Page 54 of Wings of Lies (Daughter of the Seven Circles #1)

His words should’ve broken me. Instead, they fueled my bitter hatred toward him.

No matter what I did, he never gave me any love or warmth.

If I turned back time to when I was seven, when I still hoped I’d receive my father’s affection, then I’d be a crying heap on the floor.

But ever since he hit me, an untethered seed of hate grew with each encounter.

The fact that he wanted to punish my mom for creating and loving me made me realize I was capable of deep loathing.

The air around me deadened. My ears popped, and my mom’s hands erupted in the same white light.

“Over my dead body.” She stood, acting as a barrier between me and him.

“There will only be one dead body at the end of this. And darling, it won’t be yours unless you’re found guilty again.

” My father threw a white ball of flame at her face.

She dodged it, realizing too late it was a distraction.

Blurring behind her, he grasped her hair and yanked her to the ground right before slamming her head against the floorboards, knocking her out cold .

Rage burned through me. How dare he. Tasting copper, I let my cheeks go and clenched my teeth instead, glaring up at his face as I sat on the ground.

I hated him. From the tops of his buzzed blond hair all the way to his pristine white shoes.

My soul cried out for revenge to make him hurt as much as he made us hurt.

The seed of hate blossomed into something tangible.

An itch I never felt before scattered across my hands, and a coldness invaded my mind.

“What do you have to say for yourself?” My father pointed to my mom like I caused her unconsciousness.

And what do we have here?

I jerked. “What?” Not sure where that voice came from.

My father’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t make me repeat myself!”

Not out there. I’m in here. It felt like a frozen finger dragged down the inner workings of my head as the male spoke.

In my mind? I asked, shuddering.

Yes. What’s your name? he asked.

Lucille. Who are you?

My head ripped to the side as my father smacked me, causing me to miss the male’s words.

“I told you I would not repeat myself!”

Tears stung my eyes, and the seed grew further. My anger made my skin itch more severely, and a crackling noise started.

He will regret that. The angry voice matched the pulsing rage in my blood.

Slowly returning my gaze to the gray eyes of my nightmares, I glared. “You can’t blame me for your sins.”

I shouldn’t have said that. My father was pure, an angel of renown who did no evil and brought justice to the worlds.

Sin was reserved for the weaker, the lesser, for demons.

Never him. Or so I was told. I knew saying the word would tip him over the edge, but I was so angry I wanted him to suffer. To prove him wrong.

The hand came faster and harder than last, sending my head into the floorboards. Dots pixelated my vision, only to disperse to a hand filled with white flame. My mind dropped to even colder temperatures, making my body shiver.

Touch him. Now. A cold fury seeped out of each syllable. The stranger’s rage was a welcome companion, watching and wanting what I did.

Revenge.

So, when he told me to touch my father, I grabbed ahold of his glaring white leather shoes and screamed.

I screamed for all the words he spoke to me about how worthless I was, how I was a mistake he never wanted. I screamed for each bruise I received from his hands, for each puckered scar on my back. I screamed for all the mistreatment my loving mom received. And I screamed from the pain.

The freezing temperatures in my mind were a different kind of agony. One I wasn’t in control of. The penetrating cold had to come from the stranger, but as much as I wanted it to stop, I suffered through it for the satisfaction of what came next.

Snapping my hands back, I glanced up to see an expression I’d never witnessed. My father’s gray eyes widened in shock, completely encased in ice.

It’s temporary. It won’t hold him for long. You need to leave. The chill in my mind no longer hurt. Instead, it was a soft snowstorm that raised goosebumps on my flesh.

I can’t go—my mom. I thought, scrambling on my hands and knees around my father’s frozen figure .

Then hurry, he said with no bite to his words, only urgency.

I placed my hands on my mom’s shoulder and shook her gently. “Mom. Mom. Wake up!” My head swiveled back to the frozen statue, noticing a white light shining through. No, no, no.

Hurry! he yelled.

“Mom!” We were running out of time. The ice dripped down into a puddle. We couldn’t be here when he freed himself. If he smacked me only because of words, I couldn’t imagine what would happen after my attack.

My hands shook harder, rolling her limp body across the hardwood like a rolling pin. “Mom!” I begged.

Leave her. She’ll survive, he said. But I could hear the grains of regret putting doubt in my mind.

I felt stabbing icicles and gasped. “What are you doing?” I said.

Leave her! The sliver of regret I heard earlier vanished. It reminded me of my father and how he spoke, expecting everyone to hang from his every word and do anything he asked.

I ground my teeth together. I won’t leave her.

The stranger didn’t understand. My mom was all I had.

She held me when my first dog ran away, calmed my nerves on my first day of school with humans, listened to every story I came home with, wearing a smile on her face, and guided and soothed me when bullies tried to mock my strange eyes.

She read to me every night, and on special nights, we had hot chocolate.

She was my teacher, my rock, and the kindest person I’d ever met, except when she taught me hand-to-hand fighting, which I sucked at.

But my mom was always there, calming my emotions and Glory with her soft touches.

I would never leave her because she never left me .

The gnashing of teeth echoed through my thoughts. How old are you?

Eleven. Today, I turned Eleven and hated every second of it.

He said a harsh word I couldn’t understand. Fine. We do this the hard way. He paused, thinking. Grab the heaviest pot on your table and smash it into the back of that despicable angel’s head the moment the ice melts.

I started at his words. What?

There is no room for questioning. You have already made your bed. It’s time to grow up and lie in it. Now, make that angel bleed.

He was right. But that didn’t make it any easier.

I tried to hold onto my anger as I grabbed the cast iron skillet filled with cold potatoes.

The pan required two hands. Feet slapping into the wet puddle, I stood behind my ice-encased father.

Parts of him remained iced over, while others were thoroughly soaked.

The white of his clothing hung close to his muscular frame.

Potatoes slopped onto my sparkly flats and into the water as I raised the skillet.

Winding back, I waited. Drip by drip, my father thawed. Each drip made me flinch.

I couldn’t do this.

He hurt you first, he said.

But… The doubt continued to seep in. My wrists shook with the weight of the iron.

Hovering over his neck, sweat forming with my increasing heart rate, the last of the ice melted.

And it might’ve worked. Maybe we could’ve left with no one the wiser, but the moment the glistening sheen fell away to soppy clothing, I hesitated.

In that moment, I truly realized the value of my mom’s lesson on hesitation .

His movements blurred. My body slammed into the pans and plates of food on the table.

A broken plate cut through my dress and into my back, staining my no longer pure white dress with blood.

Black and white spots dotted my vision from the force of my head hitting the pot.

My father used one hand to pin both of my wrists down.

He moved so fast I didn’t even notice the large white feather gripped in his hand coming for my arm.

Its needlepoint was dipped in black, like a quill, and as if my arm was the missing parchment, he stabbed it into my skin, dragging it up and down.

“You will never have access to your powers again, and once the Council of Righteousness is through with you, I’ll not only be rewarded, but I’ll never have to see your sinful face again.”

Shrieking from the hot agony, I tried to squirm out of his hold. But I didn’t stand a chance.

He sawed at my skin with his feather, warming my mind and taking my energy.

Fury that didn’t belong to me erupted without its piercing cold. I will take pleasure in seeing him burn in hell for his sins. Mark my words, child, his days are numbered. The stranger’s voice weakened the more my father carved.

I will find you again, my sweet Lucille. And maybe by then, we’ll both have an explanation. The last of his words faded.

A deafening bang echoed through the air. My father fell to the floor, taking his angelic feather with him.

“Lucy? Lucy?”

I gazed into her glossy eyes, now green, tears mirroring mine. “Mom?”

“Oh, heavenly. My sweet girl.” She hugged me and pulled back. “We need to leave.” My mom hauled me off the table and dashed into the bedroom. Tired and dizzy, my legs gave out. I scrambled back from my father’s unconscious body, winced at the pain in my wrist, and looked at the damage.

A bloody Binding Rune cut into my soft flesh, taking away all my powers. I was practically human.

My mom rushed out of her room with two backpacks and a pair of keys.

She hauled me from the floor, shoved calm emotions into my body, and dragged me as quickly as she could through our front door and to our only vehicle.

Not a word was said, not an explanation of where we were going or what had just happened.

She pushed me into the passenger side, buckled me, ran to the driver’s seat, and we left.

Him. The house. Everything we owned.