Clara dreamed of water again.
Not the gentle kind, not rain or rivers. No—this water pressed against her lungs, heavy and cold, dragging her down into an abyss with no light. She kicked, clawed, screamed bubbles into the dark, but something held her ankle. A hand. Pale, strong, and horribly familiar.
"Don't fight it," the voice whispered through the black water. "It's only drowning if you resist."
Her chest burned. Her body convulsed. And then she saw his face—Yurin's face—clearer than it had ever been in her visions.
He wasn't smiling. That was worse. His gaze was calm, resigned, as though he pitied her for struggling.
"Clara." His voice coiled like silk around her mind. "You cling to them because you don't understand what they truly see in you. Damien? He sharpens his blade every night because of you. Evelyn? She holds you like a child because she knows you'll break. And Zeke? He's already written your death into his equations."
The water surged into her throat. She tried to scream Evelyn's name, but no sound came out. Only the voice. Only him.
"Don't you see? You're not their companion. You're their liability. The weak point they circle around, waiting for the moment it all collapses. And when it does, when they finally break—" He leaned closer, his lips brushing her ear in the waterless dark. "—you won't even be Clara anymore."
She jerked awake.
Her body spasmed against Evelyn's arms, her lungs heaving as if they'd truly swallowed the abyss. Evelyn hushed her immediately, stroking her hair, whispering reassurance that sounded brittle even to Clara's ears.
But it wasn't Evelyn's arms she noticed. It was Damien's shadow pacing at the edge of the firelight, blade glinting faintly. And Zeke's still figure, watching her with those eyes that measured, weighed, and sentenced all in silence.
Yurin's words lingered like salt in her throat. He's already written your death into his equations.
Her stomach knotted. She shouldn't believe him. He was the enemy. The manipulator. But hadn't she seen it too? The way Damien's eyes cut to her whenever she twitched in her sleep. The way Zeke's hand hovered too close to his runes, as if waiting for permission to draw one final line.
Her throat closed. She wanted to scream that she wasn't just a vessel, that she wasn't his. But when she tried to speak, her voice came out fractured, almost doubled, like someone else was speaking beneath her words.
"I'm… fine."
Evelyn froze. Just a flicker, but Clara felt it.
Damien's pacing stopped. Zeke's gaze sharpened.
The silence that followed was worse than any scream.
Clara shoved herself out of Evelyn's arms, stumbling to her feet. She felt her legs shake, but she forced them steady, staring at the three people who had become her world. She wanted them to believe her. Needed them to.
"I'm fine," she repeated, firmer this time. Her chest ached with the effort, her throat raw, but the words finally sounded like her own. "I'm still me."
But even as she said it, something deep inside laughed.
Not aloud—no sound reached the air. But she felt it. A vibration in her ribs, a whisper against her heart.
That's right, Clara. Tell them what they want to hear. It buys us more time.
Her eyes widened. Her fingernails dug into her palms.
Us.
The word echoed, terrible in its simplicity.
She staggered back, nearly tripping on the stones by the fire. Evelyn lunged forward to steady her, but Clara jerked away, her movements sharper, less controlled. She caught Evelyn's flinch—saw the hurt in her eyes—and hated herself for it.
But worse than Evelyn's hurt was the way Damien's hand had moved instinctively toward his blade. The way Zeke had quietly drawn something in the dirt with his toe, the lines barely visible but pulsing faintly with power.
Yurin's words thundered through her skull. You're not their companion. You're their liability.
Clara's breath hitched. "I…"
The voice pressed closer, soft, patient, like a parent teaching a child how to breathe.
You're not their liability. You're mine.
Her vision blurred. She felt Evelyn's hands shaking against her shoulders, Damien's sharp stare burning holes in her skin, Zeke's silence like a guillotine hanging above.
For the first time since this all began, Clara realized the truth:
She wasn't afraid of being consumed. She was afraid that part of her already wanted it.