(Author's Note: Continuation of the The Discipline of Sorrow)
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The soul of the water that remembers answered my refusal with violence.
It rose in a sudden wall and crashed into me like a blade.
I managed to move away in time, despite my tiredness, but it struck my side and cut.
My flesh parted as if sliced by glass. Blood sprayed across the black shore as I was flung backward, rolling hard against the stone.
Oh, what agony ripped a scream out of my throat.
In my misery, the water only cheered, enjoying my suffering.
I clawed at the ground, gasping, my vision warping as more water lashed me again—this time across my back, my thighs.
Each strike peeled me open a little more.
"You will give me her name," the Soul said coldly, its form towering now, vast and formless, a living storm rising from the lake.
"Or I will carve it out of your pain."
I convulsed as my body shook. Every inch felt like it was on fire.
But still, I held on. Her name.
