Page 4 of Our Monstrous Hearts

Cassandra

The door slams against the wall with a deafening bang, yanking me from sleep. He’s back.

My heart hammers against the cage of my chest, stomach twisting into tight knots as fear suffocates my insides. Every aching muscle locks, bracing for impact. My body curls into itself, flinching from the anticipation of knowing what’s to come.

I don’t mean to make a sound, and yet a soft whimper laced with dread slips out. But the blow I’m waiting for never comes.

There’s just an eerie, unnerving silence. A stillness in the air makes me realize that something isn’t right.

With small, slow movements I inhale, not wanting to alert Clayton to the fact that I’m awake. There’s a strange scent. Almost like a candle burning mixed with the fragrance of patchouli, but that’s impossible because I never burn candles. Not since the last time, when Clayton found perverse entertainment in holding my hand over the flame. I still recall the smell of my burning flesh, like charred meat. When I close my eyes, my screams from that night echo in my head.

Slowly prying open one eye, I risk a glance, despite the chaos in my mind yelling that it’s safer to keep them closed.

My body violently jerks as my hands fly to my mouth, muffling the beginning of a scream. A shiver runs down my spine, eyes widening with horror at what I see.

A man towers in the doorway, almost hunched over from his height, blocking all light with his abnormally broad shoulders. He looks like a dark, ominous shadow. Glowing, red eyes stare right at me. Like death itself is gazing upon me.

Not Clayton. Not Clayton. It’s someone else. Something else.

“Are you the devil?” My voice cracks, soft and broken.

My head swims with confusion and anxiety as I take in the room around me, trying to process that, somehow, I’m no longer in my home. Heavy velvet curtains cover the tall windows. Candles flicker in an iron candelabra, casting shadows against the stone walls. The air is thick from his presence, something old and evil.

The man steps into the candlelit room. This time I can’t stop the gasp, sharp and panicked. Every instinct screams that there is something very wrong with this person. If I had any sense, or ability, I would run.

His skin strains over bone, pulled so tight it looks ready to tear, with cheeks caving inward as though collapsing. His ghostly-pale face is marred with flecks of discoloration, thick black veins squirming beneath the surface as rot slithers through flesh. Darkness sinks deep around his eyes, burrowing into the sockets like something diseased. Sickness clings to him, whispering that death has already claimed him.

His mouth splits open, indistinguishable from a gruesome, weeping wound, dark-red blood bubbling down his chin. A leering, predatory grin stretches across his face, as if my fear entertains him, and that’s when I see it.

Each tooth is carved to a deadly point, sharpened to tear through meat and bone like an animal.

“Worse.” He rasps in promise, his words thick with something cruel, and almost hungry.

He steps forward. Slow. Deliberate, as if he’s waiting to see what I do next. Heavy boots thud against the stone.

Panic wrenches me into action as I scramble further back into the bed, clutching the thin blanket to my chest in a weak attempt to shield myself from what’s standing at the footboard. I want to disappear beneath the covers, to vanish like a child waiting for the morning to chase monsters away. Yet my body betrays me, shaking, frozen beneath the weight of something ancient and diabolical.

This is no man. This is a monster.

Understanding dawns on me with a startling and alarming clarity. This is the monster that I accidentally wished for—the monster of Rose Falls.

“No,” I whisper. A horror consumes me at the thought of what I’ve done in asking for this beast.

I want to scream, to push him back and keep him away from me, but all I can do is shake, as helpless as a lamb going to slaughter. Although I know death would be a gift, a kindness, I still fear it, no matter how much I desire it.

As he moves to sit on the edge of the bed, I bring my legs closer to my chest, ignoring the soreness that comes with the movement. I have to get away. Make myself smaller. Hide. And yet, I can’t stop staring at him. He’s just so…big, muscles straining underneath his dark clothing. His hand alone would cover my entire face. He’s unlike anyone I have ever seen before.

“Your sorrow beckoned me, a desperate hymn from one in need of saving. I answered your pleas—not as your angel, or your savior, but as your eternal ruination. My wicked little prayer. To me you are bound.”

Beneath the deep growl of his voice, there’s a softness that I don’t expect. An almost affection. It catches me off guard, leaves me to stare wide-eyed at him in disbelief. Everyone else––my parents, Clayton, the town––has taught me that I’m unlovable.

While my mind is momentarily distracted, wondering if I should fear him, his hand cups my face. My eyes involuntarily flutter shut at this unexpected moment of tenderness. It’s a feeling I have never known. He cradles my cheek as if I’m something precious. Breakable.

I am breakable. Please handle me with care.

My body softens under his touch despite his horrifying appearance.

My thin nightgown does little to cover the bruises sullying my body. The blanket I clutch can’t cover what he already saw—that I am broken, no stranger to being hurt.