CHAPTER 27: SHARPER THAN MOST

It was becoming harder to sleep at night.

Every time I closed my eyes, my mind clawed back open, restless, circling the same prison of thoughts.

The manor’s walls felt tighter with each passing night. I wanted nothing more than to escape, but I could not see a way without dragging my mother into peril. Finn had her under his thumb now as surely as he had me.

If I ran and failed, he would make me watch her suffer for my mistake.

So I couldn’t move.

Dying slowly in the quiet hours of the night.

I curled beneath the covers, listening to the endless tick of silence, until exhaustion finally forced me under.

***

When my eyes opened again, I was home.

The sight was so sudden, so absolute, that my chest clenched tight.

My old room lay around me exactly as I remembered it.

It couldn’t be real. The house was gone, long since reduced to memory and ash. But the air here was thick with familiarity, with a scent of woodsmoke and lavender that wrapped around me like a blanket from another life.

I knew then that I had slipped into another dream, just like what happened in my first few days in Finn’s manor.

The windows stood open, the curtains shuddering with every breath of wind.

Outside, thunder rolled in the distance, the kind that warned of a storm’s slow approach.

The sky was black as pitch, broken only by sharp bursts of lightning that illuminated the room in stark flashes. Each strike made the shadows dance across the walls, stretching long, clawed fingers toward me.

I sat up in bed. My feet touched the floor with a soft thud.

The floor was cold. Too cold.

That’s when I saw him.

He stood near the window, half cloaked in darkness. A man’s figure, tall, massive. His back was to me, his shoulders broad beneath the shifting shadows.

I froze.

He didn’t move. Didn’t speak. He simply stood there, as though the storm belonged to him.

Something in his posture stirred unease. Not in the way of immediate danger, but in something deeper, harder to name, like the threat in the air before lightning splits the sky.

My heart beat harder. My throat was dry.

I couldn’t make out his face, but the shape of him, it struck something in me, familiar in ways that made my skin prickle.

Had I seen him before? Or was it only my mind playing cruel tricks?

A thought clawed to the surface: the dream I had in my first days at Finn’s manor. The same house, the same nightmarish clarity.

Was this him again?

The thunder rumbled louder, shaking the windows in their frames. The curtains billowed inward, brushing against him, and still he didn’t move.

I opened my mouth, but no sound came.

The storm built outside, each gust rattling the glass, but inside the silence grew heavier. It pressed against my chest until I thought I might suffocate.

The figure shifted.

Barely, just the faintest tilt of his head, the kind of motion that could be mistaken for nothing at all. But it was enough to tell me he knew I was here. That he had always known.

My nails dug into my palms. My body trembled though the air was not cold.

Why here? Why this house that no longer existed? Why me?

I took a cautious step forward, the floorboard creaking beneath me, but I stopped immediately. Something in me screamed not to draw closer, not to chase answers I wasn’t ready for.

Another flash of lightning split the sky, illuminating the room for the briefest heartbeat.

And in that heartbeat, I thought I saw the edges of him more clearly—dark hair, a strong jaw, the faint curve of his hands at his sides.

Then the light died, and he was shadow once more.

The storm swelled. The curtains snapped like wings. The smell of rain and earth filled the room.

"Who are you?"

The question slipped from me, thin and trembling in the storm-heavy dark.

The figure did not turn.

He remained as he was, a silhouette against the lightning, broad shoulders framed by the restless curtains.

When he spoke, his voice was low, carrying a lazy kind of amusement.

"Does it matter," he murmured, "when I am nothing more than a shadow in your dream?"

His tone coiled around me, steady and calm, yet threaded with something dangerous.

I drew in a sharp breath. I knew this was a dream. I knew. And yet—dreams weren’t meant to feel this real. Dreams didn’t leave warmth lingering on your skin even after waking.

My stomach knotted at the memory of that first time, the other dream. The same house, the same impossible clarity. My eyes had been covered then, but his voice... his voice had been the same.

"This isn’t a dream, is it?" My words quivered, but I forced them out anyway.

He tilted his head slightly, the faintest shift, like a man indulging a child’s curiosity.

"And why would you think that?"

"I... I can’t explain." My throat felt dry. "I just know. It doesn’t feel like a dream. It feels... like you’re here."

The storm rattled the windows as if in answer.

Lightning flared, illuminating the hard line of his jaw, the stillness of his posture.

In Father’s books, old tales half dismissed as fables, there were whispers of wolves from the first generations.

Wolves with power so vast they could slip into the minds of others, bend dreams into doors, cross boundaries no one else dared. I had always thought them myths.

But standing here, I wondered if I was staring at proof.

"You are sharper than most," he said at last, his tone soft but edged with approval. "Commendable."

The word slid into me like a test passed.

I tightened my arms around myself, fighting to keep my voice steady. "What do you want from me?"

This time, silence stretched long. He didn’t turn, but I felt the weight of his attention like a hand pressing against my chest.

When he finally spoke, the air itself seemed to still.

"I thought," he said quietly, "you might want some help with your... little dilemma."

My heart stuttered. My eyes widened.