Awake and Alive
The white wasn’t clean.
It was erasure.
A white so bright it made her doubt shadows had ever existed. The kind of white that made you forget color. Forget time. Forget yourself.
She blinked twice, adjusting her vision to the surroundings, the light wasn’t just white anymore.
It was surgical. Judging. Devouring.
It ate the color from her skin, from her thoughts, from her name.
Her memories felt like they belonged to someone else now.
Someone before the collar. Before the needle. Before the blood.
Her name was Lira Volen, and that was the last thing she had that was hers.
She lay strapped to a sterile slab, too thin, too weak, bones aching from three days without food, four without sleep. Her hair clung to her temples in jagged, sweat-soaked strands. Her eyes cracked open—storm-dimmed blue ringed with red.
She didn’t look human anymore.
She didn’t feel it either.
“Subject Delta confirmed stable. Begin phase two.”
The ceiling vent hissed. Cold gas. Disinfectant, maybe. Or poison.
She didn’t care.
The needle came next, sliding into the soft flesh of her inner elbow. A rush of something thick filled her arm. The vial gleamed violet-black above her head, glowing faintly like tainted starlight.
Witchblood.
Dead blood. Not hers. Not welcome.
The invasion was immediate. It didn’t seep. It shoved.
Lira bit her cheek as the pressure spread up her arm and into her chest. Her lungs compressed. Her stomach twisted.
Then the visions began.
