Chapter 30
The university hallway stretched before me like a gauntlet, each step forward a small victory against the voice in my head that begged me to run back to the safety of Covenant House.
My palm was slick with sweat where Luce gripped it, her fingers intertwined with mine as if she could physically anchor me to reality.
On my other side, Cole walked with casual vigilance, his mismatched eyes constantly scanning our surroundings while pretending not to.
"You're doing great," Luce whispered, squeezing my hand as we approached the door to our first lecture.
"Just breathe, okay?" I nodded, not trusting my voice.
The corridor seemed both too crowded and too exposed.
Every face turned in my direction felt like an accusation, every whisper a judgment.
I knew what they were thinking: there goes the girl who was kidnapped, the damaged Consort, the victim.
My stomach churned at the thought. I hated that word.
Victim. As if everything I was could be reduced to what had been done to me.
"Ready?" Cole asked, his hand hovering near the small of my back, careful not to touch without permission. I'd been jumpy about unexpected contact since it happened.
"As I'll ever be," I managed, forcing my chin up as Cole pushed open the door.
The lecture hall fell silent as we entered, dozens of eyes swivelling toward us. I froze, my fight-or-flight response screaming at me to turn and run. But then Professor Harrington looked up from his notes and offered a warm smile.
"Miss Turner, welcome back. We've saved you a seat at the back, as requested.
" A collective exhale seemed to ripple through the room, and conversations resumed, albeit more subdued than before.
Luce guided me toward the back row, where three seats waited near the exit.
As we walked, a few students nodded or smiled encouragingly.
Melody, sitting with a group of Courts girls, gave me a small wave.
Hannah, I noticed, was conspicuously absent.
"See? Not so bad," Luce murmured as we settled into our seats. Cole took the aisle position, his body angled slightly to block anyone approaching from that direction.
I tried to focus on Professor Harrington's lecture on Romantic poetry, but my mind kept drifting.
Every movement in my peripheral vision made me tense.
Every time the door opened, my heart stuttered painfully in my chest. Cole noticed, his hand finding mine under the table when Keats's words about beauty and suffering blurred before my eyes.
"It's okay," he whispered. "I'm here. We can leave whenever you want." I shook my head, gripping his hand like a lifeline.
"I'm staying." The words came out stronger than I felt.
By the time our third class ended before lunch, I had settled into an uneasy rhythm.
The whispers still followed me, but they seemed less malicious than I'd feared.
Most people were either supportive or simply left me alone, unsure how to act around me.
I understood their awkwardness; what exactly was the appropriate thing to say to the girl who'd been kidnapped and tortured for weeks?
"Lunch?" Luce asked as we exited our Victorian Literature seminar. "Dining hall or the quad?"
"Dining hall," I said, surprising myself with the decision. "I can't hide forever." Cole's phone buzzed, and he checked the screen.
"Ryder's already there, saved us seats." The thought of Ryder waiting for me, his blue eyes watchful and protective, sent a complicated warmth through me.
Since my return, he'd been a constant, unwavering presence, the first to notice when I was overwhelmed, the last to leave my side when nightmares dragged me screaming from sleep.
Walking into the dining hall was harder than the lectures had been.
The space was more open, more crowded, more chaotic.
Conversations didn't pause as noticeably, but I felt the weight of attention like a physical thing, pressing down on my shoulders, making each step heavier than the last. Ryder spotted us immediately, rising from his seat at our usual table and making his way toward us with that fluid grace that still made my heart skip despite everything.
His eyes never left mine as he approached, a small smile playing at the corner of his mouth.
"Poison," he said softly, the nickname no longer the mocking taunt it had once been, but something gentle, almost reverent. "How was class?"
"Survivable," I answered honestly. He nodded, understanding the weight behind that simple word.
"Come on, I've got food waiting for you. Rosa would kill me if I let you skip lunch."
“Rosa already made me food,” I protested, holding up the bag she had given me.
“Yeah, but I got loaded fries, and they are so much more yummy,” he said with a wink that made me smile a little.
Our table was already half-full, and Megan sat with her Regent, Lucas, their heads bent close in conversation.
Silvia and Matthew were there too, along with Max, who sat closer to Luce than strictly necessary.
A collection of our housemen rounded out the group, creating a buffer between us and the rest of the dining hall.
As I settled between Ryder and Cole, I scanned the room automatically, a habit I couldn't seem to break.
My eyes landed on Hannah, sitting alone at a small table near the window, picking at her food without eating.
The sight of her isolation tugged at something in me.
"What happened with Hannah?" I asked, keeping my voice low. Matthew followed my gaze, his expression hardening slightly.
"After what happened at Christmas, she was expelled as the Archive Consort.
They didn't formally kick her out of the university, too much paperwork, too many questions, but she's basically a pariah now.
" I frowned, remembering what I'd been told about Hannah's role in my abduction.
She had planted the threatening notes, sent the fake texts from my phone after I disappeared, all under duress and blackmail from David Marshall, the Archive Regent who had attacked me at Halloween and helped orchestrate my kidnapping.
The same David who was now dead, killed by Ryder during his interrogation.
"That seems harsh," I said, surprising myself with the sentiment. "She was being blackmailed and manipulated." Ryder's hand tightened on his fork.
"She still helped him, Cade. She knew what he was planning, at least some of it."
"I know, but..." I trailed off, unable to articulate why I felt a strange kinship with the disgraced Consort.
Perhaps it was seeing another girl used as a pawn in the Regents' games, another victim of the Trivium's twisted power structure.
Or maybe it was simply that I understood what it meant to be manipulated by fear.
Megan, who had been listening silently, offered me a small smile.
"For what it's worth, I agree with you. Hannah made mistakes, but David was the real monster."
The conversation shifted to lighter topics, upcoming assignments, campus gossip, and plans for the half-term break.
I let the normalcy of it wash over me, a balm for my frayed nerves.
I even managed a few bites of the sandwich Rosa had packed, accompanied by fries loaded with chili and cheese, though my appetite remained elusive.
"I need the bathroom," I said eventually, the pressure in my bladder becoming uncomfortable.
"I'll come with you," Luce offered immediately, already rising from her seat. Ryder and Cole exchanged a look I pretended not to notice. I knew they had positioned housemen throughout campus, keeping watch over me from a distance. Their protectiveness was both comforting and stifling.
"We'll be right back," I promised, managing a small smile for their benefit.
The nearest bathroom was just down the hall from the dining area, a short walk that still left me feeling exposed.
Luce chatted about nothing in particular as we walked, her casual tone belying the vigilance in her eyes.
My steps faltered when we reached the bathroom door.
Through the partially open entrance, I could hear laughter, female voices that seemed to cut off abruptly as we approached.
Luce's hand found mine, squeezing gently.
"We can find another bathroom," she suggested quietly. I shook my head.
"No. I'm not going to let anyone chase me out of a public restroom.
" Taking a deep breath, I pushed the door open.
Julia stood by the sinks with three girls I didn't recognise, their makeup bags spread across the counter.
They all turned to look as we entered, Julia's face twisting into a smirk that made my stomach clench.
"Well, well," she drawled, leaning against the counter with exaggerated casualness. "Look who's finally rejoined the land of the living."
"Ignore her," Luce muttered, tugging me toward the stalls. I kept my head high, refusing to give Julia the satisfaction of seeing me retreat. But as I passed, she called out,
"Hey, Turner, do you sign autographs? I've got a pen if you need one." I froze, confusion momentarily overriding my caution.
"What the fuck are you talking about?" Luce's grip on my arm tightened.
"Cade, don't. Let's just go." But Julia was already reaching for her phone, her smile turning cruel.
"I just didn't have you pegged for adult entertainment, that's all. But judging from the view counts, there are plenty of people who appreciate your... performance." My blood ran cold.
"What performance?"
"Cade," Luce's voice was urgent now, tugging more insistently. "We need to leave. Now." Julia's fingers danced across her phone screen.
"I mean, shabby slutty victim chic isn't really my cup of tea, but clearly there's an audience for it."
Before Luce could pull me away, Julia turned her phone around, and my world collapsed.
There I was on the screen, dirty and naked, my face contorted in pain as a man raped me from behind.
The sound was off, but I didn't need to hear it.
I remembered every word, every slap, every moment of degradation: every scream and every word as I begged them to stop.
My lungs seized, refusing to draw breath as I stared at my own violation playing out on a tiny screen in a university bathroom.
"No," I whispered, the word barely audible even to my own ears. "No, no, no..." Julia's laughter seemed to come from very far away.
"Look at her face! Oh my god, she didn't even know. How pathetic is that?"
The bathroom tilted around me, the fluorescent lights suddenly too bright, too harsh. I couldn't look away from the screen, from the horror of my most private suffering exposed for the world to see. My legs gave way, and I sank to my knees on the cold tile floor.
"You worthless damaged whore," Julia's voice cut through the roaring in my ears. "Everyone's seen it now. Everyone knows what you really are, just a piece of meat that got what it deserved."
Time fractured. I was in the bathroom and I was back in that cell, cold and terrified, Damien's hands on my skin, his voice in my ear telling me no one would ever want me again, that I was ruined, broken, worthless as he continued to damage me further, as he passed me onto some other monster.
Tears streamed down my face, but I made no sound; my throat closed with horror.
Then a different voice shattered the moment, Megan's voice, raw with fury:
"You fucking bitch!" A blur of motion as Megan lunged past me, slamming into Julia with enough force to send them both crashing against the bathroom counter.
Julia's phone clattered to the floor, sliding under the sinks, but the video continued playing, the sound coming on, and now my own screams were now audible and tinny in the chaos.
"I'll fucking kill you," Megan was screaming, her fists connecting with Julia's face, her arms, anywhere she could reach. Julia's friends scattered, shrieking in alarm.
"Someone get Ryder!" Luce shouted, her arms wrapping around me as I collapsed fully, curling into myself on the bathroom floor. "Now!"
The sounds of the fight seemed distant beneath the roaring in my ears, beneath the terrible sounds still coming from the phone, my pleading, their laughter, the rhythmic slapping of flesh on flesh.
I pressed my hands over my ears, but it did nothing to block out the memory of those sounds, the feeling of their hands, the smell of them, the taste of blood in my mouth.
"It's not real, it's not happening now, you're safe," Luce was saying, her words a desperate litany against my ear.
"Cade, please, look at me. You're at Regents.
You're safe. He can't hurt you anymore." But he could.
He was. Every person who watched that video was Damien, violating me all over again.
The thought that strangers had seen me like that, had watched my torture, my humiliation, my dehumanisation for their entertainment, was unbearable. I retched, bile burning my throat.
The bathroom door crashed open, and suddenly Ryder was there, his face white with rage as he took in the scene, Megan and Julia still grappling on the floor, Luce holding me as I fell apart, the damning sound of the video still playing from somewhere beneath the sinks.
"Get that fucking phone," he snarled at one of the housemen who had followed him in. I saw a foot come down on the phone, silencing my screams. Then Ryder was kneeling beside me, his hands hovering inches from my skin, afraid to touch, to trigger me further.
"Poison," he said, his voice breaking on the word. "Cade, look at me. Please." I couldn't. I couldn't look at anyone, couldn't bear to see the pity, the disgust, the knowledge in their eyes. Everyone would know now. Everyone would have seen what had been done to me, what I had been reduced to.
I closed my eyes, tears seeping from beneath my lashes to pool on the floor.
But even in darkness, I couldn't escape the images burned into my memory, my own face contorted in pain, my body used and discarded, my humanity reduced to nothing more than flesh to be violated.
Damien had won. He wasn't just in my nightmares anymore.
He was everywhere, in every glance, every whisper, every phone and computer screen.
And there was nothing I could do to take back what he had stolen from me.
Nothing I could do to make myself whole again.