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The menwho trashed my childhood home grin as they watch me. One has a hold of Juliet’s long black hair in his fist, holding her tightly.
“You stole our property. She belongs to us, due to the debt your father owes us,” the man sneers.
Despite trying to tell myself this isn’t real, my brain won’t stop reeling at my sister’s torn clothing and tears.
“You promised I would be safe here, Jonas!” Juliet screams, and I swear I feel every word pierce my heart.
“I’m so sorry,” I whisper, breathing hard. I fail everyone.
I am the worst scum of the earth, and I don’t deserve happiness.
“You were too worried about your little whore to pay attention when I snuck out of the Academy,” Jules cries. “Why couldn’t you pay more attention?!”
The fight goes out of my limbs, as I see one of them pull out a knife. Dropping to my knees, I shake my head.
“I’ll fight for you,” I beg. “I’ll do anything you want if you spare her. She’s my only family!”
Slowly cutting her clothes off, they leer at her body. I remember the cum that stained all of her laundry after I broke her out of the closet. I will be utterly ruined if they kill her.
“Choices have consequences. If she was important to you, you wouldn’t be down here playing a stupid game,” the man with a knife sneers. “You care more about your Eve than your precious sister.”
I open my mouth to deny this when he cuts her throat. I can taste the metallic tang of her blood as it sprays across my face. I can’t stop screaming and apologizing to my poor, dead baby sister.
ASH
I can hear Jonas, but neither Bastian nor I can find him. I don’t know when we lost him, because I swear he was behind us this entire time.
“Bast, I think he’s behind us,” I tell him, trying to hide the panic in my voice. Levi’s number one piece of advice was that we needed to stay calm at all times, and to stick together.
So far, we suck at both.
“Yeah, these damn walls echo, so it’s hard to tell,” Bast complains.
Turning, we use the flashlight as we walk, even though I think the lens is cracked. It keeps sputtering every few feet. We need to hope it’ll survive the rest of our trial, or we need to memorize this map.
“Bast, I’m worried we’re gonna lose the light. We need to find Jonas, and then memorize this damned map. Just in case, okay? Let’s make the best use of our resources,” I demand.
He stiffens for a moment before nodding. I really thought he was going to deck me for a minute there. He has been off ever since he fell off the deep end of his trial. I have no idea what my challenge will consist of.
I can tell that Jonas is in pain right now, and he’s one strong motherfucker.
Whatever he’s ‘seeing’ is devastating. The blood is roaring in my ears, demanding that I find my brother. Hearing a scream to my left, I turn.
“Here,” I bark, grabbing the back of Bast’s shirt to stop him. He flinches, and I look curiously at him. Bastian doesn’t love touch, but he has never pulled away from us before.
It makes me enraged that something affected him like this.
Moving quickly through the side tunnel, Jonas’ piercing screams hurt my heart. As much as my feelings about him confuse me, and make me worry that they’re wrong, I do love him.
Based on my experience with Bast, I know yelling isn’t going to penetrate the haze Jonas is under. I want to punch someone for doing this to us, even though I understand we agreed to undergo three trials. It’s my fault for being stupid enough to think they’d be easy.
The light from Bast’s flashlight bounces on Jonas’ back. He’s on his knees, crying.
“Fuck,” I mutter.
“Ash,” Bast says, grabbing my arm. “He’s seeing things that don’t exist. I don’t know what it is, but I know that it’s his worst nightmare.”
Swallowing hard, I nod. He follows me as I drop to my knees in front of Jonas.
