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Tethered to nothing.

No one.

Alone.

I was always alone.

The shimmering turquoise in my chest pulled taut, dragging my body in a different direction. I could feel her on the other end, growing closer, yet still so far away.

I blinked and suddenly, I was standing in a dungeon.

The smell of mildew and blood hit the back of my throat as I adjusted to the dim light. But beneath it, there was the smell of the ocean breeze and fragrant flowers.

Lyra.

Fire flickered on the wall in sconces, bathing the dark stone in an orange glow as I stalked through the hallway, following the trail to her.

The crack of a whip split the air and a soft whimper followed.

I tore around the corner and became deathly still.

Lyra hung with her body slumped, chains strangling her wrists as her head lolled to the side.

The priest drew back the whip, preparing for another blow against her exposed back. Every nerve ending in my body burnt with rage as I took in her torn, gaping skin and the ink-like blood running through cracks in the stone and dripping into vials.

I lunged at him, ready to rip his throat out with my teeth and tie him up for her to whip.

But I fell through him as he evaporated into smoke.

Everything around us morphed, changing into a lavish bedroom with a large iron barred window, snow floating past it lazily.

Lyra lay on top of silk bedsheets, curled in on herself as if she were scared that she was going to fall apart. The sound of her sobs wrapped around my darkened heart and smothered it until I could not breathe.

Her pain wove through me until it was my own. The sharp agonising pain of the wounds in her back, the fear, the shame, the pure utter defeat…

I knelt next to the bed, staring at this version of her in a memory I had no right to see.

I was not even sure if this was real, yet an almost dizzying relief washed through me.

I needed to touch her. To comfort her.

Somehow, I knew this was her dream.

I let out a shaky breath and placed my hand against her cold, pale shoulder.

She spun, hand lashing out to strike me.

I grabbed her wrist before she could make contact.

Her breaths came in short bursts and her eyes, glowing with unleashed power, were filled with the anger of a wounded animal.

“Lyra,” I whispered. “I am here, Lyra. It is going to be okay.”

“How are you here?” she asked with a guarded expression. But how could I explain that I was pulled to her the way a drowning man reaches for his last breath.

Perhaps I was lying on the cave floor dying, while my mind was giving me what I craved the most.

The curse made me immune to her spell, yet I was still just as enthralled with her as I was when I was Mortal.