Page 136 of Degradation

He sounds like him. He sounds like my monster.

He smells like him too, moves like him… no. This is a trick. It has to be.

He takes my hand and traces my fingertips over his face. It is him, it is, only, there are deep scars now where before there were none. Did Magnus do that? Did he get punished for what he did? Surely if anyone else knew, he’d have been locked in Oblivion. He’d have been executed. So what the fuck is he doing here?

I’m still strapped to this table. To this metal grid. And there are still prods attached to me, ready to electrocute the hell out of me and fry my very soul.

I don’t know what I imagined. I don’t know who I thought was doing all of this, but I would never have believed it was him.

“Wha, why are you…?” My voice falters as I realise, he’s the one who’s been torturing me. Hurting me. Inflicting all of this on me.

What the fuck is this?

He moves quickly to undo the bindings and as much as I want to jump off this contraption, as much as I try, my legs give way and I crumple to the floor, landing at his feet.

“No need to worship me so soon.” He murmurs as he bends down to my level.

I raise my hand, slapping at his face so hard it stings my palm.

He doesn’t react, he just stays where he is as though he didn’t even feel it. So, I do it again. I slap him harder. I slap him across one cheek and then the other.

“Paitlyn…” He murmurs, as if he has a right to speak my name, as if he has a right to say anything to me right now.

“Bastard.” I spit. “You absolute piece of shit.”

I curl my fist up, swinging wildly, slamming it into his jaw and that seems to snap him out of whatever stupor he’s in.

He grabs my wrists, hauling me up by them, and then he drops me back onto the table in a sitting position.

“Stop.” He says.

Only, I can’t stop. I can’t. He broke me. Devin fucking Blake. After everything I have been through, everything I have damn well suffered for this man, how is it he was the one inflicting all this pain?

“You bastard.” I scream again.

He grabs my shoulders, shaking me so hard. “Shut up, shut up and listen.” He says quickly.

“To what, to your excuses, to your lies…”

“I thought it was you. I thought you did it. That you orchestrated it.” Devin growls. “You had my blade remember?”

“I thought it was you.” I scream back. “I thought that’s what you meant when you said you were getting me out. That you were ending this.”

He draws in a breath that could almost be described as ragged, only nothing rattles Devin, nothing affects him.

“You had nothing to do with it?” He asks, as if he need me to say those words out loud.

“I hated him, I wanted him dead.” I won’t deny that, why should I? “But I didn’t do it.”

“If you didn’t do it, then who did?” Devin says, only he doesn’t sound accusing now, he sounds puzzled, like he’s balls deep in some fascinating mystery that he needs to solve.

I turn my head, taking in the room, if anyone else is in here, I can’t sense it, I can’t hear it.

“Where the fuck are we?” I ask as I move to stand again.

Before he can speak the door crashes open. Someone comes storming in.

“What the fuck is this?” The stranger spits.