By dawn, Anneliese lay among the reeds, a dragonfly perched on her pale cheek. Exhausted and disoriented, she struggled to focus on the hazy silhouette of the now-razed town. Along the lakeside, ghostly gray figures—soldiers of the relief force—moved methodically, gathering the remains of the night’s carnage.

  The ghastly scene was too much for one soldier, who dropped to all fours, his breath ragged. His head hung low over the disturbed reeds before he lifted his gaze and shouted, “Over here!”

  Nearby soldiers rushed to the spot where Anneliese floated lifelessly among the reeds. The first to reach her waded in fully clothed, dragging her limp body to the dry grasslands. Voices rose around her as many hands worked quickly, wrapping her in warm layers. An elderly man gently pulled and manipulated her fingers. The touch triggered a brief reflex in Anneliese, a faint stir that sparked shouts of relief from the growing crowd.

  “Lady! Are you all right?” a knight in armor called out, his voice edged with concern. He dropped his gauntlet with a metallic clang and lifted her head to rest against his breastplate, brushing stray reeds from her hair with careful fingers.

  Anneliese’s breath came in weak gasps. “I’m Anneliese… Lady of…” The words barely escaped her lips before they dissolved into incoherent murmurs. Her eyes fluttered closed, swallowed by exhaustion.

  “Lord Bradfrey, there is no …” said the elder.

  His voice faded, dissolving into the void as Anneliese drifted away—back into the nothingness.

  A ragged leather armchair awaited her, positioned before a grand ornamental mirror.

  Blinded by its radiant reflection, Anneliese clenched her eyes shut as an unseen force pulled her into the worn leather seat. Behind closed lids, her mind filled with the image of a solar eclipse—and then, a figure emerged from the darkness. An old, slouched man, his partially crushed crown teetering on his head. A king? His body twisted unnaturally, limbs contorted as he slouched in the opposing armchair. His presence pressed against her mind, heavy and unwelcoming, his gaze laced with disdain—like she was the intruder here.

  “Where am I?” Anneliese asked.

  The decrepit ghost-king’s lips curled into a half-cut, malicious sneer. His voice slithered through the emptiness, grated and hollow. “There is only one of us in this room, yet here we are. It’ll make sense when you realize—the one who guides the ship doesn’t always choose the destination.”

  “You are me?” she asked.

  A wheezing chuckle. “Ahaha. I am more than you. I am a thousand generations of magic, deciding what to make of this poor little girl.”

  “You’re a demon?”

  “I am many things—temptation, regret, lust, fear. Truths that are nothing more than lies, bound to the very emotions you cannot control.”

  Anneliese’s jaw tightened. “I don’t care what you are. I am not yours to take. Leave me, and be done with it.”

  The king grinned. At the snap of his fingers, the illusion shattered.

  A cold touch grazed her shoulder.

  His voice slithered through her mind, lingering like a stain.

  “Oh, but I’m already here. I might as well make myself acquainted.”

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  The blinding light from the mirror vanished in an instant, leaving Anneliese wide-eyed and reeling. She stumbled back, alone in the engulfing emptiness. But something was different—an unfamiliar tingling crept through her, a slow wave of numbness tracing her limbs, inching up her spine. It slithered through her nerves like an unstable current, prodding, twisting, testing.

  Through trial and error, she guided its path toward the base of her neck. As it neared, flickering lights of creation sparked across her vision—until a searing pain severed her connection, snapping her back into the void. Yet the sensation was intoxicating. Again, she pushed forward, enduring the pain, chasing the lights that grew brighter with each attempt—only to meet the same impassable barrier beneath her skull.

  “The path forward is never a straight line. Seek the unknown, the unclear,” a distant, feminine voice murmured from all directions.

  “The unknown? How is that supposed to help?” Anneliese gritted her teeth, pressing her fists hard against her temples, desperate to force the pain away.

  Then, without warning, a new force pulled at her extremities—a gravitational tide rising against the numbness. It didn’t resist her but engulfed her, drawing her deeper. The flickering lights faded, but in their absence, something else stirred. The unseen responded to her will. Shapes moved where none should be, tracing along the edges of her awareness. A spark ignited within her spine, surging outward through her fingertips, flowing in both directions at once.

  Her mind’s eye came alive.

  Smoke clouded her vision, and the void around her shattered in a cascade of flickering lights.

  Her mind’s eye shaped the nothingness into the familiar pagan stronghold, its walls undulating subtly under her will. Her gaze settled on the dying firepit, where blue flames danced between her fingers. The sensations flooded her at once—too many, too conflicting. Focusing, she bent the world to her imagination, transforming the cold, damp cave into a winter wonderland.

  Frost laced the ground. The stagnant air gave way to a crisp, wintry scent. Where once there was darkness, a snow-draped wilderness unfolded before her. Her ragged clothes became luxurious furs that hugged her frame. Long-paved roads lined with frost-tipped pines led to a grand palisade, its gates open to empty streets adorned with intricate festive decorations.

  Yet something was missing.

  The city was lifeless. No voices, no laughter—only silence and the stray wolf’s prints crisscrossing from the open markets to an inconspicuous side alleys. Clutching onto the hope of deeper meaning, Anneliese stepped into the alley and whispered, “Shadow.”

  A growl rumbled behind her.

  She barely turned before the black wolf lunged, slamming her to the ground.

  “Go home.” Its thick, vapor-filled breath reeked of decay as it pinned her down, jagged teeth flashing inches from her throat. Protector had become predator.

  The beast lunged for her neck—

  And she was yanked back.

  From the snow-covered city to the pagan stronghold. From the stronghold to the void. From the void to the blinding light—

  And then, to reality.

  Anneliese jolted awake, gasping. She was lying in the back of a horse drawn carriage, tangled in a scratchy blanket atop a pile of hay. With a sudden burst of energy, she threw it off.

  “Well, that was some recovery,” said Patricia, a round-faced woman with plush cheeks and a twangy voice full of simple-minded surprise.

  “I’m alive?” Anneliese whispered, the surreal experience still clinging to her mind, making this world feel no more real than the one she had just left.

  “Aye. More than that, by the looks of things,” Patricia said, huddled beneath her own blanket with the other orphans.

  “And the others?” Anneliese’s voice tightened with concern. “What happened to them?”

  “Look around,” came Mother Simonet’s voice, hoarse and weary.

  Anneliese turned.

  Simonet, once so commanding, now looked like a pale, hollowed-out version of herself. Her right arm was gone, amputated at the elbow, protruding from thick woolen wrappings. She tilted her head sluggishly toward Anneliese, her gaze dull but searching.

  “I thought we lost you,” Simonet murmured. “We were all lost. But our better angels intervened… and forged a reckoning upon the heathens.”

  “Aye, may God have mercy on their souls,” Patricia added. “For He didn’t spare mercy on their mortal bodies, I’ll tell you that.”

  Patricia’s words struck something deep within Anneliese—a knowledge beyond sight or sound, something sensed rather than understood. The persistent tingling in her hands held memories too fragmented to grasp, yet real enough to unnerve her. A terror she dared not name.

  Had she heard her own voice in the nothingness? Or was it the manipulative whisper of the ghost-king?

  Clutching the bent cross around her neck, Anneliese made a silent vow—whatever lurked within her would not dictate her future. She was in control.