Chapter 6 · The Living Key

"Get your hands off me!"

I screamed, but the void swallowed the sound.

Cade’s grip was a vice around my wrist, knuckles white, his face twisted in a desperate, ugly kind of panic. He wasn't just pulling me—he was trying to rip me out of the air. But the black door didn't care about his strength. It hummed, a low, vibrating frequency that matched the spinning lock embedded in my chest.

"Hold on!" Cade roared, his boots sliding across the grit. "Lorne, look at me! Don't let it take you!"

"I can't!" I gasped. My lungs felt like they were filling with wet concrete. "It’s... it’s pulling from the inside!"

I could feel it. A cold, mechanical rotation beneath my skin. Every time the lock clicked, my body jerked forward. I wasn't being sucked into a room; I was being keyed into a system.

Cade slammed his shoulder into me, trying to knock me back. He missed. He hit the floor hard, his grip slipping. For one heartbeat, I was airborne.

Then the world snapped shut.

Darkness. Then a flash of blinding, sterile white.

I hit the floor with a bone-jarring thud. I couldn't move.