Powerless #2
Hell. Purgatory. Eternal damnation. That must be where I was.
Fadric hiked Aemilia’s dress up and hooked one of her legs around his waist as his affection turned hungry and desperate. The same way he’d done with me behind the bookshop.
I knew I hadn’t loved him, but he’d said he loved me—the only one who had other than Nella.
It tore at my battered soul, the way he grabbed at the straps of her dress, tearing them away and exposing her breasts.
He kissed her deeply, the bruising kind of way.
She moaned when he bit down on her lower lip, breathing his name, and I finally lost it.
The tears on my face had dried, and my heart became full of nothing but hatred for this girl I was unfortunate enough to share even an ounce of blood with.
I knelt, still rooted to the spot in front of one dead sister and a bed where my boyfriend was about to fuck my other sister while my dad looked on like he was the happiest man in the world. This was definitely eternal damnation.
It was then that Fadric opened the front of his pants and released his full, hard length.
Even Fadric’s hand clamped around Aemilia’s delicate throat didn’t stifle the cry of pleasure she released when he pushed inside her.
I watched as he thrust into her, over and over, kissing down her jaw and neck.
I watched on, unable to look away as he made love to her.
The boy I’d wanted to love and the sister who had nearly killed me.
Every sigh and scream chiseled away another piece of my heart.
He’d given me everything I allowed, and I’d given him everything I could.
And now I watched as he gave my sister everything she begged for.
Fadric. My Fadric.
I was frozen—no tears, no yelling, just frozen. And so very broken.
This was it. I knew it now. The truth. My truth—I was powerless.
I couldn’t protect the only person I truly loved and couldn’t keep the one man I’d wanted to love me but that I couldn’t love in return.
Maybe that was the reality of it. That I didn’t know love at all, how to give it or feel it or accept it.
I was the girl that no one stayed for and no one was safe with, destined to be alone.
I slumped over on my knees, defeated. The chasm in my chest where my heart should be was so very conflicted with emptiness and excruciating pain. Loss.
I sat there for who knew how long, wallowing in my despair.
Cassius, Aemilia, and Fadric had all stopped moving, all their judging, unblinking eyes trained on me.
Cassius with his hands in his pockets, smiling.
Aemilia, bare skin exposed and body spent, sprawled out on her stomach beside Fadric.
Fadric, on his side next to her, curls tousled and hand resting on her back.
And Nella… My sweet little lamb. The life had gone from her eyes and skin, but the blood from her nose still dripped, her singed hair still smoking. The crackle from Aemilia’s lightning occasionally snapped.
Drip, drip. Crackle. A song that carved itself into my eardrums, every beat a stab to my heart.
Movement to my right caught my attention, and I turned to see another figure form. I guess my torture wasn’t over. I had discovered my truth, so this must be the memory taking form.
A woman materialized, as beautiful as she always was in my mind.
She had the same deep-green eyes as mine, although they glowed in this otherworldly place.
Her hair flowed curly like mine did, but longer and darker, and far more perfect.
She even had the same full cheekbones as mine.
Only our noses were different. I didn’t know what she’d actually looked like, but I knew in my shattered and empty heart that this was my mother.
Maybe this was still my mind creating her image, but if this was an actual memory the banshee was extracting then maybe this was really what she looked like.
She glanced at me for a moment, and her eyes seemed to soften. I hoped she would bring comfort and love and ease this unending ache. That this memory would give me some answers on whether she loved me, why she left me.
I stood with aching knees, taking a step toward her, but she turned her eyes from me to Cassius. When their eyes met, he placed a hand on her swollen lower belly, and they both looked at that spot—the spot where a woman’s womb sat.
Their faces both turned to grimaces as my mother said, “This baby is a blemish, a stain on our perfect life. I do not want it, Cassius. Make it go away. Give me the potion that will kill it in my womb and end its life before it can begin.”
Even my first breath had been unwelcome. Even my existence had been a problem to solve.
I was numb but cold over my mother’s cruel words, consumed by pain but empty.
I needed to cry, but my eyes were dry. Any moment now, the all-consuming feeling and lack of feeling would sever the remaining cords of my heart and finally take me into oblivion.
There was no chance of survival for me at this point; I was too broken.
There was no way to live in a world where my family and boyfriend betrayed me, where my mother didn’t want me, and where my sister no longer lived.
“Kill me! Kill me now!” I screamed over and over, just wanting to die, to no longer be. “Bleed me out and take my life, I beg of you! Take me beyond the veil. I can’t survive this life anymore!”
It could have been years since I came to this place of pain.
Maybe a lifetime. My eyes stared, unfocused, at Nella.
Nothing had hurt more than watching her die while I couldn’t save her.
So I just stayed here, staring at her beautiful, blank face and imagining I was holding her hand, even though I couldn’t.
I was powerless. And so I would stay for eternity, here, by her side.
It was the least I deserved for letting her down.
Dying would have been too kind, too swift, after my failures.
Despite my despair, the hollowness in my chest began to warm.
As it spread out from my chest, logic snaked its way through my sorrow, feeling like a mental fog was clearing.
This couldn’t have been a memory since I was born.
I was never killed in the womb. And how would I have a memory of something that happened before I existed?
None of this could have been real. Not my mother, not Fadric, Aemilia. Not Nella…
A light illuminated above me and drew my attention.
It looked like a star, just a pinprick of light high above, but bright and persistent.
The longer I looked at it, the warmer I felt, like my heart was reforming in my chest and beating for a purpose.
Like I wasn’t powerless, but full of fire.
Not angry fire that destroyed, but warm fire that comforted and melded, forged.
In a single blink, I left the expansive, painful darkness and found myself back in the banshee’s cabin.
“Welcome back, my child,” the banshee said with a wide grin on its face.
I looked around me and found Nella, alive and well, albeit shaken and crying, sitting next to me at that gnarled round table.
And then I sobbed. Uncontrollably sobbed. I reached for her face to feel her warm skin and damp cheeks, and when she looked at me, I knew that this was reality, not that empty, painful purgatory.
“Whatever you saw, I’m here. I’m real.”
I smiled and tried to pull myself together.
“I thank you for your truth and your memory,” the banshee said. “You were most divulging. The blood is so much more potent when the agony is all-consuming.”