The old man, jailer, and savior watched as the darkness took me.
And I—I could do nothing but fall.
In the abyss of unconsciousness, nightmares found me.
They did not creep in gently.
They tore through me, ravenous.
I saw Amir?—
Stoic.
Dissolving.
His dark eyes—once full of unspoken strength—stared, empty, unseeing.
His flesh peeled away in slow, agonizing strips, exposing raw sinew and gleaming bone.
His arms, his legs—once powerful, once familiar—contorted into grotesque angles, twisting, breaking, mocking the proud warrior he had been.
I screamed for him.
I begged.
But my voice came out raw, hoarse, useless.
He did not hear me.
He did not move.
He was vanishing.
Fading.
Until all that remained was emptiness.
And the aching echo of what we had lost.
* * *
I woke with a violent start.
My chest heaved.My pulse pounded in my ears, a frantic drumbeat against my skull.
But Amir was gone.
The dream—the nightmare—clung to me like sticky cobwebs, its poison still thick in my veins.
My bedroom wavered into existence, familiar yet distant, as though I had been gone for an eternity and returned to find everything slightly… off.
I wasn’t alone.
Mary.
She sat beside me, a silent tether to reality.
Concern etched into her face, her hands folded in her lap, but her eyes mirrored my fear.
