Audrey's POV
I pressed my back against the cold stone wall, forcing air into my lungs. Calm down. You have to calm down.
The snakes could sense fear. Every animal could. If I panicked, if my heart kept racing, if my breathing stayed ragged—they'd react. And if by some chance those enclosures weren't as secure as they looked...
I closed my eyes and focused on my new ability. Beast Taming. The name alone should have given me confidence. But confidence required calm, and calm was in short supply.
I opened my eyes and forced myself to at the room instead of just reacting to it.
The snakes were in glass enclosures. Thick glass. Secure glass. Unless the Blakes had some way to remotely open them—which, given their theatrical cruelty, they probably did—I was safe from actual physical harm. The danger wasn't the snakes themselves. It was my own mind. My own fear. The trauma that lived in this body, threatening to drag me under.
I pushed off the wall and made myself walk.
