The rain continued to fall, pummelling her skin. Her shadow lay down beside her. She reached for its hand and interlaced their fingers.
The rain began to wash away who she was. It peeled backElara’s skin, the tatters of her soul, the damage in her heart. Gods, did it hurt.
The shadow spoke again. ‘How long have you been running from me?’
She did not reply.
It spoke again. ‘You fed me. Yet, you never once looked at me.’
Elara felt pity, gritting her teeth against the onslaught of the heavy, pellet-like raindrops.
‘How did you think you could wield your shadows against a Star when you cannot even face them yourself?’
Elara was still, letting the words ring in her ears.
‘Where am I?’ she croaked.
‘In your own dreamscape,’ the shadow rasped. ‘Deep within it. Further than anyone should go. You are here to surrender.’
‘Surrender?’ She laughed emptily. ‘I’ve surrendered enough. My heart. My kingdom. What is left of me to give?’
‘Everything, Elara. Every dark, awful part of yourself.’
She did not reply, though she felt the truth of it in her bones.
‘Now you begin to see,’ the shadow rasped. ‘The Dark cannot exist without the Light, nor the Light without the Dark. You contain both, Elara. It is no use running from the darkness within and accepting only the day. It is also no use shunning the Light and caving to shadows. Surrender.’
And with complete clarity, like the dawn breaking through the night, she understood. She was not perfect or imperfect. She was not a villain, nor a hero. Simply herself. A girl who had lost and grieved and made her way the only way she knew how. So she had fallen in love. That did not make her a fool, nor did it make her weak. It made her courageous.
‘You were always told you felt too deeply. That you weretoo sensitive. But you cannot change who you are, Elara. So instead, all you did was swallow those emotions. And now, here we are.’
‘And now, here we are,’ Elara echoed.
‘What you should have been taught is how brave it is, to be vulnerable in such a cruel world. How it is better to feel every ray and shadow, than to feel nothing at all.’
And so, Elara lay back on the swirling, rolling grass, and let herself feel.
She grieved—for her parents, for Sofia, for who she had believed Enzo to be. She drowned in her fear of what the future may hold for her. And as she did, the rain continued to peel back her old self until chinks of silver shone through, the black tar that coated her soul sloughing away. Her shadow held her hand, murmuring soft words of kindness. And with one last cry, she burst open, brighter than any Star and darker than any shadow, like a storm awakened.
CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR
Elara bolted upright on the floor with a gasp, taking in the dank cell, the flickering torchlight. She felt power surge through her skin, the same deep, ancient thing from her dreamscape.
Suddenly, she realized what was amiss.
