What’s “good” is what keeps them comfortable.
What’s “evil” is whatever threatens it.
It all depends on who’s telling the story. And who’s still alive at the end of it.
The rules to it all are a cage. And the locks are on the inside.
I think, sometimes, that I should feel bad for it all.
For the lies I told. For the strings I pulled, and the doors I opened.
For the girl I leashed—strange how I might have been fond of her. Strange, and irrelevant. Because I used her anyway.
I’ve always excelled with my words. I’ve known of their importance from a young age. It doesn’t matter what you mean, only how beautifully you can say it.
And Adeline—my sweet, earnest Adeline—she believed every syllable. Unknowingly walked through every door I opened.
MySoreya.
She will curse me when she realizes. Or maybe she won’t—maybe she will curse herself. But either way, it doesn’t matter.
I don’t feel bad.
Ican’t.
Because if I stop to feel bad, the whole thing unravels. And then the fire wins, and I lose everything.
So no, I won’t feel bad. Not yet. Maybe never.
I don’t need to be good, anyway.
I just need to win. Ineedthem to pay.
It’s the only shape my life has left.
Maybe when it’s done, the fire will go out. Maybe then I’ll find out if there’s anything left of me under it. But until then, this is what I am. This is what they made.
I hate them.
I hate them.
They’ll never understand this kind of fire. They never deserved to.
There is no forgiveness. There is no redemption. There is only me. And what I remember. And what I will do.
What they made me do.
This stalker has something to do with Wren’s death, I’m sure of it. I know it with every fibre of my being.
Let them scream when it comes. Let them beg. Let them say they didn’t know. I don’t care. I’ve needed this goal for too long. I’ve carried the fire without a direction for so long I almost forgot what it feels like to move forward.
But I’m moving now. Straight for the target.
I won’t stop until I rip apart all of those responsible.
And burn them the way they burned her.
I sit in the wreckage of my room. It looks like something out of a fever dream. Papers are scattered like ash—some torn, some burned at the edges, most stained with blood.
