Page 209 of Claimed By Fangs and Darkness

I drifted into the soil beneath my childhood home, the inhospitable womb, the empty eyes. I remembered how my small hands had reached for comfort and were met with nothing at all.

At some point, the beating stopped. I was small and yielding in Aster’s arms.

I clung to him as he carried me to a small empty room—a hollowed out cleaner’s closet, windowless, no furniture save for one cushion.

My ass stung. I buried my head into Aster’s shirt as the ghost of my mother’s voice whispered familiar cruelties in my ear.

Aster kissed my head and then set me down on the cushion. He slapped my hands when I refused to let go.

Humiliation and confusion blended together. My vision was blurry with tears as I watched Aster and Conrad leave the room, slam the door shut, and twist the lock.

It was stupid and childish, but I still ran to the door, screaming for them not to leave me in here as I yanked on the knob to no avail.

I didn’t know who or what I was in this moment. A raging fire inside me had been stifled, scalding embers doused with cold water. I’d been extinguished in the peak of my rage.

I was half-aware that my traumas had been used against me but that didn’t curb the method’s effectiveness.

Pathetic,my mother whispered when I lay on the hard floor, head against the cushion.

She was right. Nothing I did was good enough here. It all led to the same result.

Curling into the fetal position didn’t help the feeling of walls closing in. I hadn’t been this trapped since I lived in that farmhouse in the hills.

By his design.

Andhers.

I shivered, tear-stricken, sore, and hungry.

I will not break. I will not break. I will not break.

I hadn’t understoodwhen they’d first put me in this room that they’d planned on leaving me in here for days.

Or at least, I thought it had been days. I’d been fed and provided water five times. And each occasion, it had felt like an entire day had passed since the last time hands had quickly placed water and food just inside the door, quickly closing it back before I could reach them.

Those quick hands were the only stimulation I’d received, save for the five times a pillowcase had been shoved over my head, and I’d been allowed to use a bathroom. Someone could’ve been watching me relieve myself, and I wouldn’t have known. I existed within the stuffy fabric head covering until I was safely back in my cage. All I knew was the shove of hands, the low snickers, the way my bladder had been stretched so far to its limit that I feared it might rupture.

Or that I’d piss myself while lying on the cold floor.

I was being treated like a war criminal.

Iwasa war criminal.

Which was why it shouldn’t have been surprising that Conrad was the one to finally unlock the door and step inside.

I’d been rocking for hours, staring at the wall, half-hallucinating. Sometimes I saw a mirror. Sometimes I punched that mirror until my knuckles bled.

Conrad’s nose twisted.

“Oh, do I smell?” I hissed. I stopped rocking. My eye twitched. “That must be hard for you.”

My voice was gravelly. I may have been screaming on and off, for about an hour at a time. I was surprised I still had any voice left.

Conrad stared at my hand which was crusted with blood. “Looks like you still have some reflection to do. I’ll return when you no longer greet me with this nasty, unbecoming attitude.”

He turned.

“No,please.” I scrambled to my feet. I would do anything to be free of this room. “I’m sorry,” I forced out. “I’m sorry. Please don’t go.”