Chapter 135

I screamed as it pushed, burned, and tore through my hand, melting into the stone beneath me. I tried to move my fingers but I couldn’t feel them. I couldn’t feel anything but the pain.

I screamed and screamed and screamed. The pain was all I could think of. I felt like I didn’t have enough air in my lungs. He moved like a shadow around the altar, still chanting, though the tone had turned almost cheerful. I turned my head trying to avoid the next one, but there wasn’t time. I had no strength. I felt like all of my strength had been taken from me.

I smelled more burning flesh and realized that the stone glinted in the moonlight.

It was laced with silver. My stomach lurched with fear. Raven wasn’t affected by silver. Why was I being affected now?

He pressed his hand against my forearm and plunged another stake through my right shoulder. I arched off the altar, pushing and straining against the stone arches as I screamed again. It burned. I could smell it.

“Candido!” I screamed, listening to my voice echoing through the caves. “Candido, help me!”

Could he hear me? Where was he? My heart was racing, and Damian paused just enough to look down at me. He laughed.

“Oh, that was adorable,” Damian said. “Do you really think he’s going to find you here?”

I choked on a sob. “Candido will find me. He’ll find me. He’ll always find me.”

He snorted. “If it means that much to you, I’ll make sure he can find your corpse.”

My blood went cold as he looked down at me. “Though… I suppose if the moon goddess is feeling merciful, maybe you’ll live. You certainly have managed not to die so far, haven’t you?”

“Y-You’re wrong,” I said, my eyes welling with tears. “I’m… Candido will—”

I shrieked as he slammed another stake into my left hand. The scent of blood was making me nauseous. I felt the world spinning around me.

Candido. Where was Candido? Was he dead? If he wasn’t, he had to be on his way here. He had to save me. Didn’t he feel how much pain I’m in?

“Candido?” I croaked through my rough throat and tears.

My mouth felt numb. My body seemed to follow. I felt the next stake in my left shoulder at a distance. Was I going into shock? I felt the pain drifting further and further away from me. I could see the glints of moonlight and sunlight dancing. I felt them like ice and fire dancing along my skin.

My body felt… different. Like it was changing. Was I shifting? What good would that do me?

No. This wasn’t like what I had been told the shift was like. My mind was slipping in and out of consciousness. What was happening to me?

Candido? Candido, where are you?

I could almost see him. I could almost hear him.

“Just hold on,” I heard him grunting. Fire flashed before my eyes. I felt the heat of it across my face. I heard paws pounding against the forest floor and flashes of gold fur.

It was Candido.

But where… was he? Where was I?

The sound of Damian’s chanting grew farther away. I felt the thrum of my heart starting to slow and even out. The pain washed over me in waves. Something was ripping and burning through me, turning my blood to magma, yet I couldn’t scream. My lungs were burning. I felt every cell in my body rioting, resisting, fighting even as my mind kept retreating. There was another burst of pain in my feet.

Candido, where are you? Why weren’t you coming for me?

I slipped into darkness and fire. Then, I was floating, and I walked into the library at the school.

My heart lightened. Was Raven there? Could she get me out? A shadow moved. I heard her laughter from far away and I followed it. It grew taller and bigger, turning to the size of a grown man. As I rounded the corner, the shadow morphed to a monstrous size. I saw a flash of moonlight streaming down over me.

It lunged out at me, clawing at me. I felt like I remembered this as I dove out of the way. Was it a memory of that night or something else?

“Hedy,” Candido’s voice called me. It felt warm and present, urgent, even like he was trying of find me. “Where are you? Where are you, Hedy?”

I tried to reach back, but I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t even open my mouth. The monster fell away as I felt myself falling back into darkness.

Then, I was so cold, so weak, so fragile that I could barely open my eyes, but I wasn’t in that cave where Damian had taken me.

I was in that house, the Wolf Fang manor, choking and trying to convince my body to get up.

Steven was gone. No one was around to help me.

I knew better. I had done this so many times before.

“She went that way!” Lilian cackled. “Quick! If we’re smart about it, we’ll get rid of her this time.”

“But can’t we just let her marry that ugly man?”

“No,” Lilian hissed. “Then, he’ll want part of the pack.”

“But, Mom, it’s mine!”

I didn’t remember this conversation, but I remembered enough. This was the night I had run from the estate. They were looking for me because I had left my room.

Thunder cracked outside and lightning lit the sky. I heard the rain falling. I heard them getting closer. I struggled to my feet. It was just a memory, just some hazy dream, but I knew. I knew that if I didn’t get up now, it really would be the end the same way that it would have been the end then. I had to get up.

Everything was burning. Everything hurt. My legs gave out. My arms wouldn’t support me, but I tried again. I dragged myself across the room to the low window.

This parlor… I couldn’t remember ever being in it before that night. I didn’t remember how I knew that it had a window low enough that I could climb out of it and not be harmed, but it didn’t matter.

I pushed and pulled myself up until I could open the window and roll onto the bushes just beneath it into the cold, humid air outside. It felt blissful against my burning skin, cooling the fever. I closed the window behind me and rolled off the bushes.

They caught in my hair and my clothes as if trying to hold me hostage, but I pushed off and landed with a grunt into the puddle of muddy grass. I lifted my head and saw a clear path as if I was staring down a tunnel into my future.

Now, I knew that at the end of it was more than just the chance of freedom. There was Candido at the end of the path and my future as his wife.

I got to my feet, stumbling at first down the uneven road. My vision blurred, my mind spun, but I kept going. I kept going. I kept going until my legs grew stronger from the sense of freedom. Anything was better than there. Anything was better than what they had planned for me, and I felt my strength growing as I started to run. I rushed up the hills, running through the trees that seemed to almost dart out of my way, letting me run and stumble forward freely.

I saw the paved road ahead. My heart lifted. I knew what happened next. I just had to get there.

Candido was coming.

Candido was coming for me. All I had to do was get there.

I saw the lights coming down the road at a distance, rushing close and closer as I got onto the road and stood in the middle. My legs trembled and I closed my eyes.

I knew what happened next. I would wake up in that warm bed in the estate and this time I wouldn’t lie to him.

The lights grew brighter and brighter until they were burning through my eyelids.

Then, I opened my eyes as Damian drove a large stone stake from above his head and through my chest. I felt it push and rip through me. My eyes watered and I closed my eyes again, trying to return to that rainy night.

I refused for Damian to be the last thing I saw.

I pushed my mind until I could find him. He turned to me with his stern expression and beautiful face. I wished that just once he would have held me, caressed me, and loved me like a lover. I wished I could have heard him call my name just one more time.

I wish I could have told him just one last time that I loved him.