Page 61 of The Sins That Bleed
“I’d let you lock me up. Imagine me being the psychic? No chance.” It earns me another laugh and I relax a little more, things feeling more like they usually do now that his secret is out.
“I wasn’t going to tell anyone, and then I met Sunny. I think she sussed me out straight away, but she only confronted meyesterday about it. After we talked about the ‘incident,’” he uses air quotes and I chuckle that he’s referring to his kiss and her rejection as the incident, “she spilled the truth and confirmed that I’d been picking up on these things. I was in utter shock, and she left to give me some time to comprehend it all and then, well, you know what happened next.”
Yeah, I watched as the other half of my heart lay at my knees, bleeding and in so much pain. The only thing I could do was offer myself up to her, because a world without Valeska wasn’t a world worth living in.
I needed to get to her.
CHAPTER 26
Withering Soul
VALESKA
There are times throughout my existence that I wish to be human again.
They have no idea how fragile their short little lives are, they have no appreciation for how easily they can end it all, and with so many options at their disposal. Vampires though, we have select few ways our existence can be ended.
The dagger I used to slash my skin could have done it, since the silver blade is imbued with the essence from darkness herself, dragging those it kills straight to hell. I should have plunged the jagged blade into my heart instead of wasting my time slashing at my skin.
I’d been so angry at myself, at the life I have lived and all the things I’ve endured, the things I have done, the hate that burns molten in my rotten soul—it turned into a frenzy. I was riddled with the guilt and blood I have carried on my skin all these years.
I force myself to be present in the moment, to be here with Sunny in support, but my heart is not in it today. After my revelation last night about Rai being her brother, things might not ever be the same between us, but I can do this for her.
We’re sat in the underworld I created, the piece of shit from her nightmares still trussed up and adorned with pins fromwhen I was last down here. He’s been hosed down to wash the vomit, shit, and piss away, to remove the odorous scent he exudes in order for Sunny to be here.
His missing eye is still a weeping open wound, though.
We’d talked at length. I shared everything I knew and everything I’d done to betray her trust. She sat across from me, legs crossed and taking it all in, her face a mask of stone that showed no sign of any emotion. I think that hurt more than if she’d screamed at me.
By the time I told her I had her abuser captive, she’d looked exhausted, unable to take one more surprise from me. She’d sighed heavily, as though she’d lived a thousand lives, and I guess that’s what trauma does to you. You drag it along as it continuous to change you so thoroughly, that your DNA feels like it’s unpicked and woven back together in a different way. Creating gaps, bumps, and fraying threads, over and over again throughout your existence. I can see she’s so tired, just like me.
Like so many on this earth from the hands of others.
I watch as she faces her démon head-on, taking her time to inflict all the pain she felt back on him tenfold. I’m proud of her, not for what she’s doing to him—this isn’t her first time—but how she’s carrying herself while doing it. Belittling him, striking him in the most unlikely places with the different tools on offer.
Right now, she’s torching his body hair off and laughing. I really hope this will set her free.
After I’d confessed about holding him down here, after it had sunken in, her only reply to everything I’d spilled in that space between us was that she wanted to be the one to hurt him. I gladly offered him up and she asked me to be there while she did it.
It’s the least I can do for her.
I know this doesn’t make up for not telling her about Rai, how he’d been right there all along for her to reach out and hold.Now she has a choice to make; tell him, or lead him to believe she was dead, actually dead, not this version we occupy.
What would be worse to him? Finding out your sister died, or that she lived, died, and then came back as something other, as a vampire?
I don’t envy her choice, but I will respect her request to not tell him yet, not until she knows what she wants to do. I promised her that I wouldn’t. It’s not my secret to tell anymore, which only adds to my guilt, that I’ve forced her into this position where nobody wins.
I watch as she singes off the last of his hair, but I’m not really paying attention, my mind playing a carousel of nightmares from every bad situation I’ve been in, to the bad decisions I’ve made throughout my time on this wretched earth.
Ibithim.
I recall the burst of hot blood on my tongue, the cinnamon notes dancing on my tastebuds and making me want to take all of it. The way he held me to him and I had to fight myself to not drain him dry.
I feel a tear slip free and I wipe it away because I don’t deserve to be upset right now. All this mess is because of me; I have no right to be sad when I’ve always known what a monster I am. I never expected to have people who cared about me despite it, people I’ve now let down and hurt.
I think of Rai, hoping he’s not in too much pain, and that Sunny told Nico everything he needed to know about making him feel better after losing that much blood. Mon âme, the tether between us stretched thin and if my heart were beating, it would be in time with his.
A soul-tie.
