Page 24 of Renegade Kingdom
But they would. By the time this was over, they’d never be able to look away.
Chapter Seven
Damon
The nightmare was scratching at the edges of my mind again.
I could feel it like claws dragging across the inside of my skull, looking for purchase, looking for a way in. It had been doing this for hours. Days, maybe. Time had lost all meaning in this fog-shrouded existence I called a life.
I pushed back. Forced it away. Built walls out of willpower and spite and the desperate need to stay myself for just a little longer.
You can’t keep this up forever, little human.
The nightmare’s voice slithered through my thoughts, oily and amused. It was always amused. Like my suffering was the most entertaining thing it had witnessed in centuries.
You’re exhausted. I can feel it. That delicious weariness seeping through every corner of your pathetic mind. How much longer do you think you can resist?
As long as I have to, I told it.As long as it takes.
The nightmare laughed. The sound echoed through my consciousness like breaking glass.
That’s what they all say. Right up until they don’t.
I’d been at the surface for days now. Conscious. Present. Myself. It should have been a relief. Should have felt like victory. But instead, I was just waiting for the other shoe to drop. Waiting for the nightmare to surge forward and shove me back into the darkness where I couldn’t move, couldn’t speak, couldn’t do anything but watch through my own eyes as the monster used my body like a puppet.
The chains around my wrists clinked as I shifted position on the cold floor of the hold. Strange, how I’d come to take comfort in that sound. In the weight of the iron against my skin. It grounded me. Reminded me that I was still here, still alive, still fighting.
Even if I didn’t know how much longer I could keep it up.
Then I registered something else. Something that cut through the fog and the fear and the constant pressure of the nightmare against my defenses.
Scents.
My brothers’ scents, familiar and beloved, drifting down from somewhere above me. Dean’s sharp winter pine. Maddox’s warm summer grass. Ryder’s wild autumn wind. And Tank, solid and earthy, like fresh-turned soil after rain.
I could smell them. Actually smell them, the way a wolf might track its pack across miles of wilderness.
That wasn’t normal. That wasn’t human.
Something was changing in me, and I didn’t know if it was the beginning of salvation or the beginning of the end.
Interesting, the nightmare purred.Your body is already starting to accept its place in Nymeria. To become something else. I wonder what that will taste like when I finally consume what’s left of you.
I ignored it. I’d gotten good at ignoring it over the past few days, even when I couldn’t force it to be silent. The nightmare liked to talk. Liked to taunt and mock and dig its claws into everywound it could find. But talking was all it could do right now. As long as I kept fighting, as long as I didn’t let my guard down, it couldn’t take control.
At least, that’s what I kept telling myself.
The hatch above me opened, and light flooded into the hold. I squinted against the sudden brightness, my eyes having adjusted to the dimness below deck. Footsteps on the ladder. Multiple sets, coming down into my prison.
My cell. My refuge. The place I’d put myself because I knew, better than anyone, what I was capable of when the nightmare took the reins.
Alyssa appeared first, her golden hair catching the light from above. Then my brothers and Tank, one by one, arranging themselves around her like a protective guard. Dean’s jaw was set in that hard line I knew so well. Maddox looked like he hadn’t slept in days. Ryder was trying to smile, but it didn’t reach his eyes. Tank just watched me with that steady, assessing gaze that felt like he could see straight through to my soul.
If I still had one.
“Damon.” Alyssa’s voice was gentle, careful. Like she was approaching a wounded animal. “How are you feeling?”
“Tired,” I admitted. My voice came out rough from disuse. “But still here. Still me.”
