25 - Failed

                                    

                                          
When Toivo awoke, he was alone.
                          
Before he even opened his eyes, he knew it. The air was heavy with loneliness. The only sound to fill his ears was the thud of his own heart, steady and strong, the fluttering beat it had taken during the battle faded in to calm.
                          
An aching throb pressed at the base of his snout, where the final Shadewylf had hit him. He couldn't even remember what they looked like. Since he'd exited the tunnel, everything had become a flurry of black, darkened further by the crushing realisation that his heroic rescue had turned into slaughter.
                          
It was a surprise that he'd even woken up at all.
                          
After several moments of steeling himself, trying to suppress his head's ache, he found the courage to open his eyes. Silver light that wasn't really there flooded into the place, his night vision flicking on automatically. He was glad it didn't require energy to use. He didn't think he had that capacity right now.
                          
Even being able to see didn't show him a great deal. Rock walls on the three sides he could see, undoubtably behind him as well, enclosing him in his own grey cell. Except this one had no bars, or any neighbours, from the silence of the place.
                          
There was cold stone beneath him, too. Shifting his paws, he heaved himself upright, his sharp intake of breath echoing as his legs stung. In the fight in the forest, he'd escaped with very few wounds, but the more recent prison battle had scraped him enough times for him to take notice. One particular gash curved from the back of his paw to almost his chest, making him wince as he tried to put weight on the leg.
                          
Who had done it, he had no idea. There had been no clear opponent in those prisons but blurred shadow.
                          
It wasn't dehabilitating, though, and Toivo found that he could endure the pain enough to stand fully and spin to face the opposite wall. It was as he expected - blank and grey, just like every other.
                          
I wonder if their magic can do this, he thought to himself as he limped over to touch his claw to the rock. Manipulate rock. That would be something he could admit was a pretty amazing power, unlike the strangeness of the fear-inducing ability he'd discovered. It also would make their living in a cave make a little more sense.
                          
He let out a frustrated sigh. Now was hardly the time to be marvelling at Shadewylf power. He was trapped in an unknown place, deep in a cave filled with villains. This may as well have been his coffin. They'd basically buried him alive.
                          
Smokering the choked whimper lodged in his throat, he growled, trying to find some scrap of the confidence that had lurked within him the last few days. He'd managed to escape the Wylfire's claws, outmanouver Shadewylves, and fight in two battles with frightening ease. But this had to be the worst trial so far. Buried alive, lost and alone, facing the reality that after all he'd survived, his mission was over.
                          
This was what failure felt like. Real failure, not some snarled threat from his father.
                          
He snorted. I'd give anything to be back training with him and Damon now. At least they never wanted to kill me.
                          
Without even realising, he was pacing again, circling the cell, a true caged animal. The jolting pain was strangely welcoming. Somehow, fighting through the pain to walk comforted him far more than if he'd given in to it and sat down on the stone once more.
                          
An earsplitting crash made him stumble to a halt, bending over and pressing his ears against his head. The sound stopped as abruptly as it had begun, no rubble following it to rain down on him. Frowning, he turned around slowly, and saw yet another Shadewylf stood just outside his prison. A corridor stretched behind him, though without getting any closer, Toivo couldn't see where it led.