From inside the house, I hear the unmistakable sound of Harry yelling. Not his usual angry shout but one I think is filled with pain. And at the exact same time, from the back of the woodshed, I hear Ryan yell in the same manner.
‘That’s not supposed to happen,’ I mutter curiously, recalling the events of this day clearly. There were no cries of pain from them on this day.
I stand here, holding a sheet that was destined to end my life… a fucking sheet! Laughable now when you think of everything I’ve survived to get to this point.
The pain-filled grunting of my abuser continues. I look to the rolling hillside filled with woodland and country lanes. In them contain means of escape. And escape I must because I know that I have to reach the final Bloodstone at Land’s End before it’s too late.
I should run. Leave here and get myself to it as soon as possible. I know this. The stakes of failure are high. The highest! But, as much as logic tells me to turn and get my backside to the final Bloodstone, my heart screams at me to face my monster. To do the one thing I could never do. Stand up and say no more. It was Toby Smith who saved me from Ryan and for that, I owed him everything. Because I never confronted the man who ruined me, long before all the others had their turn to tear my soul and me apart piece by piece. Ryan has always been the monster under my bed. Every hand that touched me belonged to him. Every breath that landed on my skin came from his mouth. Every nightmare, every jump at a loud noise, every time my heart raced through dread when a man got too close, it was always him. Even dead… he was still there and the reason for that is because I wasn’t the one who stopped him.
I will not let a sheet end me. And I will not allow a rapist piece of shit haunt me. If I don’t face my monster now, I fear that he will chase me forever.
I make my way over and around the woodshed. I see him now, through my own eyes. My twenty-two-year-old eyes, not the barely seventeen-year-old who he raped late last night. Ryan is on his knees, clutching his head. His shirt is off and the wood-axe is on the floor beside him. He has his headphones on and the tinny dum-dum-dum of his god-awful music reaches my ears, so it must be deafening for him. I wonder if perhaps he struck himself with the axe or maybe, he hit his head somehow. But it’s only a fleeting thought that crosses my mind as I reach for the axe.
I stretch my fingers out for the handle and never look away from him, just in case he turns. The muscles on his back ripple as he tends to whatever ails him. He prides himself on his body and spends hours toning it. He is remarkably strong and annoyingly quick, hence why I dare not look away.
I pick up the axe and grip it tight, watching Ryan with unblinking eyes.
‘Fuck,’ he whispers, sniffing and shaking is head. ‘What the fuck was that! Christ… my damn head…’
He’s distracted. I’m not. I raise the axe high above my head and aim for the back of his skull. And I bring it down with all the force this adolescent body can muster as I wield my fatal blow.
But the sun catches the steel of the blade and Ryan spots its reflection soaring towards him. He looks back over his shoulder.
‘CHRIST!’
He rolls clear just in time and the axe buries deep into the stump he uses to lay the wood on for cutting.
My hand still holds the wooden handle as he slowly pulls his attention from the weapon embedded inches from his head, to me. His eyes are wide and his mouth is a hollow O as he looks up at me in utter surprise and disbelief.
‘You little… You just tried to kill me, you dirty fucking whore!’ he says, his brow furrowing.
I grab hold of the axe tightly and try to prise it free. My continuing attempts to carry out my attack makes his glare turn deadly.
‘C’mon… C’MON!’ I yell at the axe as I pull and I pull, but the sodding thing won’t budge.
All the while, Ryan just looks up at me with a growing murderous rage. Veins bulge in his temple and his skin becomes red with fury. My attempts to pull the axe free turn desperate as he slowly starts to rise. His fists are clenched by his side and his teeth grind together as he gets on his feet. He towers over me, drawing in angry breath after angry breath. I look up at him, my hand still wrapped hopelessly around the wooden handle of the axe, and he stares right into my eyes. His nose almost touches my forehead and as we lock in this stare, I feel his hand wrap around mine. With a single and effortless yank, he frees the axe and twists it until I have no choice but to let go. The corner of his mouth turns up in a nasty sneer as he scoffs at my failed attempt to end his miserable life. But I have other ways to fight. Swiftly, I go for the thick knot on the binding spell. Why the fuck didn’t I take the thing off beforehand?
‘Oh no you fucking don’t!’ He promptly slams the butt end of the axe handle into my stomach. I double over and crumple to my knees. As I go down, his palm settles under my jaw so even as I fall, he won’t let me look away from him.
‘Good effort,’ he says with an angry growl. ‘But just like your very existence, Lills, pointless and a massive failure.’
Slam!
He strikes me with a closed fist. I land face down, spitting blood and seeing spots.
‘You dare… you DARE!’
As I crawl across the ground, dragging myself away, he stalks after me, tossing the axe from one hand to the other as he places himself between me and my exit.
‘You think you can get away with this? HUH? You think I don’t know that you mean to kill me? You think I didn’t see it?’ His fingers twist in my hair and he drags me quickly across the ground. I claw at his hand. I kick and I scream as he pulls me back towards the house.
‘THE BITCH ATTACKED ME!’ he bellows as my body meets the slate of the kitchen floor. I slip on my own blood as he continues hauling me after him. ‘DID YOU HEAR ME? FATHER? SIMMONS? SHE MUST BE PUNISHED!’
The unmistakable sound of stilettoes charging towards us grows louder and into the kitchen bursts my aunt Christa in all her overdramatic glory. She looks at me and then to her beloved son before clutching her chest and running at him with open arms.
I look up at her as I lay on the floor with my hair in Ryan’s grip and blood spilling down my chin. I haven’t seen this woman since I burnt her alive. All the coldness and vindictiveness I remember of her is still very much there. Her over-bleached hair is immaculately pinned up in place. Her foundation lies thick on her ageing skin and mascara clumps together on her thinning lashes. Garish jewellery adorns her in every possible place. An antique, Victorian pendant rests on her neck and large gold hoops dangle from her ears. She takes her vile son’s face in her hands. Yellow gold rings litter every one of her fingers. Her bright pink nails are chipped and fake. Her clothes are meant for someone two decades younger.
‘Oh my sweet baby!’ she gasps, examining every inch of his face. The small smear of blood that spilt from his nose makes her glare down to me. ‘What did you do to my sweet child, you evil abomination?’ Her stern face softens when she returns her focus to him. ‘My sweet angel! Tell me where it hurts.’
He’s there with the smallest smidge of blood marring his otherwise perfect face and I’m here, half his size, beaten by Simmons’s belt and my face and stomach smashed in and blood in my knickers from his late-night torment. But of course, I’m the evil one.
I will always be a demon amongst monsters.
‘I’m fine, mummy. Where is Father?’ Ryan peers past his fussing mother and looks to the empty doorway. ‘I need to tell him what she did. He’ll want to know.’
He’ll want to beat me is what he really means, and Ryan wants to watch.
‘Daddy had a bit of a fall a moment ago, sweetie. He’s having a lie-down. Took a bit of a knock to the head. Simmons may need to take him to the hospital. Never mind him. Let me check you over.’
‘He had a fall a moment ago? Did he get a dreadful headache just beforehand?’
‘He did actually, yes. Why?’
Ryan pulls at my hair. Yelling, I grab at his wrist so I can pull myself up and avoid my scalp being torn from my skull.
‘What did you do? Was that you?’
‘I DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT YOU FUCKING PSYCHO! GET THE HELL OFF ME!’
Even Christa gasps at my uncharacteristic outburst. But her surprise soon turns to disdain as she glowers at me in her son’s grip.
‘You dare lay a hand on my son. After everything we have done for you.’
‘Oh, please!’ I laugh hatefully, still gripping onto Ryans wrist. ‘Like anything any of you have ever done has been kind or generous. I tell you what, Christa, you tell your sick paedophile of a son who has been systematically raping me since I was fourteen to let me go, or I will burn this house down with all of you freaks inside.’ I narrow my eyes at her and quietly add, ‘Again.’
‘I won’t hear your dirty lies you ugly, scrawny, stinking little rat.’ She steps back and nods to the door. ‘Take her to the “Just in case” room in the cellar. The one Daddy showed you. Throw her in there until he’s feeling a little better.’
I’m lifted to my feet with a heave and my back slams hard into the kitchen counter. Ryan presses his body up against mine, pinning me in place, and smirks as he rests the axe’s blade against my throat.
‘Oh yeah. Father showed me his “Just in case” room. No windows. No way out. Just some nice, thick chains to keep you tethered to the wall and a thick heavy door that only opens from the outside. You’ll love it.’ He leans into my ear and whispers, ‘It’s deep under the house. So no one will hear you scream and believe me, you’ll be screaming plenty after the stunt you just tried to pull.’
‘Come on,’ Christa urges, stepping aside and pointing towards the hall.
Towards the door to the cellar.
If I get trapped down there, it’s all over.
‘I wouldn’t if I were you,’ I warn as he starts to move me in my future cell’s direction.
‘Oh no? And what the hell are you gonna do to stop me?’
‘This.’
I slam my head hard into his nose and without a second’s hesitation, ram my knee into his crotch. As he doubles over, I lunge and sink my teeth into the lobe of his ear. My hands grip his shoulders and we both yell as I pull, not stopping until I feel the flesh sever from the side of his face and his warm blood spill into my mouth. I finish my attack off with a knee thrust upwards into Ryan’s nose, breaking it in several places and stunning him. Christa screams like a woman possessed as I spit her sons’ ear at her feet and wipe my mouth.
‘A little trick my husband showed me,’ I boast. ‘Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to kill you and then go and save thousands of lives.’
I snatch up the axe that Ryan dropped and raise it high above my head, ready to bring it down on Ryan’s skull, ending his twisted existence for good. A blur of commotion catches my attention and I turn to see Simmons has made his way into the kitchen doorway and unholstered his gun, which he now has pointed directly at me.
Remarkable, I think to myself. For a big man, he sure can move when he wants to and with surprising stealth. His right eye gives the slightest twitch as he gets his aim and then… BANG!
The bastard fires.
At the same time, Ryan has grabbed my ankle and pulled, taking my footing from underneath me and sending me to the floor in a heap. My hands fly up over my head and a hot searing pain claims my right hand, causing me to drop the axe and scream furiously. I hit the hard tiles with a thud, my head connecting with the cabinets behind me. The axe lands by my leg, thankfully, not in it. The bang to my head stuns me and I have to blink a few times to get my vision back into focus. Reaching up, I feel for any lumps. But as my hand passes my face, I stare in shock at the mangled mess of my hand.
Simmons shot me!
He shot my fucking hand and what really pisses me off is that his bullet has taken two of my goddamn fingers! The same two fingers I was so thrilled to have back not even two minutes ago! I clasp my hand as blood spews from the ragged stumps and the agony has me feeling sick.
But there’s no time.
Ryan is already scrambling back to his feet. Simmons is ordering Christa out of the kitchen and is cautiously making his way towards me.
‘You bitch!’ Ryan hisses murderously. ‘You’re so fucking dead!’
‘Not as dead as you’re about to be, you sick fucker.’
I slam my foot into his already broken nose and force him back before grabbing hold of the axe. I’m surrounded and hurt. There’s no way I can get through them alive and all that matters is that I do! I must get to the Bloodstone. That is all that matters. Even if I get to it in pieces, I have to get to it. Clumsily, I try to use the large and heavy blade to cut off the binding spell, but the blade is too thick and I can’t get it to slide through the fabric. The barrel of Simmons’s gun settles on my temple. He puts a bullet in the chamber. The weapon vibrates with every click-click-click as it slots into place.
He’s going to fire. There’s nothing I can say. Nothing I can promise. No amount of sorrys I could offer.
I’m dead.
My people are dead.
My daughter will never see her family again.
The Descendants will be doomed.
This is where it ends for us all. Here, in my uncle’s kitchen, with a bullet tearing through my brain.
Unless I get access to my magic in the next second.
So, quickly, in a move so fast I’m not even sure that I wanted to do it, I take the axe, rise it up…
And slam it down.
I release a blood-curdling scream and throw my head back as my magic returns to me, forcing itself through every cell and atom, raging like electricity through my veins and expelling out like a shockwave.
Simmons, Ryan and Christa are hurtled backwards. Cabinet doors explode into wooden splinters. Every cup, plate, glass and window shatters and a storm of fierce wind swirls around the room, whipping my hair across my face. The kitchen is a tornado of chaos, tossing the full-grown men around like paper dolls as they try to grab on to the units and worksurfaces. Shards of glass, wood and porcelain fly around the room. The taps explode and water cascades down. The fridge freezer falls on its side and starts sliding around the floor.
I force myself to my knees, ignoring the carnage and struggling to stop the need to cry and holler as I look in horror at the discarded axe by my side, next to the binding spell and my three-fingered severed hand, all on the floor in a growing puddle of blood.
The blood loss is significant and far from stopping. I use my Telekenesis to keep the others away and summon my Physical magic to heal the wound.
I know my hand is gone. Even after I healed Gabriel when Toby severed his arm at the British Museum, I was never able to regrow my own fingers. I could never channel the same level of power I needed. I could never channel my will into the Arcane Realm the same way as I did that day. But I can heal the flesh and stop the bleeding, so I summon that power and direct it to my wrist.
Nothing.
Surely, I have access to my powers! The room is in pandemonium!
I try again, knowing I have my magic. The binding spell is currently sinking beneath a puddle of blood on the floor.
Nope. Nothing.
It continues to bleed and I realise, I don’t have any of my other abilities. I can’t make fire. I can’t create lightning.
‘I’m seventeen. I haven’t manifested it yet,’ I say in horror. ‘I only have Telekinesis! SHIT!’
I reach up and take hold of a tea towel to stem the flow but it swiftly turns wet and red.
Think… think!
What sparked my manifestations before? What happened to make them spring to life? I think of facing Gabriel, heartbroken and utterly devastated after discovering his betrayal with Ava Sinclair. That’s not going to help me here. What else? Toby pleasuring me to climax and the trees in the woods a few miles down the road erupting in fire. My Elemental manifestation. That’s not going to work.
Then I think of Theo using his powers on me the night he attacked The Orchard and how I channelled the pain he inflicted into my manifestation. How I called to it, demanding it come and help me to fight him off.
As I look at my bloody stump, I think to myself… how much more pain do I need to feel for a manifestation to come? This hurts like hell!
Clearly, it’s not enough pain. I sink my teeth into the wound, the copper taste of my blood sears on my tongue and slides down my throat. As I roar in anguish, I close my eyes and see the faces of all those I love. Those whose lives depend on me and what it means if I fail.
Gabriel. Dead after suffering such torment at Theo’s hands.
Collins, dead at the cottage, his skull in pieces and a son who will never see his face and Amara who will never recover from losing him.
Connor, tortured until he took his final breath.
My dad, gutted.
I let the images infect every recess of my mind and let the misery of all the loss consume my heart.
‘MANIFEST’ I garble through blood and flesh. ‘PHYSICAL REALM OF MAGIC, I COMMAND YOU, MANIFEST!’
Nothing.
All those who will be burnt alive. Taken from their families. Tortured.
Nothing!
I let out a desperate sob as I release my teeth from my wound. A wound that will probably kill me now. Half an hour maybe? And I’ll bleed to death.
As the destruction continues and my Telekenesis rages its effects on the room, I look out to the patio doors. To the garden.
There’s someone out there.
A man wearing a thick, red scarf.
I know that scarf. I clung to it for years. Cradled it in my sleep. Smelt the scent of the man who owned it long after he had worn it.
He has a hood up over his head but I know, even from here, that the man standing there looking at the house and what I’m doing to it, is Toby Smith.
My heart races and adrenaline surges through my veins. When he starts sprinting towards us, it turns to panic.
I’m not the girl I was when we first met, certainly. No way he will ever have a hold over me again. No way I let him hurt me in the ways he did. But that’s not what frightens me. What frightens me is the fact that he is not the man I left behind five years in the future. He is not here to help me. He is here to claim me.
This is Toby Smith!
Broken. Psychopath. Murderer. Tormentor.
And he’s coming for me!
When his black and white fire springs to life on his hands, I see all the things those hands have done. Burning me. Bruising me. Pleasuring me. Comforting me. Breaking me.
I close my eyes and see them all, mixing them with all the misery I know is destined if I fail here.
I’m shaking. Taking in deep breath after deep breath as I focus on my task, ignoring the yells of Ryan, Christa and Simmons as the room is torn apart bit by satisfying bit.
In the distance, I hear Toby yelling my name.
‘LILLY!’ he calls. ‘LILLY!’
Everything slows down. The howling wind my magic created. The flying debris. The fearful cries of those caught in the middle of it, clinging to the building in a desperate bid to not be slammed into the wall. It’s as if time itself has slowed down, moving at half speed.
‘You’re in my heart, Red,’ he whispers like a ghost in my ear, my memories creating him right here by my side. ‘You’re in my head. Always. Mine.’
‘I’m here, Beautiful,’ another voice says softly in my other ear. Gabriel’s voice. ‘We need you. Save us.’
Everything in the room suddenly crashes to the floor. My legs are littered with debris and bits of wood and glass land in my hair. The sudden warmth I feel in my chest is not what I planned on, but it will have to do. My plan to manifest has succeeded, but it’s not my Physical powers that I feel. The heat of fire, my fire, awakens. My Elemental magic roars to life and erupts from deep within. I blink open my eyes to see Simmons lying bloody but still alive on the floor before me and the unmistakable sound of someone behind me drastically trying to claw through the mess to get away. Ahead, Toby is still charging forwards, his hands alight.
He’s close, almost at the patio doors. I reach out my hand and force him back with my Telekinesis. I know that at this point of time, the brothers are still connected by the immortality spell, so if one of them dies, they all do. I send the monster to safety, and as I do, I fail to hold back the Elemental powers inside me from forging forwards.
First, my red fire erupts on my remaining hand. I press it over the stump of my wrist, and with a scream, both my realms of power erupt and what I did to The Orchard, I do to Harry Hooper’s house.
I send it to hell.
Exactly where it belongs.
