A book in the Nightshade series, 2011

THE PAIN NO LONGER kept me awake, no matter how much I needed it to. Sleep would kill me. I was sure of it.

I tried to move as often as possible, forcing my body to remember that it was bruised, scraped raw in ways that should always jolt me back to the present moment. Pressing up against the cold steel of the cell walls, I sucked in a sharp breath when the icy surface met my skin through the ruins of my clothes. But I didn’t relax. I couldn’t. No matter how much my bones were screaming at me to collapse. To puddle onto the floor, letting go of the conscious world.

I’d let it happen before, more than once. When exhaustion pushed on my head and shoulders, forcing them to the ground. When everything that had happened shoved my eyelids down with tears burning beneath them. That was the most dangerous time because I couldn’t hold my mind in check. I couldn’t fight off the swell of feelings that rose up, choking me with confusion, fear, and regret.

The torture I could take-at least until it killed me. But I’d quickly learned that my mind was the real problem. When that broke, I’d give up. And I was so close to breaking. I no longer remembered how much time had passed between being shoved into this cell and now. I knew I existed on the verge of losing it. And it got much worse whenever I passed out.

Because I only had two dreams.

I never knew which one would take me when staying awake slipped out of my control.

But they were both deadly.

Everyone is here. My whole life, embodied by the wolves I live with and the witches who rule us. The Keepers stand apart, but still in sight, tall shadows illuminated by firelight and moonlight. Nightshades and Banes ring us-shadows lurking in the woods just behind the pack. The new pack. My pack. Haldis.