I’m colder than I’ve ever been, hurting more than I thought was physically possible. I can’t tell which is more painful: the rawness of my throat or the aching in my heart.
I’ve been crawling for a few minutes. Small pebbles and sticks are embedded in my palms and knees, but I keep going. Hot tears drip from my chin and hit the backs of my hands.
That’s when I hear Callum step on a branch behind me.
I thought he’d give himself away when he noticed I was gone. I thought he’d start calling out my name, and I’d have time to run. But I suppose I didn’t know Callum as well as I thought I did. Or at all.
I don’t turn to face him. I clench my jaw and continue to crawl.
I know it’s the end. There’s no sound for one moment, and it feels drawn out into many more insignificant moments—moments in which I wonder if our memories and shared loveturn into ash between us. Something sharp glides over my back, making a long cut down my shoulder blade.
Hot liquid spills from my body, and chills pebble my skin like rain.
It’s strange. I don’t cry out and I don’t feel anything except the warmth of my blood. Even the pain in my hands fades.
All I am is numb—already dead maybe, and this is hell.
My body falls to the side, and I face Callum. He’s not remorseful like he was earlier. The light has gone from his eyes, and all that’s left is an evil I’ve never known. It’s then that I realize how truly mortifying his beauty is, how it only ever masked what he kept hidden underneath.
I lift my arm right as he swings his knife down. He cuts my arm, and more blood blooms into my clothes. Tears are streaming down my temples and choked, rasping sounds escape my throat.
“W-why?” is the only word that comes out.
He doesn’t even blink as he smacks the side of my head with the butt of his knife. It dazes me. I don’t pass out this time, but I know pretending to be dead is my only hope.
I let my limbs go limp and stay as still as I can.
The fucked-up thing is that the second you’re in survival mode, you dissociate. It’s like my brain just flipped a switch and everything that is based in emotion evaporates. Like smoke, my heart has all but vanished. I’m just a creature? surviving its predator.
Callum stares at me for only a few seconds before he gets up and starts dragging me by my legs back to the hole he dug.
My arms are trailing up over my head, and I’m staring dully into the breaking points of the trees above. The stars are barely visible, but I hold on to them. I wonder if he will hear my question in the back of his mind for the rest of time.
Why?
Callum shoves my body into the hole with one hard boot to my stomach. I hold my breath to keep from gasping as I hit the bottom. It’s damn near six feet. I don’t have anything to measure the distance other than the despair in my soul.
I watch as he shovels the dirt on top of me until my face is buried. I hold my breath, and the second that I hear him go for another scoop, I cup my hands around my mouth to keep a pocket of air. As he adds dirt, I try to make the pocket as big as I can, like they tell you to do in case of an avalanche.
It only takes him a matter of minutes to bury me. The dirt is loose, so it’s not too hard to move my way back up, but I wait for a few minutes without hearing dirt hit the pile before I start moving. It’s like climbing mud, fighting for every scrap of life I have left in me.
And after I take that first breath of crisp air, I run.
I run as fast as my wounded body will allow, and I don’t look back.
Chloe is dead.
20
ROMAN
What happened back there?”My voice is low. I don’t want Briar to hear us, but fuck, we were just attacked for the first time since settling in Bane Falls. Why now? Everything is escalating so quickly, and I’ve never seen the man who shot Gale before… Is that the connection to the underworld we’re looking for?
“Jesus Christ, Hopper, you are so lucky this hit your side. It’s just a flesh wound. Nothing vital was struck,” Bensen mutters as he retrieves the bullet and drops it into a bowl we normally use for bolts.
Gale winces and sighs once the tweezers are out of his body. “Stopped by abs and not the full metal.” He coughs and chuckles as he shoots me a wry look.
I give him a disinterested frown.
