Page 40 of Blood Court (Cursed Darkness #2)

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

LYSITHEA

I feel it the second Evren pulls away. It rips through the Soul Scar like lightning.

A cold void opens where his connection used to be.

It’s a physical pain. It’s a hollowing out.

An amputation of the soul. My magic recoils, searching for the familiar, steady presence of his ice and finding nothing but a wall.

I knew he would be the first to do it. Not because he doesn’t care, but because it’s still close for him.

The loneliness, the silence, it’s easier for him to retreat.

My first instinct is to scream his name. To use my voice to find him, to call him back from whatever cold, lonely place he’s withdrawn to. But that’s the truth. The Court needs the lie.

I stop walking, planting my feet on the stone path of the Nightmare Gardens. The pulsating flora around me dims, sensing the sudden chill. I have to do the same. I have to become the girl who survived the orphanage. The girl who never needed anyone because there was no one around that I could need.

That girl is still inside me. Buried deep. But she’s there.

I close my eyes and reach for her. I remember the gnawing hunger.

The cold stone floors. The silence that was my only friend.

I remember the absolute certainty that I was alone in the world and that no one was coming to save me.

I had only my voice, a weapon I didn’t understand, and the shadows that clung to me like a second skin.

The lie takes root.

It’s a bitter, familiar poison. My magic shifts.

The warmth that has grown in my core since knowing them recedes, replaced by a cold, hard knot of pure survival.

The shadows around my feet stop being an extension of me and become tools again.

Weapons. My song retreats deep into my chest, no longer a part of my breath but a thing to be unleashed.

The garden feels hostile now. The whisper-lilies mock me. The ancient, black-leafed tree where we just fucked feels like a monument to a life I no longer live.

This is who I have to be. The Nox Siren. A living artefact. A weapon. Not a girl who loves three monsters.

I open my eyes. The world looks sharper. Colder. The lie is a perfect, seamless armour.

I don’t need them. I don’t need anyone.

I turn my back on the garden and walk towards my room. I want to crawl into my bed, curl up and block out the world. My steps are steady. My room is a sanctuary. A fortress.

I peel off my dress and underwear. The cum from the guys, a sticky reminder of a truth I now have to deny, makes my skin crawl. I stand under the spray of the shower, the water scalding hot, trying to wash them off me. To wash the memory of their touch away. It doesn’t work.

I step out of the shower and dry off, crawling into bed and pulling the covers over my head. The rest of my lectures can wait. Dinner can wait. All I need is sleep and the chance to forget what it is like to be worshipped by three monsters.

Sleep doesn’t come. The silence in my head is a scream. I lie there, a statue, trying to remember what it felt like to be this alone. I can’t. The memory is a ghost, and the truth of it is a brand on my soul.

I curl into a ball, my nails digging into my palms, but then I sit up.

The lie requires action. It demands proof.

I swing my legs out of bed, my feet hitting the plush carpet.

I forage around in my drawers for my combat training joggers and oversized tee.

I pull them on and bunch my hair into a messy bun. I need to hit something. Hard.

I make my way quietly and quickly to the Blood Pit. I push the door open and see Professor Starscream beating the crap out of a dummy. He punches it so hard that the head flies off, and he grunts in satisfaction before he turns around to see me loitering in the doorway.

“Miss Lysithea,” he growls. “It’s late.”

“I know. I didn’t expect to find you here, but seeing as you are, can you spar with me?”

He raises an eyebrow and then lets out a short bark of a laugh. “I can’t spar with you, I’d knock your head off like I did with this dummy. What is it you’re really after?”

I chew my lip, shifting my feet awkwardly. “Something to hit.”

He laughs again. “Now we’re talking, girl.” He gestures for me to move over to him. He strides over to pick up the dummy’s head and slams it back into place, giving it a quick blast of magic to fix it properly.

“Right then,” he says, stepping back and gesturing to the dummy. “Have at it.”

I face the enchanted sack. It’s just leather and stuffing, but in my head, I see the smug face of the Court’s snake. I see Aeliana’s cold smile. I see the empty spaces beside me where my monsters should be.

My fist connects with a crack that echoes in the pit. My knuckles scream as they connect with the hardened leather. The dummy barely rocks on its stand.

“Again,” Starscream orders. “Put your whole body into it. Hips. Shoulder. Drive through the target.”

I try again. This time, I pivot, putting my weight behind the blow. The dummy sways. It’s not enough. The pain in my hand is a welcome distraction, a sharp, clean feeling that cuts through the mess in my head.

“You’re holding back,” he observes, his voice a low growl. “You’re afraid of the pain. Use it.”

He’s right. I’m afraid of what will happen if I let go. If I let the cold, lonely girl take over completely.

I hit it again. And again. My knuckles split, blood smearing across the dummy’s face. Each impact is a word in the lie I’m telling myself.

I.

Punch.

Am.

Punch.

Alone.

I stop, panting as I glare at the dummy. “Teach me to knock its fucking head off,” I growl at the professor.

“You sure you’re ready for that?”

I meet his amused gaze. “I’m ready.”

Starscream grins, a terrifying display of sharpened teeth. “Good.” He circles me, his critical gaze cataloguing my stance, my form. “You’re all arm. No power. The strength comes from the ground up. Feet, hips, core, shoulder, then your fist. A kinetic chain. A whip.”

He demonstrates, his own body a fluid explosion of controlled violence. His fist blurs, connecting with the dummy with a sound like a thunderclap. The dummy’s head doesn’t just fly off; it disintegrates into stuffing and dust.

“Like that,” he says, completely deadpan, retrieving the exploded head and fixing it with magic again.

He repositions me. Adjusts my feet. Puts a hand on my lower back. “Twist from here.”

I do as he says. I plant my feet, twist my hips, and let the motion travel up my body. My fist connects. The dummy rocks violently, groaning on its stand. Pain lances up my arm, but it’s a good pain. A real pain.

“Again,” he barks.

I do it again. And again. Each punch is a memory. Clara’s sneer. The empty ache of my stomach in the orphanage. The silence. The cold. The utter certainty that I was nothing. Evren’s withdrawal. The lie solidifies, becoming a second skin of ice and rage.

“Harder!”

I grunt, a raw, voiceless sound of pure fury, and kick out, the sole of my foot flat against the dummy’s chest. It wobbles and I kick it again, and again until it hits the ground with a thud.

I move forward and loom over it, kicking and punching it until sweat streams down my face, until my hands are broken and bruised.

I stamp on the fucking thing’s head until it’s nothing but a mangled mess.

“Okay, I think you killed it,” Starscream observes.

“Too bad it wasn’t alive in the first place,” I growl.

Starscream nudges the ruined dummy with his boot. A slow, appreciative grin spreads across his face, showing off far too many teeth. “Not bad, Siren. You’ve got a mean streak. Use it.”

I just nod, too breathless to speak. My knuckles are a mess of raw, split skin. The pain is a roaring fire, a welcome inferno that burns away the cold ache in my chest. The lie feels realer now, cemented with every brutal impact.

“Go get that cleaned up,” he says, already turning his back on me to magically repair the dummy again. He’s dismissed me. The lesson is over.

I walk out of the Blood Pit without another word, my hands throbbing as they start to heal themselves. The lie is a heavy cloak around my shoulders. It doesn’t feel warm. It feels like lead.

The corridors of DarkHallow are silent. The gargoyles watch me pass, their stone faces impassive.

The loneliness I’ve been running from my entire life is now my greatest weapon.

I just have to learn how to wield it without it killing me first. I reach my room and don’t bother with the lights.

I just fall onto the bed, the pain in my hands the only thing that feels real. The only thing I’ll let myself feel.

Tears well up in my eyes, and I squeeze them shut. I curl up and drag the covers over me. They still smell of the guys, and it makes me choke. I wonder what they’re doing without me. I want to go to them, but I can’t. This is for the greater good. And that’s really all that matters.