Chapter 40
Alina
Eight agonizing years had passed since my child was born—eight years of suffocating torment.
Hatred coursed through my veins like acid, eating away at the remnants of joy that once lit up my life with Balthazar.
I despised who I’d become—nothing more than a slave to the needs of a child I could never love.
Each day bled into the next, a relentless cycle of feeding, caring, and pretending—pretending this creature might somehow be my path to redemption.
But no matter how hard I tried, the hollowness inside me never faded.
The days dragged on, heavy with loneliness. I drifted through them, gathering antiques for the shop Jack and I bought when Olivia was two—Life After Life. It kept my hands busy for a while, but eventually, even that couldn’t drown out the whispers in my head.
At first, I tried to hide the misery, but the mask began to slip. The voices came more frequently now, taunting me, hissing that I was pathetic, a failure, and weak.
I feared I was losing my mind. Still, I refused to believe it. I needed to prove I was sane.
Then, one night, I heard voices outside the shop. Or thought I did. I crept down the stairs to the rear of the store, heart thudding, breath shallow.
And then—I gasped.
Balthazar stood at the window, shrouded in moonlight, his black coat gleaming silver at the seams. He looked as I remembered—tall, commanding, his dark hair tousled by the wind, as though the night bowed to him.
Without thinking, I bolted through the door.
I needed to feel him again. Needed his mouth on mine, his arms around me, anchoring me to something real. The air snapped with tension as I closed the space between us, my desperation eclipsing every flicker of fear.
The door slammed shut behind me, and Balthazar turned.
His eyes caught the moonlight, cold, gleaming with something feral. He stepped toward me.
I froze.
“Balthazar—I abandoned you!” I screamed, my voice breaking with my confession. “I won’t deny it. It was the only way to find the daggers. Every moment without you has been a living hell. I sold my soul in pieces to chase the shadows of power. I married a fool just to bleed secrets from his lips.”
My chest heaved. “But none of it mattered. Not compared to you. You are still my King. And I am still—will always be—your Queen.”
His eyes flickered. Calculating. Cold.
I stepped forward and collapsed at his feet, pressing my forehead to his boots, clinging to the hem of his coat like a madwoman begging for mercy. “Please… forgive me. I can’t live another day without you.”
His hand fisted in my hair and yanked me up with brutal force.
Pain lanced through my skull—sharp, delicious, punishing. I moaned.
“You fucking whore,” he snarled, dragging me eye-to-eye. His voice splintered with fury, vibrating with betrayal. “You left me for them. You spread your legs for power. You lusted after the blades, not me.”
“I know, I know,” I gasped, eyes stinging. “My—” I caught myself before the word “lord” slipped free. “My King.”
That broke something in him.
With a snarl, he slammed his hand around my throat, squeezing until my vision blurred. His skin began to rot beneath his rage—maggots oozing from his brow, flesh peeling from his face to reveal raw bone and dripping cartilage.
And it aroused me.
The scent of death. His weight. The agony and hunger.
He crushed his mouth to mine, bruising, claiming, brutal. With a savage tear, he ripped open his trousers, revealing his thick, pulsing cock—hard and furious.
“Is this what you want?” he growled, pressing it against me. “Tell me.”
“Yes,” I breathed, desperate. “Gods, yes. I need it, Balthazar.”
“You don’t deserve it,” he spat, his breath hot on my face, his spit clinging to my lips like punishment.
“Please,” I begged, writhing. “Please, Balthazar. Fuck me. Punish me. Give me what I’ve suffered for. Take me—ruin me.”
With brutal force, Balthazar spun me around.
My skirt was torn away like paper, my panties ripped down with a snarl.
He entered me without pause, pounding like a beast unleashed—relentless, feral, possessed.
One hand shoved my face against the glass, the other clamped around my waist like a vice.
I didn’t cry out. I took it—each savage thrust, each burst of pain and pleasure—because this was him. My King. My monster.
It was raw. Violent. Not love—but something more.
Even in its cruelty, it eclipsed every lifeless encounter I’d endured with Jack. Jack had been lukewarm and predictable. But Balthazar? He was chaos and fire. Hunger incarnate.
Through clenched teeth, I whispered, “Oh, my love… I’m so glad I murdered Scarlett for you.”
He stilled. Eerily silent.
“What did you just say?”
My breath caught. My mind scrambled. Had I said that aloud?
“I... I didn’t say anything,” I lied, pulse racing.
He whirled me around, eyes burning. His hand closed around my throat, tight enough to steal my air. My limbs thrashed, but I was no match for him. Panic surged through me. This wasn’t dominance—it was annihilation.
And then… he changed.
His body convulsed. His skin rippled as bone splintered beneath the surface. Claws erupted from his fingers, curling with menace. Horns pushed through his scalp. His eyes glowed, not with fury, but agony.
He threw his arms to the sky and unleashed a scream that shook the ground beneath us—a sound not meant for human ears.
I collapsed to the floor, breathless and wide-eyed, my limbs shaking as I scrambled backward like a wounded animal.
“What’s happening?” I screamed, my voice raw from sheer terror.
Balthazar clutched his skull, claws sinking into his scalp as another unholy scream ripped through him—louder, more guttural, as if something ancient and furious was trying to claw its way out from inside.
“Stop!” he bellowed, his voice fractured. “Make it stop!”
His body spasmed uncontrollably, each movement jerking like a marionette on broken strings. His eyes—once sharp with cruel precision—now blazed with pure, unfiltered madness.
I stumbled to my feet and then crumpled again to the pavement, chest heaving. And that’s when I saw it.
Just ahead, through the shimmer of streetlamp and shadow, a figure stood at the sidewalk’s edge—motionless, cloaked in darkness. A grin cut across its face, wide and knowing, like it had been watching all along.
Before I could scream, Balthazar vanished in a cloud of thick black smoke, the stench of sulfur and scorched flesh lingering in the air.
I wanted to believe it had all been a nightmare. But the ache between my legs, the bruises on my skin, and the ragged terror in my lungs told me otherwise.
I bolted inside the antique shop, slamming the door shut behind me. The lock clicked into place.
He would come back. He always came back.
But this time, I’d be ready.
Endless arguments with Jack consumed my days.
“You always side with Olivia!” I snapped, throwing my hands up in frustration. “She’s just a child, and already you’re spoiling her rotten.”
Jack didn’t look up from his keyboard in the cramped bedroom office. His voice came out calm, controlled, infuriatingly measured. “She’s our daughter, Alina. We should be on the same side.”
I scoffed. “You never listen. Our marriage is crumbling, and all you care about is her.”
One evening, something in me snapped.
I stood rigid in the living room, arms crossed, jaw clenched. The antique clock on the sideboard ticked like a bomb about to detonate.
“I told you from the beginning—I only agreed to carry Olivia for you. Don’t expect me to become your picture-perfect mother. I never signed up for this grind.”
We’d been locked in this fight for over an hour, but he still didn’t get it.
Jack shot up from the couch, frustration rippling off him. “You have to try, Alina! I’ve been doing everything. I’m fine being her primary caregiver, but God forbid you show her the slightest shred of affection!”
“I am affectionate,” I hissed. “I’m civil. I’m polite.”
“‘Civil and polite’?” His face reddened with rage. “That’s what you give a neighbor, not your daughter. A child needs love, not cold detachment.”
My lip curled. “I’m so sick of your moral high ground. You act like some saint, but you’re just a pathetic excuse for a man. A loser.”
He flinched.
I leaned in, voice venomous. “I should’ve never saved you. Our sex life is laughable—if it even exists—and frankly, everything about you disgusts me.”
He looked like I’d punched the air from his lungs.
The silence that followed was deafening.
My words had been cruel, calculated knives sharpened over years of resentment. But for the first time, I’d spoken them aloud. The bile I’d swallowed day after day had finally erupted.
Jack’s anger dissolved, replaced by something more haunting—disbelief, wounded silence.
He’d once believed I was his savior, who stood by him when the world didn’t. Now, with a few merciless truths, I had demolished that illusion. The fragile bridge between us splintered beneath my confession, collapsing like rot-infested wood.
I braced myself for retaliation. For him to scream, accuse, and throw my cruelty back in my face.
But he didn’t.
He just stood there, ashen, hollow, trembling. His lips parted, but no words came. Pain carved itself across his face, raw and open, like a wound still bleeding. For a fleeting second, guilt cut through my numbness. A pang—sharp and unfamiliar. But it didn’t last.
In the back of my mind, the voices rose again.
Zara’s hiss. The Scholar’s sneer.
They hadn’t appeared in months, but now they screamed, mocking me with threats, promises, and consequences I hadn’t yet dared to face. Their words clung to me like chains, coiling tighter around my heart. I clenched my fists, shaking with rage.
No more.
No more being their puppet. No more submitting to fear cloaked in prophecy. I had done their bidding long enough. I would not be their obedient little pet a second longer.
Jack and I stood in silence, the air between us thick and unmoving—a chasm neither dared to bridge.
Then, finally, he spoke.
His voice was low, hollow. The voice of a man grieving someone who hadn’t died but had simply… disappeared.
“Is that it?”
“Not really.”
I gripped his arms, staring into him with cold, unflinching resolve. “This isn’t working. I don’t want to be married to you anymore. I want a divorce.”
He crumpled, like I’d punched the breath from his lungs.
“I knew things were strained,” he said, blinking, as if trying to stay grounded. “But I never imagined we’d end here.”
Before we could say more, Olivia burst into the room like a beam of sunlight—laughing, bounding, radiating life.
Instantly, I let go of Jack, plastering on a smile. The performance began.
Jack’s expression softened into something real. Mine was a carefully crafted mask.
“Hello, Olivia, darling,” I cooed.
“What’s up, buttercup?” Jack added, bending to her height.
She giggled and threw her arms around him, hopping from foot to foot with manic joy. “Come watch me jump on the trampoline! I can go really high!”
She proved it right then, springing so high her fingertips nearly kissed the low ceiling.
Jack laughed, wide-eyed. “You can go that high?”
“Sure can!” she beamed.
He ruffled her hair affectionately. “I’ll be right there, little monkey. And your mom, too?”
He looked at me, searching for something. Maybe hope. Maybe denial.
I forced another smile. “Of course, kiddo. We’ll both come watch.”
Olivia darted out of the room, leaving us in her wake.
I stood frozen for a moment before exhaling. My mask slipped.
“I’m sorry,” I said quietly. “But I can’t do this anymore.”
Jack turned to me, confused.
“I feel… resentful,” I admitted, the word tasting like ash. “Toward our daughter. I never wanted her. And now I can’t even pretend. I can’t bring myself to play with her. To be near her. It’s like… everything in me pulls away.”
Jack’s face went pale, the confession landing with the gravity of a funeral bell.
His chin trembled, but he didn’t argue. Didn’t plead. Instead, he nodded—slow, solemn.
“I think you’re right,” he said, voice breaking at the edges. “It’s time we stopped pretending this is normal… or that you’re a mother who cares.”
The words hit harder than I expected. For the first time in what felt like years, we agreed.
And it made everything feel even colder.
“Tell Olivia her mom had something urgent to attend to,” I said, my voice as frigid as the snow falling outside.
I reached for my purse, brushing my fingers along the worn fabric of the sofa we once chose together in happier days.
“Where are you going?” Jack asked, his tone hollow, like the question was nothing more than habit. His face was stone, but his eyes dropped to the brown leather bag clutched in my hand.
“To Lee’s,” I replied, opening the clasp.
Inside, my fingers found the spine of my journal—its worn edges, its pages filled with things I’d never dared speak aloud. Just knowing it was there calmed the chaos inside me. I snapped the bag shut.
“I thought Lee was gone,” Jack said, almost to himself.
“He is,” I said coldly. “He’s always gone.”
I turned toward the door, but something made me pause. I glanced back at Jack, at the man I had once saved and tolerated.
“I just need some space,” I muttered. “From you.”
He said nothing.
But his silence said enough.
Unexpected guilt twisted in my chest. Our marriage was a mausoleum now—full of ghosts, echoes, and things too painful to name.
And I wondered, for a moment, was any of this worth it?