Page 38 of Awakened

She answers my confused look with a silent plea and curiosity—but not fear—so I lift my hand and place it in hers. It’s steady and warm, and for the first time in forever, I feel… a connection.

“Close your eyes,” she whispers, and I obey.

At first, there’s nothing.

No… Not nothing.

The absence of everything. Nothing is still something, but this isn’t that.

The Void—my old friend—is here. Waiting for me. An eternal darkness reaching out and wrapping me in its embrace. Not safety. Not comfort. But also, not fear.

Just… absence.

This place is familiar, so it’s easy to relax, floating wherever it wishes to take me. I can feel another life drifting next to me—Branwen. Time passes, but not here, and after a thousand years (or a thousand minutes, or a single breath) the Void shifts like velvet against my skin. It swirls around me, spinning faster and faster, pulling me down and ejecting me into a liminal space.

I land on my feet and find myself standing on soft, wet Earth, surrounded by fog. It’s silent—nothing but the echo of my own breaths chasing after me.

In my mind, another voice appears—Branwen’s voice. I strain, trying to make out the words, but they slip away. Her voice changes. Her accent thickens, becoming more melodic, with long vowels and a delicate lyricism that shouldn’t exist.

The voice gets closer, then further away. It grows older, then younger. The only thing that never changes is the wisdom infusing every beautiful note, growing sharper and clearer until⁠—

See, Daughter.

A Command, not a question.

The mist clears, and I take a step forward, walking over lush moss and wet Earth until the path narrows and I come upon two birds in separate cages. The first cage splinters as the second cage begins to sing—a melancholy melody nearly overshadowed by the crisp snap of splintering wood.

Thunder rumbles through the sky. Clouds roll in above and below and all around me, too fast for my eyes to focus. The crash of ocean waves breaks against the shore, loud and curiously comforting, like the taste of Earth and smoke that bursts on my tongue and the fragrance of salt and brine filling my nose.

The whispering voices return. Older. Younger. Male. Female. They’re crying and screaming and laughing, words turning over and over and over until⁠—

They can’t kill the song, Daughter.

The voice is right behind me, and I gasp, whirling around to find⁠—

Two birds—free from their cages. One, purest white, sparkling blue cobalt peeking through shimmering white feathers on its wings.

The second, an endless black that gleams like moonbeams on frozen rain. It cocks its head—a question—and its feathers shimmer with deep, iridescent purple.

I know, as surely as I know my name, these are more than birds.

They’re the two of us—Branwen, me—and as the thunder cracks above us, both birds unfurl their wings and launch gracefully into the sky above.

They soar higher, and we soar with them, flying over oceans, rivers, lakes, and ponds—farms and towns and cabins, hidden deep in the woods.

The moon sinks below the horizon. One by one, the stars disappear, like diamonds plucked by an unseen hand. The sun begins to rise, and the first rays of dawn extend across the land. The birds slow, coasting on currents of wind. We crest over the rise of the hill, and that’s when I see it.

A castle.

But not just any castle. I know this castle.

HQ.

From here, it looks like a stone monolith, extending endlessly into the sky. Like a sentry standing guard over the land and its people. We circle the spires, swooping down to glide along the stone walls of the keep.

The sun’s light reflects strangely off the stone. I shift, drawing closer to see⁠—

Blood.