Page 32 of Cursed Shadows 5

For a beat, he just sits there.

Tick, tick, tick.

His mind rings, a plucked harp string, and he rides it out, waits for the emptiness to return.

Residue of black powder, the recovery alone, slows the mind in these ways, makes it harder to control one’s thoughts.

Thoughts…

Hollow.

Daxeel throws his gaze up to the jar on the dresser.

Tick, tick, tick.

Those fucking fireflies…

Now that he has noticed the sound, their incessant attempts to be free, it claws at him, nails scraping down bone. His upper lip twitches, too tired to reveal his irritability, but agitated all the same.

A sigh slumps him before he shoves up from the edge of the bed. In three stomped steps, he reaches the dresser—and plucks the lid off the jar.

Tick, tick, tick.

It takes a moment.

He expected the fireflies to lift from their prison in a cloud of flickering, glowing excitement—then plague his bedchamber in a scattered frenzy.

But no.

Tick, tick, tick.

Still just hitting into that glass container, over and over, over and over.

Hollow.

His eyes clench shut.

Reaching out for the dresser, he firms a grip on the polished wood to steady himself. It is no wave of dizziness that rinses through him; it is an ache.

A carver has taken a knife to his chest and impressed a void. That is what it feels like, the icy wall around a deep, empty space.

His hand finds the ache, flattens to his chest—and he breathes, steady, calm.

Tick, tick, tick.

He understands it.

He opens his eyes, tired, and his gaze is ice.

Where the bond once resided, there is no echo, no tether. It’s not gone, but it is empty.

Hollow.

“Dax—”

He whirls around.

Unwashed tendrils of damp, wiped-down hair fall over his furrowed brow. Beneath the furrow of his brow, the brightness of his eyes burns like flames.

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