Luna's:
My heartbeat slammed so hard it drowned out the world.
Elias—all of them closed in. One with red eyes and a cruel grin. One with pleading desperation. One soaked in blood that wasn't his. Their steps echoed against the cavern walls until it felt like I was standing in the middle of a circle of ghosts.
I couldn't tell them apart.
"Luna," they said in unison, voices overlapping like a storm. Some gentle. Some cruel. All of them familiar.
The shadows hissed, feeding, twisting, dragging my mind toward madness.
"Trust me!" one Elias roared. His eyes locked on mine, burning with fury not at me, but at the darkness. "Don't give it what it wants. Strike!"
Strike.
The word lodged like a knife in my chest. If I moved, if I swung, and I was wrong then I'd be the one spilling his blood.
"Luna…" The other voice was softer, almost tender. "You know me. Don't do this."
I gripped my dagger so tightly my knuckles whitened. My hand trembled. My vision blurred with tears.
But beneath it, I felt it that slight tremor in the air. That wrongness, like a ripple on still water.
The shadow was clever. But it wasn't perfect.
"Damn you," I whispered, tears burning trails down my face. "I'll find the truth… even if it kills me."
I lunged forward. My blade cut through the nearest Elias, the one with too-perfect tenderness in his voice.
For a heartbeat, I thought I'd killed him. His face twisted in agony, then split open like shattered glass. The body collapsed into smoke, shrieking with the sound of the shadow itself.
The cavern shook.
The remaining Eliases faltered, flickered. The illusions snapped and writhed before vanishing into nothing. Only one remained bleeding, battered, alive. His chest rose and fell, his hand gripping his sword, his eyes wide as he stared at me.
The real Elias.
But before relief could flood me, the shadow's scream pierced the cavern. Its form erupted from the wall monstrous, head crowned with horns of smoke, claws scraping stone.
And this time, it didn't hide behind illusions.
It was coming for us directly.
Elias staggered to my side, pressing his shoulder to mine. His voice was raw, fierce.
"You chose right, Luna. Now we finish this."
The shadow surged forward, splitting the ground beneath us.
The battle wasn't over.
It had just begun.
...
Steel rang. My blade sparked as it clashed against claws of pure darkness. The shadow's strike nearly tore my arm from its socket, but I spun, teeth gritted, and drove my dagger into the swirling mass.
It screamed not like flesh, not like beast, but like a thousand voices wailing through my skull.
The cavern shook. Stone split.
"Don't falter!" Elias shouted beside me, his sword gleaming as it carved into black mist. For an instant the shadow parted, but it only reformed, thicker, hungrier.
It laughed.
Not aloud but in my head.
You'll kill him eventually, it whispered, its voice echoing with cruel delight. One wrong swing, and his blood will stain your hands. That's what you fear, isn't it? That you'll betray him like everyone else has betrayed you.
I struck harder, but my hand trembled.
The shadow lunged again, claws stretching like tendrils. Elias blocked, but the impact sent him staggering. His back hit the cavern wall. Blood ran from his temple.
"Elias!" I cried.
Leave him, the voice hissed. He will only drag you into ruin. Haven't you noticed how he hides from you? How he doesn't tell you everything?
I swung at the voice, at the darkness, my blade tearing through smoke but each strike cost me clarity. Each whisper burrowed deeper.
Elias roared, rising back with a savage strike that tore into the shadow's chest. "Don't listen, Luna! That's what it wants!"
But even as he said it, the shadow shifted. Its face—Elias's face split into a grin.
He's lying to you. He's always lied.
I stumbled. My blade clattered against the stone before I snatched it back. Sweat slicked my palms.
The cavern blurred. Shadows became illusions again. scenes twisting around me.
My mother turning her back on me. My pack standing in judgment. Elias's eyes, cold and unreadable, as he whispered: I never needed you.
"No—stop it!" I screamed, striking the images. Steel cut only smoke.
The shadow fed on my rage, growing thicker, darker, until it towered above us like a god of despair.
"Luna!" Elias's hand gripped my wrist, grounding me. His touch warm, real. His eyes locked onto mine, fierce and unyielding. "Trust me. Stay with me. Strike with me!"
The shadow lunged, claws spreading wide enough to swallow us both.
I tightened my grip. Rage, fear, love, betrayal all coiled into a single scream.
And I struck, not alone, but with Elias at my side.
Steel against shadows. Heart against despair.
The cavern became a battlefield not just of flesh but of everything I was terrified to face.
And I knew one thing for certain.
If we lost here… it wouldn't just kill us.
It would own us.
....
The cavern roared like a throat swallowing us whole. Elias and I struck together, blades biting into smoke, but each cut only bled darkness that curled back into form.
The shadow's laughter was thunder.
You can't kill me. You can only kill each other.
It lashed out.
One strike. Too fast. Too heavy.
Elias blocked but the claws drove through his guard, shredding his arm. He stumbled back, blood streaming, his sword slipping from his hand.
"Elias!" My scream cracked my throat raw.
The shadow swelled around him, tendrils wrapping his limbs, pulling him into its chest. He fought, snarling, teeth bared like the wolf he refused to become in this moment but the darkness smothered him. His face vanished in the black.
"No—no, no, no!" My blade hacked at the tendrils, sparks flying, but every strike just made more shadows bloom. It was swallowing him whole.
And then I heard it.
His heart is mine now.
The shadow whispered in Elias's voice. I froze.
He doesn't need you, Luna. He never needed you. You were just the easy one to use. Just like your family did. Just like your pack. You're nothing without me.
The black swirled, and Elias's face appeared in the mass eyes glazed, lips moving, speaking the words I dreaded most.
"Luna… let me go."
"No!" I screamed. "You're not him! You're not!"
But my grip faltered. Because part of me deep, broken and believed it.
The shadow coiled tighter. Elias convulsed, his body vanishing deeper into the dark. His scream was muffled, then gone.
My knees buckled. My vision blurred. I felt myself drowning in the same despair, slipping into the same void. My blade trembled like it weighed the world.
Strike him down, the shadow purred. Spare yourself. Kill the weakness before it kills you.
I raised my sword toward Elias, not the shadow. My breath shook. Tears blurred my sight.
"No… no, I can't…"
Then you'll die with him.
The shadow surged, claws descending toward me. For a heartbeat, I thought this is it. I'd fall, broken, lost. Elias would be gone, and I'd follow.
And then
"Luna!"
His voice. Not the shadow's echo. Not an illusion. His voice. Raw. Defiant. From within the black.
"Fight for me!"
Something snapped inside me. Fear, despair, betrayal they shattered. What remained was fire.
I roared.
And I struck not at Elias, not at myself, but at the heart of the shadow, pouring every shred of will I had left into the blow.
Steel met smoke, but this time it screamed.
The cavern shook. The darkness shuddered.
And Elias's body tumbled free, hitting the stone floor, gasping, barely conscious—but alive.
I collapsed beside him, my blade clattering from my hand. My chest heaved. My hands shook. The shadow recoiled into the ceiling, wounded, seething, its voice a hiss of venom.
You can't save him forever.
Then it melted into the cracks of the stone, leaving silence in its wake.
I caught Elias's face in my hands. His eyes half-opened, blood trailing down his cheek.
"You almost—" My voice broke. "I almost"
He rasped a breath, managed the faintest smirk. "But you didn't."
And then he went limp.
.....
The cavern stank of blood and smoke. My blade lay somewhere in the dust, but I had no strength to lift it. My arms were busy clutching Elias, his weight pressing into me like a body already claimed by the grave.
"Stay with me," I whispered, voice raw, though I wasn't sure if I meant it for him or myself. His skin burned hot, yet his veins pulsed with something colder something the shadow had left behind.
His chest rose, shallow, broken. Every exhale rattled like the last.
I staggered, pulling him against me, dragging his half-dead weight across the stone. My knees screamed. My vision swam. But I moved. Because if I stopped here, the shadow would finish what it started.
Behind us, the cavern whispered. The cracks in the walls still breathed the shadow's venom, like a thousand eyes watching, waiting. I dared not look back.
And then
"Luna!"
The voice split the silence. Desperate. Familiar.
Roran.
I turned my head too fast, dizziness spinning me. Across the broken floor, through the haze, I saw him bloodied, limping, but alive. His torch was gone, replaced by nothing but the glow of his eyes reflecting fear.
"Thank the gods," I gasped. "Help me with him, he's fading"
But Roran wasn't moving. He was staring.
At Elias.
Or rather, at the thing coiled beneath Elias's skin.
For a moment I thought I imagined it, but no the shadow's residue writhed under his flesh, dark veins spiderwebbing from his shoulder into his chest. His wounds weren't just bleeding they were seeping.
Roran's hand hovered near his weapon. His voice cracked.
"Luna… that's not him anymore."
My throat closed. "Don't you dare say that."
"I saw it take him," Roran hissed, stepping closer. "I saw it swallow him whole. And what came out " He swallowed hard. "What came out might not be Elias."
I tightened my grip on him, my nails digging into his torn cloak as if to anchor him here. "He's alive. He's fighting. I heard him fight."
Roran shook his head, a wildness in his eyes. "Or maybe that's what it wanted you to hear. You don't understand, Luna the shadow feeds on trust. It'll wear his face until the moment it doesn't need to anymore."
"Then I'll keep fighting until he's back!" I snapped, voice breaking into a sob. "I won't lose him not like this."
The cavern shuddered, a low rumble crawling under our feet. Dust fell from the ceiling. Time was splintering, slipping.
Roran hesitated, torn between reaching for us and stepping back into the dark.
And then the shadow whispered through the cracks again.
Leave him, Roran. Leave them both. Only one of you has to die.
Roran's face twisted, horror and temptation fighting inside his eyes.
I dragged Elias further, one brutal step at a time. His breath brushed my ear, faint, almost gone.
I didn't know if Roran would follow. Or if I'd walk out of this cavern only to lose them both in different ways.
But I knew one thing.
The shadow wasn't finished with us. Not by far.