Page 17 of The Madness Within

He lunged for the window.

The shadows struck first.

They hit him like a wave of nails and nightmares, slamming him into the wall, dragging him by the ankle, the spine, the neck. Hoisting him up like a slab of meat.

He fought.

They always do.

But the moment they realized the shadowswantedpain? That’s when the screaming began.

I sealed the door. Warded it shut. The air grew thick, humming with old curses. The flame from a single candle burned black and high. I circled him, watching his panic bloom like bruises beneath his skin.

“What is this?” he choked. “You, you can’t do this!”

“Ican,” I said. “Because the system let you live. The court gave you mercy.”

I stepped closer. The scalpel appeared in my hand like an extension of thought, shadows twisting into steel. Ancient. Starved.

“But I’m not the court. I’m the executioner.”

I let the blade kiss his chest.

From collar to navel, I carved the first line.

He shrieked as blood poured from him like confessions. The shadows slithered into the cut, widening it, licking at the nerves.

“Help me!” he wailed. “Someone,please—”

“No one’s listening,” I whispered. “But the boys you buried? They’re watching.”

I reached inside him. Pulled something soft, something warm and wet. A kidney. Still pulsing.

“This one’s for Aiden. Fifteen. Had braces and a birthmark behind his ear. You took him apart like a fucking science project.”

He sobbed. “I, I was sick.”

“You were starving,” I corrected, holding up another organ. “And now you’ll know what it feels like to bedevoured.”

The shadows pinned his limbs like crucifixion nails. Ripped fingernails from bone. Peeled flesh from muscle like silk off fruit.

I gutted him slow.

Surgical.

Magical.

Every scream was a song. Every artery a thread in a tapestry of guilt.

When I tore his heart free, I didn’t drop it. I let it beat in my palm. Once. Twice. A stuttering apology.

Then I crushed it. Turned it to dust and fed it to the shadows.

They devoured his body next. Inch by inch. Until nothing remained but bloodstains and bones arranged in the shape of justice on the floor.

The butcher shop burned behind me, black smoke curling into the sky like a god being summoned.

But no gods answered.

---