Page 31 of Wicked Vows (Cursed Darkness (DarkHallow Academy) #1)

Lysithea

I stalk through the snow-dusted courtyard, my boots crunching on the thin layer of ice.

I don’t look back. I don’t have to. I can feel them.

A three-headed monster nipping at my heels.

Death siren. The words echo in the space where Jenson’s memory lives.

It’s a raw, open wound, and Verik just poured salt in it.

The Scar on my back is a burning fire. It’s a leash, and they’re all holding a piece of it. I reach my hallway, the silence a heavy, suffocating blanket. My hand trembles as I push open my door. I want to slam it in their faces, lock it, ward it, scream until the stone cracks.

But what’s the point?

Verik can make a door wherever he wants. They’re a part of me now. An infection I can’t cure. I walk into my room and turn, my back hitting the far wall. A cornered animal. My sanctuary is now my cage.

They file in after me, filling the small space with their oppressive presence. Dathan closes the door with a soft click that sounds like a cell door locking. Evren holds the grimoire, its single, malevolent eye staring at me.

“We need a plan,” Verik says, breaking the silence. His voice is flat, all business now that he’s had his fun.

“Here’s a plan,” I say, my voice a low, dangerous tremor. “You get the fuck out, and I wait for this book to kill me in peace.”

“Not happening,” Dathan states in a tone that suggests the end of the conversation.

I growl softly and turn from them. Why did I let them do this to me? Why am I not turning their brains to liquid right now? I hate them at the same time as I need them, and it is fucking with my mind in ways that even Clara the bitch couldn’t.

Maybe Verik is right. Maybe the brand is making me feel this way, maybe it’s keeping them safe from me and me from them. It’s the only thing that makes sense.

Suddenly, I turn around and start to sing. It’s an old lullaby that one of the girls at the workhouse used to sing while she scrubbed her hands raw. I used to think it was so pretty, my whole being longing to sing it with her. Except I was in the magic branks, silent and soulless.

Verik’s eyes widen. Dathan’s breath catches. Evren remains his usual stoic self.

Nothing happens to them.

“Why aren’t you bleeding?” I scream at them and sing louder, trying to hurt them, trying to punish them.

The notes tear from my throat, a weapon honed by years of pain. The air in the room vibrates, thick with a killing tune. The orchids on my windowsill explode into dust. The mirror over my desk cracks. The windows rattle dangerously.

They don’t even flinch.

The Scar on my back ignites, a roaring inferno. My power, my rage, my scream—it’s not hitting them. It’s flowing into them. The brand is a conductor, turning my most lethal weapon into a shared source of strength.

My voice cracks, faltering into a choked sob. The silence rushes in, a crushing weight.

Verik was right.

The bond saves them.

I can’t hurt them. The one thing that protected me, the one power that made me untouchable, is now useless against the very monsters I want to destroy, but it’s more than that. It’s making me not want to hurt them.

“Ah!” I cry out as the brand punishes me, flaring up with the heat of hellfire that lances across my back.

I collapse to the floor, tears streaming down my face.

Verik and Dathan lunge to help me, but it’s Evren who reaches me first. He slings the grimoire on the bed before he gently scoops me up in his arms and cradles me, carrying me to the bed.

He sets me down and crouches to remove my shoes.

The brand sizzles on my skin, making me feel nauseous.

Evren reaches for the zip on my dress and tugs it down.

I sit motionless as he helps me out of it, and for the second time today, I’m half naked in front of Dathan.

But there is no sexual tension in the room.

Only worry that I can feel pinging in their power spikes.

Evren gestures for me to lie down on my stomach, and I do, turning my face away from them as Evren places his freezing hands on my back.

I let out a loud moan that cracks a corner of the window, but I don’t care. DarkHallow will heal itself. I am a lost cause.

Evren’s hands are a blessing and a curse.

The cold is a battlefield on my skin, ice waging a slow, deliberate war on hellfire.

The relief is so profound it’s a different kind of agony.

Tears leak from my eyes, soaking the pillow beneath my cheek, even as my pussy goes damp at the feel of his touch. It’s humiliating. It’s defeat.

I can feel them watching. I am their pet project. A broken thing they are determined to rebuild in their own image.

“It protects us,” Verik’s voice is low, a statement of fact, not triumph. “And it protects you. We are all killers, Lysithea. It’s our nature. It’s in our blood. Without this, we are alone, lonely and cast out in cages of our own making. Don’t see this as a fault. See it as a strength.”

“Don’t,” I choke out. I don’t want his logic. I turn my head, my cheek pressing into the cool cotton of my pillow. “Get out.”

“We’re not leaving you,” Dathan says, and the finality in his tone is a cage door slamming shut. Evren’s hand remains on my back, a constant, chilling anchor. He doesn’t move. He won’t leave. They’ve taken my voice. They’ve taken my sanctuary. What the fuck is left?

For a long moment, we remain in total silence. No one moves. Even my sobs are quiet. Then Evren moves his hand, gliding it over the brand, over every millimetre of it, soothing it, soothing me. It feels like heaven and hell all at once.

When his fingers brush over the side of my breast, I stop breathing. Did he do that on purpose, or was it simply an accident?

It doesn’t matter. It felt good, and that is something that sickens me to my core.

I shouldn’t be letting these men touch me.

These men shouldn’t be making me feel good when they do.

I let out another moan, this one tortured and filled with such longing.

Evren’s hand stills on my flesh. I turn over, staring into his eyes as I show him parts of me that should be kept under wraps, but practically begging him to touch me.

After the experience with Dathan in the garden, I’ve turned into a needy creature, seeking comfort even from the men I despise the most.

His ice-blue eyes are a frozen lake, and I’m drowning under the surface.

I want him to break the ice. I want him to pull me under.

My nipples are hard, my breath a ragged thing in my throat.

This is not me. This is a creature they created, a needy, pathetic thing that craves the touch of her captors.

He doesn’t move. His gaze drops from my eyes to my mouth, then lower. But there’s no lust there. Only a profound sadness. He reaches for the edge of the duvet. He pulls it over me, covering me with a slow, deliberate motion. He tucks it under my chin like I’m a child. A fragile, broken doll.

The rejection is colder than his touch. Humiliation burns through me, hot and acidic.

“Well, that’s one way to kill the mood,” Verik mutters from the corner.

“He’s not wrong.” Dathan’s voice is a low rumble. “This isn’t about fucking you, Thea. It’s about keeping you in one piece.”

“I don’t need you to keep me in one piece,” I spit, the words muffled by the duvet.

The grimoire on the bed beside me flips a page, a dry, whispering sound. The single eye swivels, fixing on me. A new line of blood-red text appears.

Test failed. Now she burns.

The scream that thunders through the room, ripped from my soul as the brand ignites into a white-hot inferno, smashes the windows before oblivion drags me under.