Page 74 of Porcelain Grave

"Rhys! Oh god, Rhys, please!"

"Please what, love?" he whispers, his voice suddenly dropping to a haunting, melodic purr even as he continues to hammer into me with psychotic intensity. "Please break you? Please ruin you? Please make you forget there was ever a world outside of my arms? I've got you. I've fucking got you."

He accelerates, his movements becoming a blur of raw power. He is fucking me with a desperation that feels like he's trying to climb inside my skin. I can feel the orgasm building, a tidal wave of heat that rivals the fire behind us. My internal muscles clamp down on him, milking him, squeezing him with every frantic pulse.

"That's it... give it all to me!" he screams, his voice cracking. "Scream for me, Ophelia! Let the fire hear you!"

I peak first, a violent, shattering climax that rips through my body in jagged waves. I arch my back, my eyes rolling back in my head, my entire being vibrating with a pleasure so intense it feels like pain. As I collapse against him, sobbing and twitching, Rhys lets out a guttural, animalistic roar. He delivers three more devastating, deep thrusts, burying himself as far as humanly possible, and then he comes. I can feel the hot, thick jets of his seed flooding my womb, filling me up, marking me from the inside out.

He doesn't pull out. He stays buried deep inside me, his forehead resting against mine, both of us gasping for air that is becoming thin and scorched. He holds me there, straddled and shaking, for a few seconds of agonizing silence while the fire roars just inches away, the heat now an unbearable weight.

Suddenly, the madness shifts back into purpose. With one hand still gripping my hip, he reaches behind him and wrenches the key from the lock. The door clicks open.

He doesn't let me go. He carries me out of the room, walking backward away from the inferno, with his cock still buried deep in my soaking, aching pussy. Every step he takes causes him to slide slightly deeper into me, a constant, pulsing reminder of his possession.

He carries me up the stone stairs, his breath heavy, his eyes still shimmering with that terrifying devotion. We ascend rapidly, the smoke billowing below us, the roar of the collapse echoing in the depths of the catacombs. By the time we break through to the surface, the cool night air hits our sweaty, naked skin like a shock

I have no burns on me. Neither does he.

He finally stops on the damp grass, but he keeps me pressed against him, his body still joined with mine. I am shaking hard—my limbs trembling from the adrenaline, the terror, and the aftershocks of the most violent pleasure I've ever known. I look up at him, seeing the soot on his cheeks and the absolute, unhinged love in his eyes.

I don't run. I don't scream. Instead, I reach up, wrap my arms around his neck, and pull him down into a kiss that tastes of smoke, salt, and madness.

Chapter 23

I’m hunched over the canvas, the smell of linseed oil and turpentine thick in the air, clinging to the back of my throat. My fingers are stained with charcoal and deep, bruised purples, and my heart is hammering against my ribs like a trapped bird. I’m shaking, just a bit, but it’s a fucking electric kind of shaking. For seven years, I’ve lived my life in a blur of covered glass and averted eyes. Seven years of treating every reflective surface like a fucking landmine.

I can’t even look at a puddle in the street without feeling the bile rise in my throat. Because every time I’ve dared to peek into a mirror, I haven't seen myself. Not really. I see them.

I dip my brush into a mixture of titanium white and a grey so cold it looks like a corpse's skin. I start with the frame—a heavy, ornate Victorian mirror, the kind of thing that looks like it belongs in a funeral parlour. I paint the gold leaf peeling and rotting, the wood curling like burnt skin.

Then, I move to the glass.

I don't paint a reflection; I paint a haunting. I sketch two figures standing right behind where I should be. My sisters. My identical, beautiful, dead fucking sisters. I paint them with a translucent, shimmering quality, their skin a sickly, iridescent pale. Their eyes are the worst part—wide, vacant, and leaking a dark, viscous fluid that looks like old blood. I paint their wounds exactly where I remember them getting butchered at. I paint their mouths open in silent, eternal screams, their fingers reaching out, pressing against the inside of the glass as if they’re trying to claw their way back into the world of the living.

I remember the sound of my own screaming every time I saw them. The way I’d smash the glass or run until my lungs burned, the sheer, blinding terror of being hunted by my own face.

My hand slips, a streak of crimson splashing across the canvas, and suddenly I’m not in the studio anymore. I’m back in that fucking house. It was so dark then—a suffocating, heavy kind of dark that felt like it was trying to swallow me whole. I can smell the metallic tang of blood and the scent of stale beer.

I remember looking up. I remember the weight of the silence, broken only by the wet, rhythmic sound of something dripping. And then I saw him. My father.

I didn't look at the floor first. I looked into his eyes.

And there, in the dark, dilated pupils of the man who was supposed to protect me, I saw my own reflection. A tiny, terrified version of myself mirrored in his gaze, framed by the glint of the butcher's knife he was still gripping. The blade was slick, dripping red, and behind him—just barely in the periphery of that reflection—were my sisters. They were sprawled on the floor, their dresses soaked through with gore, their lives slipping away in little, shuddering gasps. I saw the exact moment the light left their eyes, mirrored in the eyes of the monster who killed them.

A sob catches in my throat, and I violently smear a handful of black oil paint across the bottom of the painting. I don't use a brush for this part; I use my bare palms, dragging the darkness upward, swallowing the feet of the ghosts. I want the void to take them. I want the darkness to be as thick and oppressive as it was that night.

I paint the reflection in the mirror not as a person, but as a fracture. I draw jagged lines cracking through the center of the image, splitting my sisters' faces in half, mirroring the way my own mind felt like it had been shattered into a thousand jagged pieces.

I step back, breathing hard, my chest heaving. The painting is a fucking nightmare rendered in oil and pigment. It’s grotesque, it’s haunting, and it’s the most honest thing I’ve ever created. I look at the canvas and for the first time in seven years, I don't want to scream. I just want to burn the whole fucking world down until there's nothing left but the ash and the truth.

I trek through the carnival, the air thick with the smell of fried dough, ozone, and something metallic that makes the hair on my arms stand up. The neon lights of the rides flicker in the distance, but I keep my eyes locked on the coven's tent. It looms like a great, black lung, breathing in the shadows of the night.

As I approach, a man stumbles out of the tent. He looks absolutely fucked—eyes glazed over, mouth hanging open, wandering around like he’s forgotten how to use his own legs. He’s completely disoriented, a total zombie. I don't give him a second glance; I just step past him and slip inside.

The interior is dim, smelling of dried herbs and old wax. I don't wait for an invitation; I just march in and sink into a chair. The light is low, provided by a few flickering candles scattered across a heavy wooden table and lining the walls. The table is cluttered with weird shit—skulls, crystals, bundles of sage, and jars of things I really don't want to identify.

Six figures sit around the table, their faces hidden behind heavy black veils. The silence is oppressive, the kind that makes your ears ring.