Chapter 34
OLLY
"Run again, little monster, but if you fail to escape us, you have to submit your body to us, and let us use you like the slut you are, no more fighting back.
I fucking dark dare you." His voice slithers over my bare skin, with the threat of his cruel smile.
How can something so beautiful be so evil and depraved?
I can see it in his features and body language; he wants to hurt me.
A deep, cold dread grips me, making me feel exposed and fragile, yet exhaustion threatens to drag me down.
Every inch of my body is begging for a reprieve, just a moment to recover from everything I've been put through tonight, but I know that could lead to my death.
You don't lie down for the monsters without being prepared to be consumed.
I dart in the opposite direction from the other two, still hearing them fight like demented gorillas, and attempt to evade Damon.
His threat that he's going to use my body for his pleasure both terrifies me, and causes a dark coiling sensation low in my core.
I'm starting to wonder if I might have hit my head harder than I thought, because a part of me doesn't necessarily find the prospect of that happening as repulsive as I should.
"That's my girl! Run, unhinged princess, run!
Make sure you give me a good chase," he taunts me before darting after me.
Tears fall down my face like a cold river, as I zip around another tree, no longer hearing the sound of the other two.
My blood is whooshing in my ears, and my harsh panting breath puffs out before me.
I don't feel my legs anymore, only the vicious burn, and the frantic slap of wet leaves against my skin, as I tear through the forest. Bare, cruel branches whip at my arms, ribs, and face, leaving behind a sharp sting.
The cold keeps biting into me, like it wants a piece too, like the night itself is hungry, and I'm meant to be everyone's meal.
My breath shudders, breaks, and reforms into something ragged and desperate.
I don't dare look back. I can hear Damon moving through the underbrush with a sinuous, predatory grace, and he's getting closer and closer.
He doesn't crash through branches like a normal person, nor shout threats like Cross, or call my name with a forced calm like River.
No, Damon stalks, gliding silently like a creature of the night.
His deranged laughter echoes with insanity, making his approach even more terrifying, as if the darkness itself is alive and hunting me.
The forest pushes me forward, roots tangling my bare feet, threatening to take me down, frigid mud caking my skin, and shadows concealing all the lurking danger.
My vision flickers at the edges, warning me that my body wants to shut down, and I'll be trapped here at Damon's mercy if it does.
I push harder, my lungs burning like they're splitting open, and I swear I can taste blood inside my mouth.
I burst through a wall of thick branches, and suddenly the ground almost vanishes beneath me.
A shriek leaves my lips, as I realize my mistake nearly too late.
I skid to a halt at a jagged cliff edge, my toes hanging over open air, and an abyss twenty feet or more below, yawning like a hungry maw.
My stomach drops with despair, and terror, at where I've ended up. Fuck, fuck, fuck.
A cliff, a fucking high one. Jesus fuck, I could have died just now.
A fierce wind roars up from below, cold and furious, as if it wants to swallow me whole.
The dwindling night is beginning to vanish, and with it go my hopes of escaping this mess.
I stagger backward, heart hammering against my ribs, as if it's begging to flee before I do.
"No, fuck," I whisper, as even my vocal cords abandon me.
I grasp onto a skinny tree trunk, barely hanging on to the ground itself, and use it to center myself before I go tripping over.
Then I hear him, a slow exhale behind me, too close, as the hair on my arms stands on end, but not from the cold wind.
I turn slightly, pebbles and loose ground under the blistered soles of my feet, and there's Damon emerging from the treeline like he's being born from the shadows themselves.
His sinister smile is the first thing I see.
Stretching. Unsettling. Delighted. Victorious.
It's filled with too many white, sharp teeth in the diminishing light.
"Little monster," he whispers, head tilting, pupils wide and wild.
"You shouldn't have run this far, naughty girl. "
I back up instinctively until my heels touch nothing but open air.
The drop cascades behind me, waiting to swallow me whole, and my grip on the tree tightens, until my numb fingers feel a burst of pain.
My voice, filled with desperation, barely leaves my throat as panic threatens to drown me. "Stay back!"
Damon steps forward, ignoring my demand.
It's just one step, but it's enough to cage me between him and the abyss.
For a brief nanosecond, I debate which one will hurt me more, the drop or him.
My heart beats erratically in my chest, as he simply studies me as if I were a desperate animal, displaying my last movements before a trap springs harshly shut on me.
His expression fractures, fearlessly calm one second, twitching with frenetic excitement the next.
"You hear it?" He murmurs. "The woods go quiet for you.
" He presses a finger to his temple, tapping lightly.
"The dark knows when prey's cornered. It's hungry, so hungry, little monster, and you're its favorite kind of meal. "
"Yes, she looks so beautifully hopeless.
Perhaps I'll let you have a taste after I'm done with her," Damon utters to the emptiness at his side, and that terrifies me even more.
Who the hell is he talking to? My pulse pounds in my neck as I scan the edges of the tree line, and the rocks that have me cornered.
There's no path out or down, and no way around him unless I fight him off, and in my current condition, I can't do that and win.
Fuck, I'm trapped and doomed, and yet a fire is burning within me, rejecting that this is the end for me, that I've lost.
The night sky is beginning to lighten further, bleeding color like someone dragging a brush through murky water, and my heart clenches in my chest. The darkness thins from inky-black to bruised violet, before a seam of gold tears open along the horizon.
It glows so fiercely it looks molten, a line of pure light forcing its way through the last scraps of night.
Smudges of amber and rose, each one touched as if by fire, their edges coral, peach.
A breath of lavender greets me, and I realize that I would have never made it out, despite my attempts.
It was all for nothing. I've lost this sick game of chase with these assholes.
The question now running through my panicked brain is, will I now lose my life as well?
What do they have in store for me next, and will I be able to endure it with my mind and soul intact?
Damon must notice the moment of realization flickering across my features, reflecting my inner thoughts.
His sadistic eyes narrow, and the corner of his mouth lifts in a condescending smirk.
"You're so lovely in your despair. Is your heart crumbling, little monster?
" His teeth snarl as he swipes at the air around him, as if something was touching him, and he was fighting against it.
Jesus fuck, this guy is certifiable. What small hope I was still clinging to is fleeting, and it's exiting me faster than the little body heat I'm retaining.
"There it is," he says softly, almost tenderly, as his gaze meets mine, and I see the madness within him reflected back at me.
"The moment you understand. There's nowhere left to run, you belong to me, to us, to Mayhem. "
I feel the void behind me, and the monster in front of me, and my terror spikes so sharply it feels like someone plunges an icicle through my chest. I reach to grip the air behind me, as if it might suddenly turn into a ledge, offering me a way out, but nothing meets my grasp except the realization that I've lost. My knees want to collapse, and my throat tightens, until breathing feels optional, because he's right, there is nowhere left, no shadows to disappear into, or thickets to crawl through.
There is no more darkness to hide inside; all that's left now is the cliff, the drop, and him.
"Don't touch her! She's mine, you don't get to play first," he growls at nothing, his teeth white against his already pale complexion. I'm not sure if I should ignore his madness, or attempt to push him over the edge. Which one will serve me better? Which choice allows me to continue breathing?
"Why? Just tell me why? I don't even know you. Why do this to me?" My voice trembles as I meet his molten gaze, filled with vibrant ambers, greens, and browns, as he stares at me with anticipation and victory across his features.
He cocks his head as if he's listening to someone else speak, and for a moment I don't think he'll answer me.
"Your defiance and resilience are a drug, one so pure and addicting that there was never going to be a way to ignore you.
Everything about you, every particle, was made for us, as if you were molded into our every need and desire, even the ones none of us would have dreamed of. "