worst of all.
I can’t hear everything Matt’s saying, but I don’t know if that’s because I’ve truly forgotten or if I’ve just blocked that encounter enough that I’ve blotted it out by now. But I remember the gist. I was a liar, insane, and he was glad I’d gotten arrested. Glad that I was declared mentally unfit and would be taken away. He was glad, I was devastated. That right there should’ve told me what kind of man he was.
After Matt storms out, it’s only the correction officers standing there in matching uniforms, staring at me with eyes filled to the brim with judgment and condemnation. I see myself of four years ago as I crumble into a ball on the floor, hugging my knees to my chest as I sob. My heart pangs in my chest at the sight, and even though tears track down my cheeks, anger rises like flames.
“What’s wrong with me?” I hear my past self whimper, and my temper flares even hotter.
“Nothing is wrong with you,” I say, even though she can’t hear me. “That monster you chased away deserved to be shoved in front of that car. You were protecting that little boy you took from him.”
That knowledge is too late now, though. A lifetime too late.
My childhood, my sisters, my young adult life, all stolen from me. And now the rest of my adult life has been stolen too. By another bastard monster.
No.
I’ve let demons ruin my life for long enough, and I refuse to let Morax or anyone else steal more from me.
“I’ve had enough.” My words are quiet, but they sound heavy, like thudding footsteps. “I’ve had enough!” I shout, and my voice rents through the air and cracks the walls of the scene, making it crumble at my feet until I’m standing in nothing but a black shadow.
My chest rises and falls quickly as I look around, and I realize with a jolt that this isn’t just any shadow. This is my darkness. The black vision that ebbs over my eyes and protects my mind from harm. This is what lives in the recesses of my head, this pulsing, omnipotent power that I never realized I always had access to.
“Impressive.”
I whirl around at the abrupt voice, and there, standing a few paces away, is a male I’ve never seen before. He’s standing in the darkness—in my darkness—and looking around it as it moves like liquid in a lava lamp, with a hint of fascination on his face.
He has taupe skin, shades darker than mine, with a feathered pair of ginger-colored wings at his back. His hair looks like espresso, with just the faintest hint of orange to go with his wings, and he has short horns at the edge of his hairline. A pair of severely straight eyebrows lift up at the ends, giving him a sinister Mr. Spock-like edge. The scar that cuts through one of his brows and down the corner of his eye makes him look all the more tough and menacing.
Chiseled jawline, aquiline nose, both features harsh enough that the tiniest hint of fangs peeking over his thick bottom lip makes him look more handsome than monstrous, because it all fits him somehow. He carries an edge of threat, but oddly, I’m not afraid of him.
“Who are you?”
He finally turns to me, and I can see the flash of black piercing through his septum, and another scar that runs from the corner of his lip and stretches over his jaw. “Don’t you know?” he asks with a frown, and I’m trapped by a pair of the brightest blue eyes I have ever seen.
I’m staring—I know I am, but for a second, I can’t make myself look away. “Should I?” I ask, my voice a little wobblier than I’d like.
He arches his scarred brow like he’s annoyed, but the glint in his eye tells me otherwise. “You keep calling.”
I blink as his words register, and then my mouth drops open. “You!” I exclaim, taking a step back. It’s him. The voice that keeps butting into my head.
“I prefer the name Ire over you, but whatever tickles your wings, Snarls,” he says arrogantly, his blue eyes dipping down to take me in.
I should care that even here in my dream-darkness, I’m in my underwear, just like I am in Morax’s cell. I should care that I’m dirty, and even though you can’t see the evidence of what’s been done to me on the outside, my inside is scarred