The lights couldn't have been off for more than ten seconds, but by the time everything converted back to how it had been before the darkness had struck, everything felt . . . wrong?

Colder than the grave, the icy tendrils that had immobilized me, that had rooted me to the spot, overruling the need I had felt to get to Lumen, had lessened, but looking around proved that I hadn't been the only one affected. Pools of air formed around Jonathan's mouth, his eyes wide; it was perhaps the first time in my life that I had ever seen him look afraid, and it was like a bullet through...