The bruises on her throat throbbed with each heartbeat
Noje's fingers found the tender marks before she was fully conscious, pressing against skin that remembered impossible hands. The Rewriter's grip. Those dead, painted eyes wearing Zarin's face
"You're awake." Zarin knelt beside her, his sword drawn, scanning the shadows with lethal focus. "How do you feel?"
"Like I was strangled by my own character." She pushed herself upright, tasting copper. "What happened after...?"
"It vanished the moment you collapsed. Like it was never there." His voice carried an edge she'd never drawn him with—uncertainty mixed with something that might have been fear. "But the marks it left are real enough."
She touched her throat again and winced. "What was that thing?"
"I don't know. It knew you, knew me, and according to every law of creation, it shouldn't exist." Zarin's gray eyes met hers, and she saw something that made her chest tighten. "But you do. And that's why they're coming."
The temperature plummeted. Her breath misted in air that had been warm moments before
"Don't move," he whispered, knuckles white around his sword hilt. "Don't even breathe loud."
The shadows moved—not the soft shadows she used to draw, but something alive, peeling off the walls. Dark shapes flowed like smoke yet solid enough to gouge stone where they passed, emerging from every corner with hungry purpose
"Shadow wraiths," Zarin breathed. "They hunt creators."
One creature turned toward them, faceless but focused, its attention hitting her like ice water flooding her veins. It made a sound between hiss and scream that raised every hair on her arms
The others answered in harmony
"How many?" she whispered
"Too many." His blade was already cutting air as the first wraith lunged, steel meeting shadow with a sound like tearing silk. The creature shrieked and dissolved, but three more flowed forward to take its place
"I need the charcoal!" Noje shouted over the rising chorus
"Still in your hand!" Zarin parried a strike aimed at his throat
She looked down. Right—her fingers were still wrapped around the charcoal from their escape. No time to think, only to move. Her hand found the stone wall and began sketching on pure instinct
A sword materialized in her grip, not drawn but real. Real enough to bite shadow-flesh when a wraith flowed toward her, real enough to make it scream
"Back to back," Zarin called
They pressed together, weapons ready, while the wraiths circled like starving wolves and more emerged from every shadow, their numbers growing with each heartbeat
"They keep coming," she panted, sketching a shield just in time to deflect claws that sparked against metal with genuine force
"They'll keep coming until you're dead or gone," Zarin said, driving his blade through another attacker
"Gone?"
"Portal home. It's the only thing that'll make them retreat."
Even fighting for her life, the word 'home' felt wrong, but she sketched anyway with desperate, quick strokes. A doorway of light shimmered into existence behind them, casting their shadows long across the stone
The wraiths recoiled, hissing
"There," she gasped. "Now what?"
"Now you don't touch it," Zarin said, his voice sharp with something between command and plea
"What? Why not?"
"Because every time you leave us, pieces of us disappear." He drove his sword through another wraith, the motion violent and precise. "When your grandmother died, you stopped drawing for three months."
Her blood went cold. "How could you possibly know..."
"Because that's when half my memories vanished, when the castle started crumbling, when people I'd known for years simply stopped existing." His voice cracked slightly. "I watched friends fade like sketches being erased."
A wraith tested the portal's edge, bouncing off the light like it had struck glass. The impact sent ripples through the doorway, and through it she could see her dorm room—her desk, her tablet, Maya sleeping peacefully in the next bed
Normal life. Safe life. A world where no one screamed when she touched doorways
"You want proof?" Zarin's voice was rough with desperation and fury. "Touch it. See what happens to me."
"Zarin, I..."
"DO IT."
Her hand moved before she could stop it. Her fingers brushed the portal's shimmering surface
Zarin screamed—not anger or battle-rage, but pure agony that seemed to tear from his very soul. He doubled over, sword clattering to stone as he clutched his head like something inside was being ripped apart piece by piece
"Stop," he gasped, blood trickling from his nose. "Please, stop."
The sound hit her like a physical blow. This was her fault—her creation, her character, suffering because she existed here, because she'd touched a way home. Horror and guilt crashed through her chest as she jerked her hand back. What right did she have to leave when her very presence here meant life for him, and her absence meant death? How could she even consider abandoning him to save herself?
He collapsed to his knees, shaking
The portal flickered and stabilized while the wraiths pressed closer, no longer afraid of the light that had just caused such pain
"Every time you leave," Zarin whispered, his voice broken and raw, "pieces of us die"