Page 47 of Escaping Hallow Hill Academy
And that, I know, is a fate worse than death.
Chapter Twelve
“Finally, you’re back. I swear, your dog has been whining nonstop since you left, and—what’s wrong?”
I ignore Kira’s onslaught of words as I step into the room. All I want to do is drop face first onto the bed and sleep for an eternity.
“What are you wearing?”
I’ve barely looked at myself since Sialen untied me, but at her disgusted tone, I look down. A paper hospital sheet covers my body and beneath it, I’m bare.
“Oh, did you have a checkup? I had my examination yesterday,” she whispers. It clicks then that she wasn’t there when I woke. She was being tormented and she doesn’t seem nearly as fazed by it as I am. “It’s my third time. I’m usually treated well if I don’t go dragon crazy, but they say it’s for my protection and everyone around me. My mom used to say the same thing. That’s why she brought me here. It’s for my own good.”
She’s so fucking optimistic, it makes me crazy.
I can’t deal with her right now. I can’t deal with her annoying happy voice or the way it rakes down my nerves as she talks so calmly about something that shouldn’t be calm at all! The sharp sound of it is like metal clinking against glass. It reminds me too much of that stupid fucking room.
“Kira!” I snap. “Stop!”
Because I can’t stand to hear her chatter in that brainwashed way that everyone else does. She has no idea that the medical examinations aren’t examinations at all, but experimentations. That I was just cut through like a Christmas fucking turkey while she talks a thousand words a minute.
“Ouch, rude. I’m just trying to help.”
I take a step towards my bed. Styx is lying on it in his wolf form, staring at me with wide, worried eyes. My omega knows something is incredibly wrong. He can likely smell the dried blood on me, see it in my eyes.
I slip on top of the sheets, and he presses his furry body next to mine. My fingers grip into the roots of coarse fur, and I feel the prickling pain of tears behind my eyes that I refuse to let fall. I bury my face into my pillow and work on steadying my breathing, but it seems impossible.
I was fucking tortured.
How do you get back from that?
I like to think of myself as strong. I want to think that nothing and no one can break me, so it’s hard to admit that for a moment there, it felt like I would break. Like Dr. Hyde knew it, too.
“Em?”
I ignore Kira’s prodding until eventually she slips away into the silence. I’m grateful for it, but wary at the same time.
“They need me for a follow-up examination this afternoon,” she says quietly, and I hate that she’s going back willingly.
I want to scream and pull her beneath the safety of the blankets with me.
But I don’t. I don’t say a fucking word.
It isn’t until I hear the door click open and shut that I register my own harsh breathing.
The bed at my side dips, and I don’t need to open my eyes to know that it’s Rue.
“Ma chère,” he whispers in his thick, romantic accent. “You have been gone for so long. I could feel your pain. What happened?” His eyes burn over my body. “Ah,” he says, as if realization has hit him. Probably the hospital gown gave it away. “Who did this to you, ma chère?” His voice takes on a deathly tone to it that sends shivers down my spine.
“Hyde,” I reply. No one told me to keep it a secret. Why would I? The bastard sliced and diced me, practically.
The wounds may have healed, but the hurt’s still there. The violation of what they did to me is still there.
A stillness settles over the room that’s worrisome, and then Styx emits a sharp whine that has me looking up at Rue.
I’ve never seen him look so deadly before. For a moment, I can tell he’s an Ancient One. I even feel his emotions inside me. Searching for death, demanding it as fiercely as my Holy Lady of Darkness does. For a moment, I am reminded of the Reaper of Sekar legends. A shadowy figure, a spectral being that comes for retribution among the dying, cruel souls. Unlike Styx, who guides souls into the afterlife, the Reaper condemns the living to death.
That’s who Rue looks like. I see a flash of Sekar legends within him. In the cruelty of his bleeding eyes and the demanding tone seeking both revenge and justice. In this terrible world, those are one and the same, after all.
