Page 105 of Her Creation

Dr. Paranthal’s last words rang through her head, and as she let her head fall against the damp stone, she thought about her mother, silently cursing God for taking her just as she’d done a million times before. As her father and Inno came into her mind, she broke apart completely, and short, guttural sobs fell from her shaking body.

“Silence,” the guard ordered harshly.

She tried to stop but could not.

His darkened form seemed to take pity upon her and his voice softened. “They say you made a monster… Is it true?”

She took in a heavy, sour breath of air. “No. I made a masterpiece, a monument of my grief and love, but never a monster was made other than myself, and that was built long before my creation.” Her words slid across the iron bars.

“Do you regret it? Making him?” the guard asked.

“No,” she answered quickly. “My only regret is not loving him sooner.” Her eyes fell on something small crawling across the floor. “How cruel to give us love, an immortal, everlasting feeling, while supplying us with bodies built for rot and decay. We are given feelings that outlive us and bones that cannot. We are made capable of boundless attachment yet housed in vessels meant to fail. How pitiless to grant us something endless and eternal and no way to keep it,” she said dreamily.

The guard scoffed.

Chained against the stone wall, Victoria felt how Inno must have felt. Forgotten and abandoned to the dark. If she could go back and do it all over again, there were many, many things she would change, but loving her mother, father, and Inno were not any of them.

She only wished she’d not fought it. She wished she’d have lived instead of existing, making decisions based on how she would be judged. If loving Inno meant she was damned, then she was damned from the moment she had seen him. What is it worth to fight something so inevitable? What is a life if not lived with love?

“It’s time. Bring her and the others out to the platform. The executioner is ready. Everyone from three towns around is crowded around to watch the bitch’s head fall,” a man shouted.

The guard responded something she couldn’t understand and the other man replied. “Bind her hands. Once she’s out there, make her kneel and cover her head.”

The guard made a sound of agreement and then moved to open the cell door, roughly grabbing Victoria and unlatching the manacles before binding her wrists so tightly she let out a soft cry. A stained white cover was thrown over her head. He shoved her forward. She heard shouts as she was led through the hallway of cells, but her heart pounded in her ears so loud she didn’t hear what they said. She remained trembling, her head down as they passed through another long hallway. Eventually the guard shoved her against the wall so hard her face tingled.

She’d expected to be crying, knowing what fate lay ahead of her, but she had already cried so very many tears that she found she had none left. What life had she lived where she had no more tears left to shed for herself as they’d all been spent on others?

She had only one last prayer. That God would forgive her and keep Inno safe.

She felt the stirring of a crowd as the guard shoved her forward, the crowd gasping as her head covering was ripped off. The blinding light of the sun caused her to squint, and she heard the swing of the executioner’s sword come down.

When no pain came, her eyes flicked open and she realized she was at the back of the crowd, and the wooden platform that held the focus of all eyes was in the center ahead of her. A covered head, freshly severed, rolled in front of the executioner, and Victoria turned away from it…

And found Inno, beautiful face illuminated by the sun, in a guard’s uniform.

Her mouth fell open, but he lifted his pointer finger to his lips with a wink and gently urged her forward. “Keep moving until we are out of the crowd completely. There is a carriage around the corner.”

The voice was the same scraggly voice of the guard who had asked her if she regretted making the monster. Inno pushed her forward and gently pushed her head down until they were out of the crowd. No one looked at them.

A black carriage awaited, with two horses and no driver.

“Get in the back,” Inno whispered across her forehead with a hurried breath as he removed his coat to reveal a plain, coach master’s tailcoat instead of the guard uniform she’d just seen him in. He hurried her inside the coach, and before she knew it, the carriage was moving quickly away from the crowd. Surprised at how fast he urged the horses forward, she looked out the window and onto the platform in the distance to see the severed head picked up from the stage and the white covering pulled off to reveal Baron Wilhelm von Lichtenmarstein’s head, severed and bloody.

She heard the crowd’s gasp of betrayal from inside the carriage as it gained speed. Oh God. Inno had somehow managed to switch her with Wilhelm.

Panic unfurled from her gut despite the moment of peace at her prospective freedom. As she rode alone in the back seat of the carriage, every emotion possible flooded her. The moment the carriage door opened, Victoria hurled herself into Inno’s arms. He wrapped his tightly around her as she clung desperately to him. His hand covered the back of her head as he gently pressed her against his chest, savoring the embrace, but not wasting a moment to unhook the horses and send them off before he ran into the castle’s front door.

“You left me,” Victoria breathed as she kissed his face. “I thought you’d gone. You should have gone.” Their lips pressed together in a panicked frenzy.

He pulled away and, without letting her go, glanced out the window hurriedly. “I never left you. I needed to finish something,” he answered before kissing her as though he might never get to again.

“Wilhelm,” she muttered.

He nodded. He tightened his hold on her and carried her into the castle. “What is this life I have worth if I must live it knowing those that hurt you still walk and wander without fear or consequence? I am their consequence.”

She held him tighter, unwilling to lose another second. “They will be here any moment—the people of town. They will be angry at the new baron’s death.”

“I didn’t know where else to go, or if you needed anything from here,” Inno said, sounding flustered for the first time.