A Necessary Evil (Book 1)

Chapter 44

My mother’s nails dug into my arm as she dragged me from the ballroom. I felt the stares from every pair of eyes in that room as they watched the highly inappropriate scene before them. Even Raphael was gaping at me as he disappeared into the crowd as my mother pulled me further away. I didn’t understand her anger. Why couldn’t she just let me be? Hadn’t she already made it clear exactly how little I meant to her?

Finally, she stopped and pushed me into a room far from sight of the other guests. “Where the hell have you been?” she yelled at me the minute we were inside. She hadn’t changed. She was never one for wasting time.

I snorted. “As if you care.”

Fury bubbled in her, what I now recognized as soulless, eyes. “We have been searching everywhere for you! Only to get an invitation to your engagement party! Have you not brought enough shame on this family? What will happen when they find out what you are? What will they think of us?” Lady Eleanor went on yelling. She was more worried about not tarnishing her clean family name, than her own daughter. I thought the revelation would hurt more, but it seemed like all those months I was without her actually did me good. I had accepted no longer being part of her family.

“You think I want to get married to that monster? You think I ever wanted to get married to him? You are as blind as you are conceited!” She slapped me again.

“I am still your mother! You will not speak to me like that!”

I shook my head fiercely, trying hard to remain calm. “No, you are no longer my mother.” Saying the words out loud to her for the first time brought forth the pain I knew I should’ve been feeling from the start. It took every ounce of will power for me to keep in the tears that were forming in my eyes. “You lost that privilege the moment you drove me to my death! The moment you told me I wasn’t your daughter because of something that was completely out of my control! I do not recognize you as ANY relation of mine!” I yelled at her, my built up anger from the past few months all directed at her, the woman that was supposed to love me no matter what.

She struck out to hit me again, but my reflexes kicked in and I caught her hand. I was done being made to feel small by this woman, that my opinions didn’t matter. My whole life I was treated as a puppet, just going through the motions of what it was to be human. I was her doll that always had to be perfectly in place and the moment I broke out of that mold was the moment she discarded me like I meant absolutely nothing to her. And I was not feeling sorry for myself anymore. If I could let go of her, I could let go of that life once and for all.

We stared at each other for a while and she pulled her wrist from my hand. “You are a disgrace. How I ever thought that one day you would be able to shift our family higher up the social ladder, is beyond me. You have turned into a lowly wench with no manners at all! I will not allow you to get married to John. You will not have the honor of marrying a knight!”

“There is no honor in marrying John, you would be doing me a favor,” I stated bluntly, through clenched teeth.

A flame ignited within her and she grabbed my arm roughly and pulled me closer. Blood streamed down from where her long, sharp nails pierced my skin. I cried out in pain, but she ignored me. “Very well, if you are going to be so ungrateful, you will not marry anyone! You will go to your death as planned! You do not deserve the second chance I had planned on giving you when coming to this party tonight. You have succeeded in proving what I knew all along! You are a filthy witch and this world would be better off without you!”

Before I could react I felt something hit me from behind causing my consciousness to fade away the same way it had that first night of my nightmare. Before I landed on the ground I was able to catch a glimpse of the person sending me into darkness. It was my father. He had once again betrayed me.