Cut To The Bone

Carpe Diem | An Amazon Prime PANIC Bonus Chapter

Author's Note

In celebration of Amazon Prime Video's newest series Panic, I am thrilled to be teaming up with Amazon Prime Video and Wattpad to write this exclusive chapter that puts my characters from this story into the world of Panic!

I hope this chapter intrigues and inspires you to learn more about Panic. Visit the #PanicWritingContest on Wattpad for the chance to put your creative writing chops to the test and learn more about the show!

To find out more about the contest, prizes, and how to enter, check out the #PanicWritingContest here: wattpad.com/AmazonPrimeVideo

Don't forget to watch the series premiere on May 28th, only on Amazon Prime Video, here: http://primevideo.com/

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Azima Rousseau had been through Hell and back... but nothing compared to this.

In all her life— in all her travels— she had never come across any city or village like... she leaned back and read the name on an illuminated tower in the distance.

Carp.

Definitely no longer within the Parish's jurisdiction, she immediately assumed someone — or something— else was in charge.

In one moment she had fallen asleep next to Rahn in their home on the apple orchard, having just finally gotten Alisa to sleep in her bassinet, only to wake up on an overgrown field surrounded by rusted farming equipment to the sounds of yelling and cheers.

Shaking off the mental haze, she watched, hidden, from a distance, as young men and women walked themselves across a dangerously elevated length of metal connecting two dilapidated towers as if possessed...

If she was where she believed she was, she also knew its denizens could control more than just the minds of the weak-willed. Time, space, even—

"Azima."

Even the dead.

Everything stilled and stopped.

Including her heart.

Slowly she turned towards the voice that she never thought she'd hear ever again. That, for the last year, she considered what she could have sacrificed for just another moment with its source.

But there he stood. Dressed more plainly than last she saw him, his ember eyes glowed with demonic delight as sharp fangs protruded over his sardonic smile. Even his ruby skin seemed to flare with its own inner fire.

She wanted to run to him, to hold him close and lose herself in him again. Instead, she held her ground, the struggle of the last year forcing her to remain in place.

"How?" Azima forced out instead.

Malecoda pushed off the tree he had been leaning against and prowled to her with that arrogant saunter that made her body heat through to the core. "You know better than anyone that demons can't truly die."

The weight of the realization knocked the breath from her. "But it... I was there. I did it... I saw you—"

"Did you?" His smile curled with his suggestive tone.

Azima blinked, willing herself to think back to the war, to that moment she had tried so hard to block from her memory. When she knew they were the only solution to sealing the Rift, and she was so ready to sacrifice herself for him. For them all...