Chapter 12 #2
Arlo glares. “Haven’t you worked out what she is?
Yes…yes, of course you have—you knew straight away, didn’t you.
Come on, John—your pack, it wasn’t personal; it was business.
I had no intention of hurting them. Things happened beyond my control.
” The hellhound slams another knife into the demon’s chest. I pull my knees to my own chest.
My God, where are they all coming from?
After finding the shifter pup locked in that room…
I don’t know the details of what happened to John’s mum and sisters.
I don’t want to know. I have enough nightmares.
But that moment in the hospital, when the demon revelled in their deaths in delighted, whispered words, I knew, without a doubt, that he was responsible.
Even with that knowledge, I still can’t watch another creature suffer.
I can’t. It’s not in me to sit and watch someone be hurt. Not after having suffered the same fate of being subject to John’s ministrations.
With determination, I place my palms on the floor, ready to roll onto my knees so I can stand, but a firm hand pushes me back down.
“Emma, no. This has been a long time coming.” I flinch as the demon screams. “Do not interfere, don’t you dare get up,” Eleanor says.
“You used me,” I whisper. My voice is hoarse from my tears.
“While you pretended to guard me, you were in here making a demon circle, in his home. Weren’t you?
” I shake my head in disbelief. I throw my arms up in frustration.
“I don’t know how Arlo let this happen. It was never about guarding me; it was always about gaining access.
How could you do this, why would you do this?
I can’t watch this. I have to help him.” I attempt to rise again and she pushes me forcibly back down.
“You will do no such thing. He was going to sell you. If we hadn’t interfered, one of those men would have bought you.”
“No—”
“Yes. Don’t be such a silly little girl. This is how the world works.” Eleanor’s hand returns to my shoulder in warning, and her fingers dig in. “What do you think you could do? Against John?” She shakes me.
“I could get the guards—”
“What guards? The entire estate is crawling with hellhounds. Wake up, Emma. The demon’s rule has ended. You need to pick a side. The right side. The demon would have let you die. John saved you.”
I knock her hand away from my shoulder. “John hurt me,” I shout.
At that declaration, Eleanor shakes her head with disgust. She looks away and blatantly ignores me.
“Please, don’t let the hellhound do this, Eleanor.
” I beg, “Please make him stop, please make him stop. I don’t want to be here to watch this, please?
” The demon screams, and without my permission, my eyes flick back to Arlo. I look.
The floor of the circle is now awash with blood. No-no-no. I shake my head and press the back of my hand to my mouth in an attempt to stop the frightened keening noise as it spills from my lips.
Each time the hellhound uses his knife, my own skin burns.
Oh, God. I don’t want to be a witness to this.
Traumatised flashes of my time in the basement superimpose themselves over what is happening to Arlo.
I rock from side to side and hug my knees.
I could have kept pretending that what John did to me wasn’t as bad as my memories.
That it was embellished by pain and trauma.
Seeing this happen with my own eyes without my shock and pain to shield me, there is no burying the truth. John is a ruthless monster.
At the sight of all that blood, part of the innocence that I was doing my best to cling on to—dissipates.
After all the challenges I’ve had in my life, it comes down to the bare-bone facts. The demon has sheltered me. I heard things…I heard about the horrible things the demon had done. But before I rode out that morning on Pudding, I still thought the world was fair.
I never wanted to see the bad. I wanted to see the light.
The beauty.
I wanted the bad things to fly above me, completely over my head, unrecognised in the bright bubble of my life. I wanted to be untouched, untainted.
On purpose, I misinterpreted intentions and situations. I didn’t want to see it. I didn’t want to see the horrors of what people are capable of. Especially when I could do nothing to help. Powerless.
I held a silly, fixed black-and-white view where I trained myself to see only the good. To see evil and recognise it around me…I didn’t want to. I thought it would break me.
Then I met a frightened shifter pup.
After I looked into those green eyes…to ignore the terrible things and to not acknowledge them, it made me culpable. It made me accountable.
I patted myself on the back for doing the right thing in helping her…when I should have been doing the right thing on countless other occasions.
It is my shame that I didn’t act sooner.
Bad things do not stop if you don’t see them or when you stop watching or stop listening to the whispered truth. They are still there, even when you deny their existence and put your metaphysical fingers in your ears.
I’m a hypocrite.
You don’t need power to do the right thing. No, doing the right thing gives you power.
I struggle again to stand, and Eleanor mercilessly holds me in place.
I watch as the hellhound turns Arlo into pieces of bloody meat, destroying the once-proud demon. As I watch, I remember my pain and my fear at the hands of this man.
I cry.
I cry for the demon who nefariously sheltered me.
I cry for my own inadequacies—my uselessness.
And I cry because deep down inside I know…I know John is right and I hate him for it.
It takes a monster to destroy a monster.
When it is over, all I can hear is the steady drip-drip-drip of blood. The rough breathing of the hellhound and my own twisted, beating heart. The girl I once was has died, but by God she was clinging on. Clinging on to foolish hope. But in this world full of monsters?
There is no hope here.