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The priest was caught off guard, sure, but he didn’t have a moment of doubt. Instead, he collapsed to his knees, whimpering about how he missed his momma. He went on and on about how this was a miracle, a bright light cast down from the lord.
I told him how God wanted me in the asylum. That my presence would cleanse the evil from each patient. That I, myself, needed cleansing. God needed his vessel to be pure and without any temptation of sin.
The priest ate it up and nodded eagerly at my command.
The rest happened in a blur. He brought me to the asylum and wrote a report and diagnosis of the treatments I’d receive. And that since I was without my savage travel companion, I wasn’t a danger to anyone. I would cooperate. I was not to be executed for the crimes Dessin committed.
And now, as I am dragged through the halls of the asylum, I breathe in the deceiving scent of wood and leather, only to detect that ripe stench of body odor and stale urine.
I feel no fear or debilitating anxiety. Only a cold, detached sense of calm.
The stone walls vibrate with the screams of the patients. They echo with the dead that never made it out, that still linger from room to room. I can feel it blistering over my skin, the dire memories that beg for me to step through their veil. The urgency to see each injustice happen over the years, to watch the torture evolve into what they are now.
But I have a plan, and I must stay focused.
Conformists spin around to see my arrival, mouths dropping open in shock that I’m alone. Or perhaps, it’s the presence of death and destruction permeating from my soul. Maybe it’s the way my lips curve into a maniacal smile or the way my eyes glint with the promise of torment. Not mine, and not the other patients, buttheirs.
They whisper and gawk at me being dragged past each room by my elbows. The orderlies yanking me are not gentle. Their touch will likely leave nasty bruises. The thought only fills my belly with satisfaction. Because each mark they make on my body, I will return tenfold.
A swish of short, raven-black hair catches my attention. A devious smirk on her face that says,oh, I’m going to have fun with you this time around.
She has no idea. Meridei, out of everyone here, is the person I am most excited to see.
The person I am most excited to play with.
After being stripped of the clothes that Runa and Asena gave to me, hosed down with ice-cold water, and given a white nightgown and grippy socks to wear—we stop in front of the thirteenth room.
There is only one moment that my stomach does an unhappy flip. My arteries stop pumping. It’s the moment I’m shoved inside, whereheonce stood, wherehewas once chained, whereheonce suffered.
My fingernails scrape against the stone floor. On all fours, I look over my shoulder at the orderly glaring at me. “We all used to fear this room. How does it feel to ruin that reputation?”
The door slams and I’m left on the floor, with simmering excitement for vengeance flaring hot inside of me.
“It feels fucking amazing.”
I’m hesitant to move through this room. The air is heavy and almost suffocating to try to breathe in. The memories seem to be physical entities that I can’t see but canfeelpressing against my skin like a warm, wet bubble. I take a cautious look around. At the iron bed bolted to the floor, the shackles for wrists and ankles.
I scoff. They didn’t bother locking me to the bed, securing the threat in the thirteenth room properly. They don’t see me as a danger. They see me as a plaything they can work out their frustrations on. A laughable patient that they’ve hated since I stepped foot in this asylum as a conformist.
My eyes scroll over the smoky, dimly lit room once more, with the aged brass gas lanterns, the concrete floor, and the doorway to the small washroom.
I can almost catch his lingering scent of cedar, sandalwood, and manipulation. The sensation traveling up my nostrils and to my brain leaves me grinding my teeth together. It reminds me of gushing blood, sweat, and Dessin’s pale face as his eyes drained of all light.
The memories claw at my chest, begging me to give in to the building pressure, like waiting for an ocean wave to fall over my head. It blisters over my skin uncomfortably as I try to resist it. I’m practicing control. That’s the advice Dessin would have given to me. To play with the ability, test its perimeter, and push the limits.
Without warning, Dessin’s growls fill the room and the sound of restrained agony. The same tone I heard when he was being treated in his room for throwing a fit. The time they called me in, and I had to stop him from crippling the orderlies that held him down.
“This is what you wanted all along, isn’t it?” I ask the memory of Dessin swirling around the room like a puff of cigar smoke. “For me to remember you? Remember Kane? But you must have known that the only way for me to use this disorder, these vivid hallucinations, would be for them to break me the way they broke you.”
It occurs to me that he didn’t know how much he meant to me.
“How could you not know that losing you would be the only way I’d break? The only thing that would be far too much for my mind to handle?”
The little bit of emotion I let slip past my concrete barriers pulls me into a memory.
Dessin sits on the bed, head bowed, hands clasped, elbows resting on knees. And he’s in his white uniform.
“She seems happy,” he says quietly, talking to someone.
