In The Dark Of Night

Chapter Twenty Eight - Limbo

Chapter Twenty-Eight 

Limbo

You don't shoot a dog when it's already dead

~Markus Zusak

Gyrad shoved open the oak-wood door and strode, unannounced, into the bedroom of silk and dawn-light.

She was sitting on the floor, overlooking the balcony that stood just above the high treetops of the willows that sat in the expansive backyard.

Her long, curly hair was pulled up into a messy bun, and her back was straight - tense.

The blond could just make out the tremor to her hands as he slowed his walk, and he could see, as the wind brushed her pulled -up curls aside, the image of the devillistic knight on her neck writhing.

"Abella."

She didn't respond.

Instead, the tremor in her hand grew, until it was full out shaking.

He could hear her heavy panting just under the whistling of the trees beyond the glass window.

With an irritated sigh, he stalked over to her and bent, reaching out to grab her trembling palm, twisting it, forcing her to look him in the eye.

He almost reeled back onto his heels when he saw her - marks as black as coal tore like bloody nail-marks from her eyes, down her cheeks to her lips. Her eyes - stark, red and teary - were glassy as she looked at him, and her lips were dry and chapped and shaking.

"Abella..."

"...Lathaniel?" The sound was hoarse and cracked, and the dark-skinned girl reached out a searching, shivering palm.

Gyrad bit back a wave of frustration - not this again.

Instead of jolting to his feet and stalking out like he wanted - or backhanding her, like he'd been taught - he adopted a look he knew was kind and caring, stroking the soft yet dry skin on her hand, murmuring nothings to her beneath his breath.

"Lathaniel... you're late... It's getting cold..." The Fae girl's smile was crooked, and the stark black marks on her skin stretched - it made her look insane and frightful... and terrifying.

"It's not Lathaniel, darling... Don't you remember? It's me... your Gyrad."

The Fae blinked, no recognition whatsoever playing on her distorted features.

A single blood tear ran from her eye.

"Lathaniel... It's getting cold... I want to leave. Let's go."

He told me these would stop once she got her sister's body... That she'd be fixed - whole. Gyrad's temper was flaring and his grip on the girl's hand tightened up.

The bloody tear trickled down his brand new, pale white skin.

"Abella... Wake up... You're you again... You're here. Alive. And I need you working... For tonight. Remember tonight?" His nails dug into her skin. "Remember your role?"

"Lathaniel... You're hurting me." She made an attempt to tug back her hand, but Gyrad kept her firm - his blond hair a halo around his face, his green eyes hard with contempt.

"Don't mess this up for me, Abella - for us. Know your role. There will be no space for mistakes, do you understand me?"

She gave a gasp of pain as his nails tore into her skin, bright red blood sprung from the new wounds, running like a stream down her wrist and dripping like an unscrewed tap unto the rustic tiling of the bedroom floor.