Twenty-Nine
Twenty-Nine
HER
By the time morning comes, I’m all cried out. I have no more emotions left inside of me, but I’ve had time to think. To process what has happened.
And now I know three things.
One, Varius is not a zombie. Zombies don’t breathe. They don’t mumble in their sleep, and their wounds don’t heal overnight. So he’s something else. I would think he is a hybrid, but hybrids are infertile. So he has to be a monster Sau adopted from the Plane of Monsters or something. A creature that looks human that she decided to keep and raise as her own.
Two, I don’t want anything to do with Varius fucking Shadow anymore. He tortured me. Then he raped me. And perhaps it wasn’t violent, perhaps it wasn’t cruel, but it was a violation of my trust. I asked him to stop, begged him to because I wasn’t ready to be touched by the man who’d hurt me. I told him he was breaking us… and he did not care.
And three, I can’t leave him. My father won’t care what Varius is. He could be an actual slug, and Stefaan would still force me to honor the marriage contract drawn up between us due to all the perks it gives him. The connections. The money. The fucking prestige he has always been after. But even if he was willing to hide me, even if he cared about my happiness, I can’t go to him. Can’t go to anyone because I absolutely believe Varius’ words when he said he would kill anyone who helped hide me.
So I am stuck with him in this life.
But that doesn’t mean I have to be stuck with him in all the others.
I took his blood into me again last night. And he took more of mine. The bond has strengthened considerably, and I know if I just look inside it, I can feel all the love he has for me. The guilt over what he’s done. The stuff he doesn’t know how to say or show. Parts of it flickered into my fitful, sleepless dreams. But I don’t want to look.
I don’t want to forgive him.
I don’t want to fix this anymore.
So here I am, sitting in the quiet of his room, with my back to the wall and the knife I used to stab him hanging loose in my hands. I cut away the front of my skirt and look down at my pussy. It smells of him, and I breathe that scent in, use it to give me the anger, the fuel for what I’m about to do.
Lowering the knife in my hands, I trace its tip along the tattoo on my pussy. Property of Varius Shadow
But he does not own me anymore. He might be able to force me to his bed and force me into being his bride, but I am no longer his.
So I breathe in deep and pick up the dildo I pulled out of the drawer. I put it in between my teeth, clenching it tight in preparation for the pain. My nostrils flare as my hand shakes, so I keep breathing until it calms. Until it steadies.
Once it does, I start cutting off the layers of skin that mark me as his.
Taking my power back, making myself mine again.
Tears burn my eyes as the agony rips through me. My teeth sink into the bright pink silicone, stopping at the rigid core inside it. Grunting, I force the knife to keep going, to keep peeling his name off me even as the pain builds.
Property of is gone.
Then Varius
Then fucking Shadow
Dropping my head back against the wall, I pant heavily as I close my eyes. I remove the dildo from between my teeth with a shaky hand. Then I grope for the healing wand that I took from the ensuite and point it at the bleeding patch of missing skin.
“Iactus,” I mutter, breathing out harshly as the white light soothes the pain on my pussy. If only it could fix the shit inside.
I swallow hard as I sit here without his name on me. I feel both heavier and lighter at the same time. Happier and sadder. But less broken. I’m taking back the strength he took from me. I’m making it so no one else can hurt me but me. My own body. My own heart. Nothing about me is his any longer.
Now comes the second part of my plan – a part I’m not entirely sure will work. I don’t want to die, don’t want to leave Dayne all on his own, knowing the spiral he will fall into in my absence, but nor can I live like this. Knowing that death will not relieve me from Varius’ shackles. So I flick off the tattooed piece of skin still stuck to the knife and then lift the blade to my wrist.
Once a blood bond is started, it must be paid for in one way or another.
We shared a lot of blood last night – way more than the few drops needed for the ritual to be sated. So maybe I have already paid most of the blood due. But...
I have also lost a lot between the fighting and the torture and Varius feeding from me. If it needs more than I have…
I shift the knife in my grip.
The blade skims across my skin, leaving goosebumps in its wake.
I don’t want to die.
But I don’t want to live like this either.
So I take a deep breath and close my eyes.
Then I slide the knife quickly across my skin.