Page 4

It was just like before. Always this. Always waking up in the aftermath, the violence already done, the trap already set. My mother patting my head and lying to me. There are no monsters.

Panic started to rise. It scuttled up my throat like cockroaches under my skin. Couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t look away from the bars on the window, even though the glass was so dirty I could barely see out. Even if I broke it, the chain would still have me pinned to the wall, like an afterthought, like a corpse you didn’t want walking away.

My heart tried to keep up. Boom, boom, boom, like someone knocking on a coffin lid.

I remembered my hands on the steering wheel. Dark sky outside. Cold. So cold. My last fragile hope was a light in the distance, a farmhouse. I remembered the way the front porch sagged, the way my feet made the old wood groan. I remembered the door opening.

He was there. Black hair and broad frame. I remembered begging for help. I remember he smiled. He hit me. That I remembered. The crunch of my skull, the blooming dark, the knowledge that nobody would ever hear me scream here.

Dread gnawed at my insides. It wasn’t just pain. It was the certainty that things could always get worse, and they would. I knew this feeling. Every cell recognized it. Powerless, voiceless, unwanted. Property.

Tears burned at my eyelids. I’d learned long ago not to cry for help. But I cried anyway.

The door to the basement opened. A little bit of light poured in. My captor walked down the steps. I couldn’t see his face this time. He was wearing a mask. Not a store-bought mask, no, this looked to be made by his own hands. It was rough burlap with two holes cut for eye sockets, and a jagged line sewn where his mouth would be. It was uneven and creepy.

It reminded me of a scarecrow mask, but simpler.

“What the fuck do you want from me?” I screamed at him, attempting to stand up on my legs. He stormed over and pushed me onto the bed. I yelped and fell backwards.

He straddled my chest and slapped my face. It stung. “You’re a feisty one, little bluebird. I’ll have to change that.”

I struggled to use my legs to kick him, but his body weight was too strong. “I’ve survived worse. I grew up with a fucking monster. You’re no different,” I spat at him, glaring at the empty sockets.

He chuckled. It was a low, chilling sound. “We’ll see about that. You’re mine now, little bluebird, and you won’t ever leave here.”

He tilted his head at me, the mask twisting his features into something inhuman. For an awful moment, I thought he might kill me right there—snuff me out and toss me in the dirt like a broken doll. But instead, he leaned closer, burlap scraping my cheek as he breathed me in.

“You think you know monsters, little bluebird?” he murmured, voice muffled and warped by the mask. “You don’t know anything. You look in the mirror and close your eyes. You don’t see what’s behind you. You don’t see what’s inside.”

The room seemed to tilt. I thought of my mother again—her hand on my hair, her soft lies. There are no monsters. I wanted to scream that she was wrong, that she doomed me by believing it.

“I’m not afraid of you,” I whispered, though my voice trembled.

“You should be.” He leaned back, releasing my chest. I sucked in air, the chain rattling against the wood.

He got off me and paced the tiny room, his boots thudding on the floorboards, dragging the shadows with him. The eyeholes in the mask followed me, hungry and blank.

“Do you know what happens to birds that try to fly away?” Malakar said, almost sing-song, his voice pitched with a child's glee. “They break their wings. They fall and fall. I found one once. Its bones were all soft, like bread. I tried to put it back together but it kept bleeding, kept screaming. I buried it under the porch.”

Chills broke out on my arms. I pressed myself against the cold brick wall, wishing I could disappear into the cracks.

“I’m not a bird,” I managed, though I tasted bile.

He tilted his head again. “We’ll see. They always say that. They always beg and cry and scream, and then the dark takes them. The dark always wins, little bluebird.”

His words slipped sideways, like he wasn’t talking to me at all. He mumbled, like he heard someone else in the room. My heart rabbit-thumped in my chest.

He circled the bed, dragging his fingers along the grimy sheet. “You smell like fear. Did you know that? It’s sweet. Like sugar melted on the stove. My father hated the smell. My mother—she used to cry, and it made the whole house sticky. It gets in the walls.”

I squeezed my eyes shut, sick from terror and the smell of my own blood. His rambling made no sense, but that was worse than threats. There was no logic here. No rules to play by. Just him, the mask, the chain, the endless dark.

He sat on the edge of the bed, too close, the mattress dipping under his weight. “Do you pray, Starla?” he asked, too calm. “My mother prayed. She prayed and prayed, but God didn’t answer. Maybe God doesn’t like women. Maybe God never listened at all. Praying didn’t do her any good, because the dark still took her.”

His hand brushed my hair, gentle as a lover’s. I recoiled, but he caught a fistful and yanked my head back. His masked face loomed over mine. “Don’t move. Don’t scream. Screaming makes it worse.”

I forced myself not to cry, not to give him the satisfaction. Salt stung my wounded scalp. He watched me with those empty eyes.

He let go and stood abruptly, knocking the bucket with his boot. Flies scattered. “You’ll stay down here tonight. Maybe longer. Maybe forever. It depends if you learn to love your cage.” He went to the door, then paused. “I’ll bring you food later. Don’t make a mess. I hate messes. I hate noise. If you scream, I’ll come back.”