Chapter 3
The next several years of my life are full of training, preparing me for the important coursework I will be tested on at Universitás and the trials I need to pass for acceptance.
The training Sully gifted me has transformed me into a confident young lady.
I have definitely come out of my shell during my years with the gentle giant.
People in town even manage to act civil around me, due to the respect they have for him.
Don’t get me wrong, this town is still an utter shithole, but being Sully’s apprentice has definitely improved my tolerance of other Fae.
As my body matured, I learned to use it as a weapon in a different way.
I got even with the nasty barmaid, who had a particular hatred for me, by seducing her daughter.
I did feel a tinge of remorse for breaking her heart in the process, but to be fair, I had made it clear to her from the start that I don’t do attachment.
Really, it was her own fault for falling for me.
That was nearly a year ago, and now, what we guesstimate to be my seventeenth birthday is fast approaching.
Any free time I find between training sessions, work, and Sully’s teachings is spent in the only good part of our village: our ancient, uncorrupted patches of Mysticwoods.
Today, I visited one of my favorite creatures, the armored flying polar bears.
Their fur is translucent, like my hair. They love teasing me, saying someone in my family lineage must have bonded one of them, giving me my iridescent hair that shimmers like starlight.
The bears believe the color signals warrior’s blood coursing through my veins. However, I think they just enjoy telling me fanciful stories in hopes of extra ear scratches. Many creatures in Cascara can speak in some form or another: telepathy, body gestures, or oral language.
I lost track of time in the Mysticwoods with the bears, hurrying my way back into town.
I peer down at my sketchbook of magical creatures as my boots slosh in the mud of the rutted road.
With my focus on the pages in my hands, I fail to notice the stumbling man’s path swaying into mine as I bump into him.
The hairs on my spine rise like the hackles of a wolf. I know exactly who I’ve collided with as the stench of vomit and cheap beer stings my nostrils. My eyes snap up to see the slithering bastard swaying in front of me.
It’s been so long since I’ve seen him, bile instantly crawls up my gullet at the sight.
In the time since I left, his wife had died.
The rumor was that a monster had gotten into their house after they drunkenly left the door open.
Which never made sense to me, given the blistering cold of our winters.
She was said to have been ripped apart, blood spattering the walls in a frenzy.
The local healer couldn’t even identify the body, but when her face was never seen again, the town knew.
But I know differently. It wasn’t a monster from the woods but a monster from within that haunted the house I had been left to.
A cold grip around my neck rips me from my thoughts.
“My, how you’ve grown, vermin,” he spews each of his words between his broken teeth, a grin peeking out from the lengths of greasy dark hair.
His breath foul with decay. His six-foot-tall, gangly form reminds me of a misshapen tree, like the one that grows out of a swamp, never forming quite right.
But I can see that half of his putrid smile reaches his bloodshot eyes.
His eyes get lost in mine while his suffocating grip tightens around my throat, as if he is reliving his fond memories of his favorite bloodletting activities.
Fear seeps through my veins, as if I am still that tiny child in his hands again.
A little thing whose only desire is to melt into the safety of her shadows once more.
Power wells inside me, reminding me of all I have become.
I grab the forearm attached to the hand constricting around my neck and shove.
My other elbow swinging up, smashing the spot right before his wrist. I take advantage of the physics Sully taught me, creating torque.
Snap. The satisfying sound sunders the frozen air, twisting my face with a wicked grin—his bones shattering beneath my strength for the first time.
My frame—now 5’11”—is cast in pure muscle from years of training and working as a blacksmith. I devour his cowardly screams as he stumbles back several steps. Taking note of the changing position of his feet.
Sully’s words echo in my head. “Watch the direction of their feet, the momentum of each part of their body. Mass times velocity. Let your opponent show their cards, then wield their own hand against them.”
The subtle change in his positioning signals me he’s reeling up to charge at me.
The sway to his left side shows me he will come at me with a weak left hook, followed by a knee to the gut.
A smug smirk kicks up at my lips as I take in the tremble of his right hand, thanks to my gift leaving his right arm hanging with an unnatural bend.
I counter his moves, allowing him to reach maximum velocity before leaning my weight backwards.
I sidestep as he leans into me; gravity does the rest. My smirk twists into a wicked grin as he falls face-first with a thud.
I step on the back of his neck, pinning him down as the muck squelches into the side of his mouth, placing my other boot on his newly deformed forearm.
He whelps in pain, writhing further into the filth. I crouch down, my whisper slicing his with a chill sharp enough to make ice envious.
“Who’s the vermin now?” I mutter under my breath. “Fucking scum.”
Deciding I’ve had enough of his slurred curses and pitiful attempts to break free as he chokes on more and more mud, I quiet him with a blow to the back of the head with the hilt of my short sword. Dragging him into the woods to a known Ronew hunting ground.
He wakes up tied to a tree, deep in the woods, bound by magical vines that tighten the more you move. Which I strategically positioned around the soft parts of his neck, stomach and groin.
He spews toxic words as he gazes into my obsidian eyes, gilded in vengeful gold.
“You rotten piece of shit. You think I won’t kill you for this?
You are a curse upon this world, you—” he hisses before his words are cut short.
Vines slithering tighter. Gnawing through his flesh with his every movement.
“Mmm. Please, do finish that sentence, darling.” I beckon with a feral grin, twisting into a predator’s smile.
“Vines snagging that foul tongue of yours?” Without remorse, I look down on him.
Blood trickles down his neck to meet the pooling garnet below his groin.
“Not so tough now that you’re picking on someone your own size? ” I laugh, but there’s no humor in it.
I falter, the manic grin threatening to slip from my face. Does this make me as evil as him? Giving him a taste of what he did to me all those years… I sigh dramatically, quickly concluding that I frankly don’t give a fuck.
Karma’s a fickle bitch. But I must admit, Karma is my favorite of the gods.
The balancer, the enforcer of good and evil, decider of souls in the Ever After.
She is the weighted scale between her older sisters, the Fates: Beságe of Beginnings and Endara of Endings.
They are believed to be the children of the power who created our universe, Saool.
The Fates and Karma, born of divine conception.
The Celestials were created as amusement for her children’s immortal lives.
They lit up galaxies and molded stardust into worlds of celestial wonder.
Most importantly, they created a diverse array of life, each one a thread for the Fates to spin in the wicked games.
A raspy wheeze claws me from my thoughts. Ugh, how fucking rude. I look at the pale, greasy male before me with no guilt for the vines ripping him to ribbons. Only disappointment I didn’t make his suffering last longer.
“Pity.” I click my tongue, the darkness inside me brimming with utter delight. It revels, feasting on the bloodshed and carnage before me. Yet quickly, it grows restless. Snarling and bucking against the confines of my corporeal form, always craving more. More.
I clench my fist, stifling the beastly energy within.
With his last full breath, he seethes his dying words, “He will devour you, starb—” before the blood gurgles from his freshly exposed trachea, vines severing his tissue into muscle threads and macerated cartilage.
How typical. Still trying to lash me with his hollow, delirious threats.
Even with his last fucking breath. I turn, pulling up the hood of my cloak as my cape twirls behind me in suit.
Just before a shower of tainted blood rains down from his diced carotid artery.
Thank the Celestials. I loathe scrubbing blood from my iridescent hair.
With the scent of a fresh kill on the breeze, I don’t have time to waste thinking about his last words.
Nor do I care. I know all too well the speed and hunger of the Ronew, who will be ravenously approaching to bring his soul back to the soil.
They shred through flesh with five hundred teeth layered in three disturbing rows.
Their long bottom jaw splits down the center, so they can engulf prey much larger than themselves.
Their skin is a patchwork of devoured flesh, recycling leftover nutrients.
I have a feeling Karma is on my side for this kill. May he journey to the pits of Emberhell on his venture to the Ever After of the Underrealm, to finally atone for his demons that mar his soul.