But I accepted the offerings.
I granted them power.
The rules were clear. The bargain was struck.
Feed me.
And for centuries, the Usher family did. They brought me offerings. Pure. Delicious morsels to satiate my hunger.
In return, their empire bloomed. Their lives flourished. All was as it should be.
Until religion came to their doorstep. Fredrick Usher forgot his family’s promise to me. He built his god a chapel. Knelt at the altar of a hand carved cross and begged for absolution.
With his overzealous enthusiasm, his son turned his back entirely. His son after him and the twins. The current Usher wields no knowledge of my existence. Of his family’s promise. Has no understanding of the power beneath his feet. He can’t even hear me. None of them can.
Except her.
Lenora.
Soft, sweet Lenora with her heart as vast as an ocean and a smile capable of warming even my cold tendrils. Lenora with her tender nature and pure heart.
She can hear me.
And she shouldn’t.
She isn’t an Usher.
There isn’t a drop of their blood in her and yet…
She chose me.
Confounded, I watch this delicate creature with her big eyes and sultry lips as I have from the moment she woke me with her grief. So deep. A raw wound, jagged from where her very heart was torn from her chest. That hollow wail of anguish stirred me from my centuries of slumber. Had me opening my eyes to this place, a mere shell of what it was. My temple, buried beneath a labyrinth of decay and darkness.
Betrayal. The unadulterated audacity. With his newfound God, Fredrick Usher had buried me like a sin he wished to clean from his very blood.
But I am his blood.
I am that voice forever tickling at the back of their minds. I am the reason they had the life they were given.
Not this …Godhe loved so much. This God he thought would absolve the darkness in his veins.
I gave them their wealth.
I gave them power.
I am the very reason it all began to unravel around them.
They thought they could continue to exist without me? Without me is death. It’s the annihilation of their entire line.
One by one.
Until no Ushers stands.
Until every blessing I bestowed upon them turns to poison in their mouths.
I am vindictive.
I am petty.
