Chapter 39

The world around me shifted, and the ritual room faded into a foggy gray. I was no longer standing in the circle I’d drawn but somewhere between memory and dream, a liminal space that felt strangely alive, pulsing with shadows.

Beside me, Draven’s presence solidified, shadowy and powerful. They looked at me, their gaze both cautious and unyielding. “This is your mindscape,” they said, their voice reverberating through me. “We’re stepping into the boundaries that hold you—the ones your mother left behind.”

The weight of their words sank in, and my throat tightened. The shadows curled around me, responding to Draven’s touch, stretching into dark tendrils that faded in and out of form, like fingers brushing against me in comfort or warning. I swallowed hard, grounding myself with the memory of why I was here. I had to break this binding. I had to finally confront what had been done to me—what had been hidden away.

The fog began to swirl, coiling tighter, forming images and memories. We moved forward, stepping deeper into the murky landscape, until a shape solidified before me—a younger version of my mother, her face softer, her hair longer, standing beside a window where thin sunlight leaked through. My heart lurched as I watched her, bathed in the muted, familiar light of my childhood home.

I watched as my mother stood over a much younger version of me, her hand outstretched over my forehead, lips moving in words I couldn’t quite make out. This was the memory—the memory. The one I’d never been able to access. She was binding me, casting the very spells that had kept my magic hidden. Her voice echoed softly, familiar but chillingly distant, as shadows wove through her fingers, settling into the air like mist.

Then, suddenly, she paused. Her hand hovered in mid-air, frozen in time, and the room grew still. I felt the hair on the back of my neck rise as my mother’s head tilted ever so slightly, and, with an eerie deliberation, she straightened her spine and turned.

She was looking directly at me. The older me.

My breath caught, and I took a half-step back, the ground feeling unsteady beneath my feet. Her gaze bore into me, sharp and piercing, as if she saw through every defense I’d ever built. For a heartbeat, I could only stare, my mind struggling to process what I was seeing.

“Mara?” she said, her voice low, laced with an unsettling calm. “What are you doing here?”

I opened my mouth to answer, but the words caught in my throat. I was… I was here to break the binding, to reclaim my magic. But under her gaze, those reasons felt flimsy, like paper-thin excuses, too weak to stand.

When I didn’t answer, her mouth pressed into a hard line, and she took a sharp breath through her nose, shaking her head in something close to contempt. “You think you are worthy of this power?” Her voice was cold, biting, each word laced with a kind of disdain that cut into me. “You weren’t enough to save me, Mara. What makes you think you’re enough to wield it?”

The words hit like a slap, sharp and brutal. I could feel the sting of them ripple through me, the weight of her accusation settling like ice in my veins. I took a step back, the truth of her words twisting inside me. “Wh—what?” My voice was barely a whisper, cracking under the weight of her gaze.

She took a step forward, her eyes dark and unyielding. “Your father—everything he did—I had to stay with him,” she continued, her tone growing harsher, more bitter. “And you? You were never strong enough to make me leave. You were weak, Mara. Just a child.”

The shame clawed at me, thick and suffocating, the words burrowing under my skin like splinters. “I was a child,” I whispered, my voice trembling.

She lifted her chin, her gaze narrowing as if that confession only solidified her disdain. “And still, you failed,” she said, her voice unrelenting. “If you were stronger, I wouldn’t have needed to bind you. But you weren’t ready. I had to hide the truth from you, to keep you safe from your own potential. Do you know how much I had to sacrifice because of you?”

Her words twisted and coiled inside me, latching onto the doubts and fears I’d carried for so long. I could still remember the nights spent listening to her muffled sobs through the walls, the bruises she’d brush away like dust. I’d thought she’d stayed for me. I’d thought… I’d thought she was protecting me.

“Sacrifice?” I managed, my voice shaky but laced with something darker, something angrier. “I… I thought you were protecting me.”

“Protecting you?” She laughed, an empty, bitter sound that sent a shiver down my spine. “I was protecting myself, Mara. I kept you with him, knowing what he was. I knew the dangers. I bound you because I couldn’t trust you to be safe—not with your power, not with the risks. You were just… too weak.”

And then it hit me, sharp and clear like the edge of a blade. The binding hadn’t been about me, not really. She hadn’t done it to protect me, or because she thought I couldn’t handle it. She had done it to protect herself. She’d stayed because of him—because of my father—and she’d taken me down with her.

The anger burned hot and fierce, unfurling in my chest like wildfire. My fists clenched, and the words poured out, raw and unfiltered. “You chose him over me.” The accusation tasted bitter on my tongue, but it was the truth, one I couldn’t ignore anymore.

Her eyes flashed, a spark of defensiveness, but I didn’t let her speak. I was done listening to her excuses, done believing in the lies I’d told myself all my life.

“You stayed,” I spat, my voice rising. “You stayed with him, knowing what he was, knowing what he was capable of. And you kept me there, bound me, hid me, because it was easier for you! You didn’t care about protecting me—you only cared about protecting yourself!”

The shadows pulsed around us, reacting to the force of my anger, thickening like a storm. My mother’s face twisted, caught between guilt and defiance, but I didn’t stop. I couldn’t.

“You let me believe—” my voice broke, the fury mingling with an ache so deep it felt like it would swallow me whole “—you let me believe that you loved me. That everything you did was to protect me. But you lied. You lied to me, and you stole from me.”

The last words came out as a scream, my throat raw, and something within me shattered. The binding—the magic that had kept me chained all these years—splintered, breaking apart under the force of my fury. I could feel it unraveling, feel the energy bursting free, unrestrained and wild, like a dam finally giving way.

My mother’s figure flickered, her face twisting into something pained, her mouth opening as if to speak—but it was too late. The memory rippled, distorting, breaking apart like shards of glass, and her image shattered, dissolving into nothingness.