Epilogue
“No! Mother, please! Mother, help me!” I bellow, struggling in the arms that drag me backwards towards the onyx entrance. “Mother, please!”
She watches me dispassionately, her bright eyes as cold as her heart. There is no familial bond or love there, even as her daughter is thrown into hell. “Mother, please believe me!”
She turns, her dress coiling round her like a snake, and walks away, leaving me to my death.
“Mother.” I sag in the arms that are holding me, my bare heels digging into the rock as we plunge into darkness.
My last sight is of my mother’s retreating back.
The betrayal lies thick on my tongue, and I feel sick to my core, but as the darkness conceals the rest of the world from me, reality sets in.
If I don’t escape, I’ll die, so even as my heart breaks, shattering in my chest, I force strength through my skinny body.
“Let me go, I’m innocent!” I roar as I twist in their arms, trying to free myself.
They just laugh as they continue dragging me.
“I am. I was framed. Please, let me go. I have money—”
“Your mother has money, You have nothing. Don’t you see, girl? No one can save you now.”
Fear pounds through me and sweat slicks my body as a cold chill makes me shudder.
Their leering eyes lock on me. “We could have our fun with her before we toss her in. She won’t survive an hour in there. It would be a waste.”
Their meaning is clear, and my eyes widen as fire burns away inside me.
“No!” I wrench my arms from them and begin to run.
Their laughter chases after me as sharp black stones cut into the soles of my feet.
My blood makes me slip, and my chest heaves from fear as my tattered dress catches on the rocks surrounding us.
The darkness consumes me as I plunge deeper into the earth, searching for a way out.
I don’t understand their amusement until it’s too late, my arms windmilling in the air as I try to stop my descent as I gape in horror. The rock ends abruptly into an opening that stretches as far as the eye can see. I ran exactly where they wanted me to.
Despair and desperation fill me as I stare at the darkness, knowing what awaits me down there. I’d rather die up here than go below.
I turn, my heels hanging over the edge of the jagged rock, and hold up my arms to ward off the leering men coming for me, their faces contorted with lust and greed.
“Please,” I whine.
“She begs so sweetly. It won’t save you though.” One chuckles, and I glance at the black hole behind me, knowing what lies in wait deep in the earth.
Hell, or as close to it as you get in this world.
I have been sentenced.
I have been abandoned.
I have been marked for death, and not even the fury filling me from the betrayal can stop this.