What the void whispered couldn’t be true.
It is. With your first breath, you woke me. When your eyes first opened, I saw again. Your first words spoken echoed in my thoughts. Your first steps taken brought strength to mine. I’ve always been with you.
The whispers should bring comfort. Remind me I wasn’t alone. Instead, something stirred violently within me—a hot, acidic sensation.
Without warning, a being appeared. He looked to be made of pure gold, from the tips of his glistening hair to the soles of his feet. His skin glowed like precious metal, and the way the light hit his features sent an unsettling mixture of awe and apprehension through me. Some sort of primitive instinct warned this wasn’t his true nature. It was artificial. As if he had taken on the appearance as a disguise, stealing it from someone else. In an instant, dual bolts of icy fear and burning ragepumped through my veins. Some small, unknown part of me knew him. Pitied him. Feared him.Loathedhim—
You’ve never been alone.
A coldness had snuck into the void, a chill that followed the last breath. The streaks of crimson deepened and spread, and the whispers became strange and raspy, like dry bones rubbing together.
You know my voice.
I didn’t knowmyself.
But I know you. I’ve always known you. And you will soon remember me.
Everything turned crimson, pulling me into it. I fell, tumbling through the manyyearsthat rushed by in a whirl of distant memories. Fleeting views of breathtakingly beautiful people with luminous silver eyes glowing with Primal essence. Expressions of either pity or venomous scorn accompanied by smothering…shame—so much shame that it coated my skin and left me feeling as if I’d never be able to wash it away. I briefly saw a man’s scarred profile, his well-shaped lips curving up and causing a dimple to appear—a smile distinctively familiar to me. The images kept coming, one after another, until I felt like I was spinning.
Then it stopped. All of it. And I was…
I was staring at gold bars.
The gold bars of acage. And beyond that, thick and unyielding darkness.
Sucking in thin breaths that seemed to do nothing, I rocked back. Pressure squeezed my chest as my wide eyes darted left and right. Various gold-trimmed chests were to my left, stacked upon one another. To my right, was an ivory privacy screen and a bed. My chest tightened even further as my fingers curled into something soft. A white fur rug—
My attention snagged on the flimsy, sheer gown covering my legs. Hand shaking, I tugged at the translucent, light-silver material over my stomach.
Where was I?
That question led to a more concerning one.
Whowas I?
My hair slid over my shoulders, falling forward as I closed my eyes. I combed through my racing thoughts. They were like a frenzied swarm, buzzing and stinging as I desperately tried to make sense of it all. I was… I was a Primal.
The one those who’d come before feared.
I was the Harbinger and the Bringer the Ancients had dreamed of before the dawn of man.
The Primal of Life and Death.
I knew that.
What I was.
But notwhoI was.
And I knew those two things were vastly different.
I had to know who I was. How couldn’t I? Who was I?
A tremor coursed through me as I concentrated harder. Words came to me but quickly faded away, slipping between my fingers before I could grasp them. My mouth dried as an immense weight pressed down on my chest, making each breath more difficult than the last.
Forcing my eyes open, I twisted my body toward the bed, my gaze sweeping over gold-and-white sheets, a mound of pillows, and—
Air lodged in my throat.
