Chapter 15 #2
I giggle, my buzz turning into full-blown drunkenness.
“I think we both know what she wants, my friend. And no, I’m fine.
I’m gonna walk home. I could use some fresh air.
” A year ago, with Draven, Aries, and Bones as my enemies, I never would have walked home by myself.
But now, the scariest thing in Ever Graves lives in my head. Wherever I am, so is the danger.
We motion for the check and scramble to wrench it away from the other. Lettie succeeds, slapping her heavy black card into Duff’s palm before I can whip out my cash.
She winks. “Bones would kill me if I ever let you pay.”
“Lettie! I have money too, you know. Let me treat you sometimes, please.” I lick the rim of my shot glass and debate getting one more for the road.
“Never. You’re familia. Which means, technically, my papa is the one paying.
” She giggles as she signs the credit card receipt.
Anyone else would’ve sounded like a spoiled asshole, but Lettie is the sweetest girl on the planet.
She’s a fucking saint. Admitting that her father pays all her credit card bills just makes her even more endearing.
She’s Edgar Crane’s only daughter, so, of course, she’s going to be his little princess.
I give her a big hug and relish the cookies-and-cream scent that wafts from her silky black hair. “Love you. Text me when you get home safe.”
My curiosity gets the better of me, and I linger at the door for a hot second.
I watch as Lettie struts over to her ex-girlfriend with an extra swagger in her step.
I can see the fireworks from here. Good for her.
I hope she gets laid tonight. That girl deserves to let loose more.
I, on the other hand, need to try and sleep by myself tonight.
After I swipe another vial of poison from Aries, that is.
I zip up my leather jacket and step out onto the blustery street.
The moon is full and bright, so I decide to take a shortcut.
The path from town to my estate is well-marked and doesn’t veer too far into the woods.
Not like the route Draven took me on earlier.
I don’t think I could ever find my way back to that creepy cabin on my own.
And I definitely don’t want to either. The energy was so dark; it took me well into my third margarita to shake it.
The only thing about this shortcut, though, is that it takes me past the Wishing Tree. As much as I loathe that spot, I’m drawn to it. I marked it with my blood, and now my oath binds me to it forever.
I turn on my phone light and shine it on the ground.
It’s not as well-lit as I thought it would be.
The last thing I need is to trip and fall out here.
Lettie knows I’m walking, but she doesn’t know what route I took, and the signal out here is terrible.
This whole town seems to have more dead spots for Wi-Fi than it does spots where it works.
Come closer.
Fuck. No. “Go away!” I yell into the empty space in front of me. As I near the Wishing Tree, the hissing gets louder.
Dark one! He screams in my head.
My knees buckle, and I stumble forward. My head is pounding, throbbing from the tequila and his voice. It hurts so fucking much.
His hold on my mind is as strong as his hold on my body. And this fucking tree. I shouldn’t have come back here tonight. He knows when I’m alone. He knows that no one is meeting me out here. And so he strikes like a snake in the grass, rattling and hissing as his energy slithers up my leg.
It happens faster than I can fathom.
The vines of the tree snap out and wind around my wrists. I fall back, no, I’m yanked back. My phone flies out of my hand and lands in the dirt. More thorny vines twist around my waist, then my ankles, and lastly my thighs. I’m pinned to the trunk. Fuck.
“Help! Hello? Can anyone hear me?” I call out. The sound of my own voice in the silence sends a shiver up my spine. Deep down, I know there’s nothing, no one, out here but wolves and owls and… him.
I try not to panic, but when the dark threatens to consume you, swallow you, it’s suffocating. Debilitating. I feel reckless. Chaotic. Unhinged. Like a poisonous flower in full bloom, I’m dark matter, a black hole.
Mine. Mine. Mine.
This isn’t right. He’s vengeful. Twisted. He has become decay and rot as a result of the existence of decaying, rotting things around him.
I’m drunker than I thought. Nothing is making sense in my own head. Fuck. “Help. Someone, please, help!”
But help is a seed, like an idea, a precious thing. And yet those who plant them may not be so gentle.
He’s talking in riddles again. “Shut the fuck up, and let me go!” The harder I try to wriggle free from the vines, the tighter they wind around my limbs.
This tree has become my curse. My death. These branches are like corpses, bony like skeletons. And yet the dark is kinder than the light sometimes, hiding the true nature of things, protecting us from what we grieve. I grieve. For a past I never had. For a life I never will have.
My thoughts are racing.
Shhh…
He is in deep. So dark… So cold.
Fuck. Here comes the craving. The thirst. It can’t be quenched. Ever. Only subdued and delayed for brief stints with that fucking poison. He’s like candy and arsenic and blood. Sharp and sweet. Cloying. Repulsive.
Skelker.
Its bones are my bones. Its blood is my blood. Flesh of my flesh.
He slaps me hard, inciting the needy cunt between my legs. My face whips to the side, my cheek stinging as my pre cum trickles out. He’s starving and I’m depraved. The lust between us… It is deranged. It is inside me.
Skelker.
He has many names and limbs and voices. But for me, he reveals his resinous eyes, knotted veins, ashen skull, and smooth antlers, pierced appendages, and devil’s bindings. He reveals himself. Finally.
“Mia,” he utters against my ear, his breath ice-cold.
My teeth chatter. “S-stop. I can’t do this again. P-please.”