Page 4 of Of Sockets Of Stitches
I love the idea of a harem.
I had believed him so completely, and how could I trust a belief again? Belief in myself. Belief in my capability. Belief in my fate.
“I have been the greatest fool.” And the added cruelty was that King See had warned me. So many times he had told me not to love him. That he would never love me.
Fool.
The creature huffed and sat back on its haunches. When a creature was all a person could sense any longer, then a person became rather attuned to its various noises.
Have I fooled myself in queendom and monsters and self too?If I had been a fool in love, then perhaps I was a fool in all aspects.
In this haze I felt no surety in myself. But no, the haze was not to blame. Mother had appeared fearful because she could not see surety in mebeforeI entered this place.
I no longer felt worthy of love, even love of myself, because I had been convinced ofhislove, and convinced of the rightness of mine toward him. Lies and schemes had crushed any notion of the sentiment.
So I have no trust in myself.
In my mind and power, I searched for such trust. No answer rose in me.Death of trust. A gaping hole where dreams had once existed. The haze amplified all emptiness in my heart and soul, but at least fear could not exist amid this exhaustion and clamor of thought.
So weary and wrung.
Exhausted and crawling in mind.
Perhaps that was the only reason I felt the tiny cog spin in my skull. The cog spun as if rusted and flaking. As it creaked around, a curious idea rose in me, a mere wisp that I inhaled for worry that snatching at it would only see the wisp flee.
I inhaled the wisp of an idea.
You have monsters. Monsters need you.
I smiled, and there was a surge of energy in me. Enough that I thought to lift my head and tell the creature what I had recalled.
But how strange to find…
The creature was gone.
Chapter Three
The clamor of truth.
Monsters need me.
Since entering this place and envisioning the rocky slope that I had clambered up, I had imagined myself sitting. Now I imagined myself lying down, cheek pressing against a jagged rock that I could not feel but which drew blood and bruise.
I was cut off from body, and I mourned for its distraction.
The creature was here again. Close. I did not care.
The clamor of my minds are too great,I thought at it.
The creature launched forward, jaws snapping. I did not move as he started to stalk a tight ring around me. Not close enough for me to touch, but not much farther.
Ah, this is My End.
The creature snapped its jaws again, yet I was but a stuttering heartbeat now. Weariness had been left behind, and I existed in an abyss but for the creature’s interference.
I could do without his presence. Then the abyss would be complete.
Do it,I whispered.
