutched his shoulders, shadows fraying wild around her.

"Breathe," she begged. Her voice cracked. "Please."

He didn’t open his eyes. But his chest heaved again, shallow, trembling. The sword at his side throbbed, faint, a pulse like a second heartbeat.

The humans stared. None moved closer. None dared.

The commander exhaled harsh through his nose, then turned away, barking low orders to his men. "Set watch. No one sleeps until the ceiling stops groaning. Keep distance from the elf and the girl."

They obeyed quickly, too quickly, like men relieved to retreat from something they didn’t understand.

Nysha bowed her head over Lindarion again. Her shadows sank low, wrapping him tighter, blotting out the faint gleam of steel. She ignored their whispers, ignored the commander, ignored the burn in her chest that threatened to spill over.

Her lips brushed his ear as she bent close.

"You’re not allowed to leave me," she whispered, words shaking apart as they left her mouth. "Not yet. Not ever."

Ashwing pressed his head against her cheek, tongue flicking, a strange comfort in the ruin.

The cocoon pulsed once, shadows clinging like threads of fate.

And in the silence that followed, she swore she felt the faintest squeeze of his hand against hers.

—

Dark.

Not the kind of dark that eased the body into rest, no, this one had teeth. It gnawed at him, clung to him, whispered with a thousand tongues. The sword’s voice was there too, coiled at the root of his spine like a serpent.

Rise. Feed. You are not finished.

His lungs burned. His mouth tasted iron. For a moment, he thought the dark had claimed him entirely.

But then, warmth.

A hand pressed against his. Small, trembling, but steady in its own way.

Nysha.

The sound of her voice bled into the black: "You’re not allowed to leave me. Not yet. Not ever."

The words hooked into him deeper than the blade itself ever could. His chest spasmed, breath tearing back into him ragged, shredded. His eyes cracked open, red drowning the whites, vision fractured, edges stained with blood.

The ceiling above was jagged stone, dripping. The smell of damp earth and sweat filled his nose. But beneath that was something else, the stench of fear. Human fear.

He turned his head. Slowly. Too heavy, too much. But he forced it.

There they were. Lined along the chamber’s edge like vultures, eyes fixed not on him, but on her.

Their mouths didn’t move, but he didn’t need them to. He could hear it in their breathing, their shifting, the way their hands twitched on their weapons.

Monster. Witch. Demon.

The words crawled across his skull.

’They dare. They look at her that way while she drags me back from the pit.’

The sword stirred in his lap. Its hunger twined with his fury, urging him upward.

His fingers curled. He pushed himself up onto one elbow, shadows writhing across his body like veins come alive. Blood spilled down his chin, painting his teeth red when he spoke.

"Lower your eyes."

The humans stiffened. The commander turned sharply, his hand hovering near the hilt at his side.

Lindarion’s voice cracked the chamber again, harsher this time, sharp enough to split the air.

"Now."

Shadows flared outward, spearing across the stone floor, forcing the humans back with sheer weight of presence. The torches guttered, their flames smothered. In the half-dark, his red eyes burned hotter, wide and merciless.

"You think I don’t hear it?" He coughed, spat blood, and still kept talking. His voice came like a blade dragged across stone. "The way you breathe her name like a curse. The way you clutch your steel when she moves. You would have let me die back there. She did not."

The commander’s jaw clenched, but he didn’t speak. His men shifted uneasily, their fear sour and thick in the air.

Lindarion dragged himself further upright, leaning heavy on the sword. The blade hummed, shadows coiling tighter around his arm, as if it too thirsted for the humans’ throats.

"She carried me when I could not stand. She bound me when my own shadows tried to consume me. And you," his voice dropped to a growl, "dare lay eyes on her as though she is filth?"

The commander finally spoke. His voice was hard, clipped. "She’s not one of us."

Lindarion laughed. It was broken, ugly, blood bubbling in his throat. But it was laughter all the same.

"Neither am I. Do you think your walls, your cities, your prayers made you untouchable? Your kind already burns. You rot in the ground while pretending to breathe clean air." His eyes cut over them, one by one. "Without her, you would already be corpses feeding Maeven’s pets."

Silence stretched. The shadows writhed higher, crawling the walls, choking the chamber in suffocating dark.

Nysha’s hand pressed against his arm. "Lindarion—"

He froze. Her voice snapped through the haze.

Slowly, painfully, he turned to her. Her red eyes shimmered, not with power, but with strain. With worry.

And for a heartbeat, his rage wavered.

The sword hissed in his hand. Strike. Silence them. Prove it.

He ground his teeth, shadows trembling.

Then, with deliberate slowness, he drove the blade point-first into the stone between him and the humans. The cavern shook with the impact, hairline cracks racing outward from the strike.

The shadows receded, curling back toward him, hissing as they retreated. The torches sputtered alive again, weak but clinging to flame.

The humans still stared. But none met his gaze anymore. Their heads lowered, whether from fear or obedience didn’t matter.

Lindarion leaned against the sword, chest heaving, vision blurring again at the edges. He tasted blood still, warm and constant.

His words came softer now, but sharper still.

"She is under my protection. Look at her that way again, and I will paint these walls with what little blood you have left."

No one answered.

Only the dripping of the cavern ceiling dared to speak.

Lindarion swayed, the weight of the sword nearly dragging him down again. Nysha caught his shoulder, shadows bracing his body against hers.

For a moment, he wanted to collapse into it. To let the darkness close in again, let her bear him. But he forced himself to stay upright.

He lifted his head once more, eyes burning into the commander.

"You lead them," he rasped. "Then teach them silence. Or I will."

The commander held his stare for a long, heavy breath. Then, finally, he gave a curt nod.

"Understood."

Only then did Lindarion close his eyes. His grip loosened, his body folding slightly toward Nysha’s lap.

The sword still pulsed. The whispers still clawed. But beneath it all, there was her hand. Small. Trembling. Still holding him upright.

For now, that was enough.