Page 352 of Coal Hearts

She’s not safe.

Up ahead, my eyes locked onto a scene.

A scene I couldn’t make sense of.

A crowd of blackness.

Two creatures of darkness.

And there, on the grass, a third fell onto whatever prey it’d caught.

A part of me cringed in sympathy.

Whoever had been caught would suffer.

But...I had no time.

No morals to stop them.

I have to find her.

I went to veer to my left.

To leave the predators to their kill.

But...

Something.

Unexplainable wisdom.

The harshest throttle of knowing.

My hand clutched the stupid gem, and my legs slowed.

A man’s shout rippled through the watery night.

A man high on lust.

A Master getting off on doing unspeakable things.

I waited for an answering scream.

The tears of his prey.

Only silence.

A heavy, oppressive silence that felt...different.

Silence that wasn’t just silence.

Silence that tugged me, taunted me, and cloaked me with far more energy than it should.

Energy that seemed...familiar.

My heart wrenched.

My feet stopped.