[Lyra]

My mother violently ripped her hand away from my face, stumbling backward as if she had just touched a burning brand.

The memory wall in my mind lay entirely shattered, the debris of that night crashing over me with suffocating force. I fell to my knees on the cold, swept stone, gasping for air as the phantom taste of copper and raw, euphoric slaughter flooded the back of my throat. My body was trembling, but as my vision cleared, the first thing I saw was the look on my mother's ...