The Wand and the Wolf

32 - seeing through the dark

Ibhan POV

I shot up, gasping for breath, hand clawing at my own throat. I sucked in huge gulps of air but my chest wouldn't inflate and I flailed until I felt a hand in the dark.

"Stop struggling," the voice said, muffled by the dark. "Open your eyes," the voice said.

"They're open," I gasped, my throat raw as I spoke, making me choke on my own words.

"Yes but you are not seeing," the voice replied. "Breathe," the voice said as a figure reached towards me. Cool fingertips pressed against the front of my throat and I stopped gasping, releasing the little air I had scavenged. I let it all out, painfully slow breaths as my chest constricted. And then I took it in again, slowly through my nose.

Eventually, I blinked away the darkness, and I saw the room around me. My father pulled back his hand from my throat, and eventually let go of my arm too as I regained my senses.

"What was that?" I asked as I sat back. My head was heavy and confused.

"Adjustment to the darkness," my father said as he turned his attention to the window. I was in a different room to the one I was in earlier. "You have your shadow marks now," he said quietly, "you are closer to the darkness than you have ever been."

The door swung open and in swept my mother, arms outstretched towards me as she fluttered over. "Oh, I'm so proud of you," she cooed as she enveloped herself around me. She smelt like dusty leather book colours and a gentle brew of tea. Something twisted inside me as a memory surfaced. The last time you hugged your mother you were crying for your mate. The voice reminded me and I sighed.

"How soon can I get out of here?" I asked and my mother shushed me. I sighed and sat back as she pulled forward the little folding table and set down her bag, pulling out a carefully sealed bowl and ushering me to eat. I sighed and did as she said, sipping at the soup she had brang. It was a sweet, cool, relief for my throat. I let my mother hover over me for a while more until eventually, a courier came in, bird cage in hand.

"Feathers," I called, and the bird cawed loudly in my direction, "where did you get to, hm?" I said as the courier placed the cage on the table beside me. I reached in a finger, letting Feathers nibble the side of my finger as I spoke to the courier. "Am I free to leave?" I asked and he nodded handing me some papers with a few recovery tips and a discharge letter from the doctor before leaving the room.

I wasted no time in packing what my mother would let me lift, which was very little, and spent the remainder of my time convincing her I could be left in my own home alone and didn't need to move back home to recover for a few days. My father was silent for most of the drive over and I didn't mind, I  wasn't sure I would have liked anything he had to say anyway.

"Now, don't experiment with your shadow marks too much straight away," my mother said, for the umpteenth time, "it can give you a migraine." I nodded along absently as I watched the world whizz by. I felt different, like the calm after a storm. Or maybe before a storm. I couldn't tell yet.

"Ibhan," my father called, snapping me out of my thoughts. We were outside my home, my mother already half way to the door with my bag and Feathers' cage. My father helped me out of the car, before pressing a small folded sheet of paper into my hand. I slipped the paper into my pocket and let him lead me into the house.

It was several hours more before my mother finally felt she could leave, and all the while the paper felt like a lead block in my pocket. It was important, I knew that much, my father wasn't one who particularly cared for secrets. I unfolded paper and inspected it, though there wasn't much to see.