The Blood of Darkness

Chapter 3

Val

"It's a shame that I've had to cut your beautiful body like this." the Dark King whispers, tracing feather-light fingers across my bare back.

My fists clench, and my breath quivers. "It's a shame that you can't control me."

He lets out a dark chuckle and raises an eyebrow. "We'll see." A pause. "Would you like me to tell you a story?"

Yes. Anything to delay the approaching bloodshed.

"No." I say.

A smile tugs at his lips. "You're a horrible liar, darling."

His hands trace across my shoulders, my sides, my face. I shiver, swallowing back the bile in my throat. With every touch, carefully skimmed over my day-old stitches, he reminds me that those same stitches will be calculatingly ripped out within minutes.

"Let me begin." he says coolly. "Once upon a time, thirty-six nights ago, a Dark King appeared and offered a lovely, powerful girl his hand, his heart, and his kingdom. Do you know what that girl did?"

I look straight into his dark brown eyes, a cold calm descending over me. "She was a clever girl, so she refused."

The Dark King clicks his tongue, and his nails tap on my chains. "What happened after that?"

I swallow nervously. "The Dark King cut her up like an animal and forced her to stitch herself back together, over and over."

"Like this?" he asks, his fingers carefully tugging at the stitched skin on my back, pulling it apart until the stitches rip.

There is a scream from deep within that forces its way from my mouth, it is as if my terrified soul has unleashed a demon. The pain increases in waves, small lulls giving false hope of an end. Each peak robs my ability to even scream, sending me writhing in agony against the Dark King's grip.

As the pain continues, as more and more stitches are torn, I feel like a ghost in a world of paper dolls. A ghost in my own machine. A ghost running through time and space, looking, always looking in the blackness for a sacred spark. And all the world becomes noise, a distraction, and I am not there at all.

It's so much easier that way.

I wake with a gasp, pain ricocheting through my entire body.

It takes me a panicked moment to realize that I am not in my cell. That the Dark King is not here, having woken me up for one of his "visits".

Instead, I'm in a medium-sized bedroom, faintly smelling of the smoke of a burnt out cedar candle. Light streams from the window next to the bed I'm in, so it's nearly midday. How the hell did I get here?

My memories are fuzzy, but I recall the guard...Lake half-carrying me up the front steps of a huge townhouse. He pounded on the door, because the same sound seems to thud in my skull. A boy, probably near my age, opened it. He had dark, reddish hair, olive skin, and golden eyes. I'm pretty sure Lake said his name was...Kye. The first thing I thought when I saw him was that he was not to be trusted. A girl, a bit younger than me, was peeking out from behind him. She had that kind-hearted look about her, with her honey-blonde hair, warm brown eyes, and tanned skin. She was the opposite of Kye, with a trustworthy sense to her. Neve was her name, I think. She's most likely from Asilo, while Kye is definitely a Trivette native. Kye also said something about someone else, who was asleep, but I don't remember the person's name. All I remember is pushing away from Lake and walking inside, despite feeling incredibly lightheaded, and someone, maybe Kye, asking me some kind of question. Then nothing.