Page 37 of Darkness Consuming
Chapter Nineteen
The Plan
Violence
The following morning, I close my door on the three men I’m harboring in my room. My boots echo with determination. The plan circles my mind, twirling faster with every quick beat of my pounding heart.
Amandria’s whispers echo around me long before I ever enter the laboratory room.
“I just think it’s dangerous,” Jeriko says with a shake of his head.
The moment I enter, silence follows. Amandria passes me one of her sweetest smiles as she closes my father’s journal with a casual flick of her thin fingers. She’s been obsessing over that thing lately. At first, I thought it was an act to impress the King, but now I’m not so sure. She’s … suspicious.
“Good morning, Sister.” Her tone drips with honey. I return her pleasantries with a small scowl before taking my seat just near the drawer that I knows reverses the effects of my father’s sedatives. “I hope your friends slept well.”
I cock a brow at her statement but I know better than to feed the monster that is my sister’s curiosity.
“Tell me, which of them are you risking all of this for? Who’s the lucky guy who’s stolen my sister’s little, black heart?” Her chipper words make her eyes shine brighter. Too much interest and too much enthusiasm is in her tone.
The smallest of smiles tip my lips.
“All of them.” I say it simply and I say it assuredly, and I say it entirely just to confuse and piss her off. Her little mind is naive and sees the world in black and white.
Nothing about love is black and white, though.
Her blonde locks sway as she tilts her head up to look at Jeriko.
“All of them?” The thin line between her brows etches deep just like our fathers.
In a way, Amandria is just like our father. Deep down, beneath the pretty smile and the pretty dresses, lies a power that’s identical to our father’s. Someday, she’ll rule our people with that dangerous power. I just hope it doesn’t eat away at her mind the way it did the Mad King.
“What would three men possibly see in a mentally unstable train wreck like you?”
I don’t give the silence a moment to settle after her cruel words. I speak my mind immediately.
“Probably more than just the beautiful but controlling narcissist that Jeriko sees in you.” My even tone makes her lips curl with outrage.
“I am more than just an appearance. I am the most powerful woman in all of Fallen!” She says the city name as if it’s something she herself has conquered.
“Is that true?” I arch a brow at her before turning my attention to her boyfriend. “Is she the most powerful woman in the kingdom, Jeriko?” All those times he pushed me and I pushed back are probably flashing through his little tiny mind.
My sister’s big eyes spotlight him as the seconds tick by and he can’t seem to speak fast enough.
“Uh—” That spectacular statement is all he manages before my father saves him.
“Good morning, my children.” He wafts through the room as if he’s made of the air itself. “I hope you slept well, Violence.” His eyes gleam at me as he starts to pull the sedation from a pocket on his coat. He holds the vial against the counter with the smooth end of his arm as his hand starts the fill the syringe.
My throat becomes dry. If everything goes smoothly today, we will have saved a kingdom. If it goes terrible, we’ll die.
“Your power is the strongest I’ve seen yet. Even when it’s contained, it’s brimming. I can only imagine what you’d be like unleashed.” My father takes a step closer to me as Jeriko locks the straps firmly into place against my wrists. The leather bites into my skin. I don’t fight any of it for a single second and it’s hard for me not to jerk away from them.
The needle sinks in my flesh and I don’t flinch away from the feel of it. I simply hold his manic gaze as my father pushes every ounce of the cold liquid into my veins.
The needle is pulled away, and as the effects start to fall across my drowsy mind, he speaks.
“Someday soon you’ll be retrieving the most powerful souls from the depths of the underworld.” His disgusting words begin to fade away but I hear him clearly when he says, “I’ll be cleaning your room today too. I’ve been told there’s an abundance of trash in there.”
Amandria’s pleased smirk stretches across her beautiful features as her fingers interlock with Jeriko’s. The gleam in his eyes sparkles against the dark scar that glints across his face. There’s a look of hunger in his gaze.
Dangerous hunger.
