Delta [Epsilon #2]

Chapter Five

Kyra

******

Drip, drip, drip.

I blinked myself awake. My nails scraped along the cold rock beneath me, trying to get a grasp of where I was, of how I got here.

Drip, drip, drip.

I squinted, trying to focus. I could see golden light flickering in the distance. It wasn't type of light that filters through tree canopies and glass windows. No, it was the angry orange light of a flame, sputtering as it struggled to stay alive within the oxygen-deprived halls.

Drip, drip, drip.

My blood ran cold, just like the tears down my cheeks. The cobblestone walls, the iron bars... I knew where I was. I'd know this place from any nightmare, from the darkest crevice of hell. 

"Kyra?" a weak voice murmured.

Drip, drip, drip.

I saw them in the cells opposite me. Their skin was burned, marred with scar tissue from whatever hell they'd endured. Their eyes were dead, even if their bodies weren't. Zion's hair matched the shade of the blood leaking from his ears, and Alia's eyes had never looked so cold. 

"Kyra," that voice came again, but their mouths didn't move. They just stared at me, silently, the accusation written on their faces. You did this, you did this, you did this.

I pushed the heel of my palm in my eyes. I wanted to push everything away, all of it, but that voice kept calling my name.

"Kyra..."

My body went rigid. Slowly, dreadfully, I raised my head. I could no longer see Zion or Alia. No, just a pair of glowing, azure eyes. Eyes of a lover. Eyes of a liar. Eyes of a betrayer. And they were looking at me, into my soul, decoding every little bit of me. I was falling apart under his gaze, bit by bit, so he could later piece me back together again. So he could piece me back in all the wrong places, as a Kyra that wasn't truly Kyra. 

Me. Him. The lines were blurred.

"Kyra..." his voice came again. I pressed my hands over my ears, squeezing my eyes shut. Cold terror surged through me, freezing my blood and slowing my heart. I didn't want to look at him. I didn't want to hear him, his words. My words, I realised, as my mouth opened to speak. 

"Kyra..." we said in unison. 

I opened my mouth in a silent scream. His blue eyes were bright, amused, and I realised he had taken my voice again. He had stolen my words, my very breath. Three isolated thuds sounded somewhere in the distance, the marching drumbeat of my death. I could feel his hands squeezing my neck. I could see the bodies of my friends, decaying and dead. I couldn't breathe.

Thud! Thud! Thud! It came again, the beats of my dying heart. Azriel's grip tightened. 

I can't breathe. I can't breathe. I can't breathe-- 

A sharp gasp ripped from my throat, and suddenly I was alive again. I thrashed against the sheets that clung to me, bearing uncanny resemblance to blood after the battle, to the sticky-hot skin of a lover. My vision spun as I gasped and choked, trying to remember where I was, how I'd gotten here. 

Panting, I sprung out of the bed into a room I didn't recognise. This was a dream, wasn't it? I'd wake up any moment now back in those cellars. I almost expected him to crawl out from under the mauve loveseat, or even jump out the closet on the far wall. I sobbed between breaths, my mind in utter disarray--