This, she thought, was the tale not of Cupid and Psyche, but of Persephone dragged into the depths of the underworld. This was a chthonic sacrifice. An eon passed and the presence shifted and slid away, receding slowly, nails raking her torso and her legs before lifting from her body. She breathed in and turned her head. In the darkness Alba caught a glimpse of two hungry, large eyes, fixed on her. The eyes had no face; they belonged to a shadow that had the outline of a body, yet she could discern none of its features. No nose, no mouth, no teeth.
