Promises

25. Welcome To My Dark Side

8th February, 2013

Dear Diary,

When it comes down to it, I'm an unhinged Ferris wheel rolling towards the sea, a windmill full of corpses. I'm not like other people, I am burning in Hell. The Hell of myself. And I was in darkness, so darkness I became. Now bring me your suffering, the rattle roar of broken bones. Bring me the riot in your heart, angry, wild and raw. Bring it all, I am not afraid of the dark. There's always been a difference in who I am, and what I show on the outside, because trust me, you do not want to feel what I feel.

I thought maybe writing down all my dark inner thoughts would help, and it does... in its own way. So, welcome to my dark side, you're going to love it.

Bella stopped writing and tapped her pen on the desk, mind swimming with dark thoughts. This was dangerous. She was all by herself, with nothing to distract her, and she loved it.

In the dark, she felt safe. Just like black was her safe colour. Most kids were afraid of the dark at night, afraid of what might be lurking there. Afraid of what they couldn't see. But not Bella Pleasant. Young Bella Pleasant was darkness itself. Every bad thought, every regrettable action, every fight, every bruise and broken bone, every time she cried herself to sleep at night... everything that had ever happened in her life channelled into mania.

With depression and self-harm issues worsening, she was developing a whole new problem. One that nobody would notice until it was too late.

Bella got to her feet and pushed in her chair so it was underneath the desk. If she left it out, that'd just give Skulduggery one more thing to scream at her for. She scooped up her diary and pen and tucked them away in their normal hiding place. She closed the drawer again and sighed. Her number one wish in life at that moment, was to get hit by a bus and die. God, she would give anything to just die. In fact, she even wished that she hadn't been born at all. Obviously, nobody wanted her here anyway, so what was the point of staying any longer?

Then Bella paused. She'd promised to Reverie that she wouldn't give in to her dark thoughts, but it was so tempting to go downstairs right now and drive a kitchen knife through her heart. Instead, she pulled out her blade and moved over to the full-length mirror, looking herself up and down. Bella screwed her nose up in disgust at her malnourished and broken figure. Her skin clung to her brittle bones, the dark circles and bags under her eyes sticking out like a sore thumb. She looked horrible.

"Thirteen tomorrow," she murmured to herself, turning the blade over in her hands. "Happy birthday to me." Bella smiled, the emotional pain cancelled out by the sudden stinging in her arms. "I draw with silver and it turns out red," she mumbled quietly, staring at her arms. "Magic."

***

"The girl's birthday is tomorrow," Claret growled under her breath. The sheets were pulled up over her chest, and Erskine Ravel was laying beside her in the bed. The morning sunlight had begun streaming in through the gaps in the blinds, and it had woken Claret up. Now she was grumpy.

Ravel traced the blonde's jawline with his thumb, gazing at her fondly. "What do you propose we do?"

Claret smirked, rolling over to face him, and hummed quietly. She hooked one long, smooth slender leg around his waist and moved so she was straddling him. Claret's hands cupped Erskine's face gently, her piercing blue eyes boring into his golden ones. "Throw a surprise party for dear Isabella of course," she grinned, leaning down and kissing him quickly on the lips. He smiled.

"Sounds like fun."

"I have an idea for a theme," she cooed, rolling her hips. A growl came from deep within his throat and she felt him harden against her.

"Tell me, Claret."

"My brother is going to put on a show, and then he's going to leave, and never come back."

Erskine blinked, staring up at her incredulously. "Compulsion?"

He received a nod in response. "Oh, yes. This way he won't be able to interfere with our plans if does end up fighting the link," she sang. "He won't be here, and it will be so much easier to snatch Bella."

"What about Tyrell?" He raised an eyebrow. "She told us he was back."

"Got it covered. If my big brother gets in the way, I'll kill him."