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The scent tells me it’s Weyland, but my heart starts to race. The firm grip feels like a collar, like the old hands that used to hurt me. Screaming, I jerk from the grip, hitting the spongy ground and scrambling backwards. I see blurs, shapes, and hands reaching for me.
Familiar hands.
Hands that hurt me.
Shadows grow around us, taking away all the light until I’m lost in the darkness of the shadows, completely cut off.
Alone.
Panicking.
Old memories wrap me in their mocking, cruel grip.
“Oh, how I missed you, my little pet,”the king’s voice whispers in my ear, and I twirl in the shadows, wide-eyed and terrified. His mocking laughter comes from behind me as I push to my knees and spin, whimpering in agony.
“Pet, little pet!”His voice comes at me from every direction.
Covering my ears, I start to scream, the panic choking me.
Suddenly something substantial, warm, and smelling faintly of fires and flowers wraps around me. My eyes open, and a hand, a black shadow hand, thrusts toward me, offering me a way out.
I grasp it with everything in me and pull.
Chapter
Twenty-Three
ROOK
The trees pass me by as I run, pushing myself, although I don’t know why. No one can see me after all, not if I don’t want them to. I could blend into the fog rolling through the Dead Lands or the ever-present darkness, appearing as nothing more than another shadow.
That’s what they all think I am.
I am a bigger monster than most.
Even now, the world has a hazy quality to it, and when I smack my hand into a tree as I slide to a stop, it’s nothing but black smoke formed into the shape. I could change into anything if I so wished, and I often do.
Boredom is my worst enemy.
I’m about to turn and find my way back through the lands to the cave I inhabit when a chord is struck. It’s like music in the air, calling to me. I focus my powers on it, letting it wash through me.
There is so much delicious, vibrant pain, it beats within my soul. I could no more ignore it than I could the darkness. I let it guide me until I happen upon a clearing. My powers seem toreact without my command, shadows crawling along the ground and foliage, obscuring it in darkness.
There are three monsters there, and they turn their horrified eyes to me, their whispers reaching me in the dark.
Boogeyman.
The horror and terror in that one word makes me smile. When the boogeyman comes, everyone runs. Ignoring them, I turn to the creature who called to me, and with the first look, I am struck by lightning, as if the sun has pierced my abyss.
She is a small, human female, but she exudes so much agony and fear that I could drink on it for days. I want to lick it away and taste every inch as she screams.
I find I do not like her terror, even if it echoes my own.
I drift closer, unable to resist, and emerge through the shadows as she spins. Her eyes are closed and unseeing, and her hands are over her ears as she screams. I look around for the cause and see nothing. Suddenly, her eyes open. Her big bright orbs freeze me in place, begging for an escape, for a savior. I have never been someone’s liberator before, but something about this little human makes me want to be.
I hold out my hand, watching her, and when she lays her soft, small one in mine, I am lost to her completely, brightened by her sunlight and darkened by her pain.
I become hers.
