Autumn woke up with a violent jolt, her breath caught in her throat. Darkness. Utter darkness.
Not the soft, comforting dark of twilight…but a thick, suffocating blackness that clung to her skin like tar. Her head pounded, her thoughts sluggish, as if swimming through molasses.
Such a cold, complete darkness that swallowed every whisper of sound, every flicker of light.
Her heart thudded against her ribcage like it was trying to claw its way out.
She blinked hard.
Still nothing.
"Dax?" she croaked.
No answer.
Her voice echoed, bouncing back with a hollow emptiness that made her blood run cold.
"Where…did he go?" She sat up…or tried to. Her body protested, trembling, weak. Her fingers scraped across stone…and only then did she realize she was still on the altar.
"Alpha Malrick?" she tried again, louder this time. "Hello?Anybody? Where did you all go? "
Silence.
A kind of silence that did not just feel empty…it felt abandoned.
