Page 133 of Depravity

My feet dangle beneath me, they catch on the floor, on the threshold, on the rugs. I can feel the pain, but there’s no fear. No panic. Harsh emotions are beyond me now.

And yet that ringing follows me out, follows me like a shadow.

I’m laid out once more. I’m strapped down only this time, the room is different. It’s cleaner.

The doctor glances at me before turning to Xavier. “Are you absolutely sure?” He says.

“Will it shut her up?”

He grunts back.

“Then do it.”

Do it. Do it.

Fix.

Hands grab at me, hands claw at me. I’m once more held in place.

My father appears and he’s suddenly in front of me, his head shaking like he’s trying to stop something. Like he wants to protect me. But my family don’t protect me. My family hurt.

“Don’t,” He says to Xavier. “There’s no need for this…”

“I can do what I like,” Xavier snaps back. “Besides, she doesn’t need it, and it’ll be a nice little thing to send to him.Maybe it’ll speed things up because I for one, am sick of waiting…”

“Xavier,”

My father is pushed out of the way, held out of the way.

My mouth is wrenched open. My jaw feels like it’s pulled apart.

The doctor stares deep into the crevice of my throat and I don’t know what he expects to find there. What secrets he thinks I have locked up.

Metal latches onto my tongue. It yanks and it yanks and I can’t get it free.

Then something slashes. Something cuts.

Pain erupts, blood pours hot from the source. Filling my mouth, filling my throat, pouring down my chin like a river. I gurgle, I choke. I throw up as my blood flows and flows.

It’s unfathomable, unbearable. I writhe and I flail, while my body curls into itself like I’ve been set on fire. Like someone has poured petrol over all of me and then lit a match.

And that high pitch scream moves. It no longer rings out around me but it is in me. In my head.

I can’t breathe.

I CAN’T FUCKING BREATHE.

My hands claw. I’m fighting out of pure instinct and the doctor is there, pushing something in, something hard and plastic and nasty. He forces it down my throat, forces it into my airway.

Three weeks. Three tortuous weeks.

There’s been no sign, nothing beyond that awful tape. I know they’re waiting for me to just do what they want, but I also know if I do it, I still won’t get her back. The Esau don’t work like that, they don’t behave like that. And the fact that Brynn is an Asher, no, they’ll never willingly hand her over. If I want her, I have to find her.

And that feels near impossible.

I clench my fists, letting out a snarl, and it’s only by pure luck that the noise doesn’t carry.

I’m in the Cathedral, surrounded. Far below I can see my brother performing another damned ritual.

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