Page 99 of Vengeance Becomes Her

“Someone I never should have believed in.” With those words poisoning the air between them, she left him standing there in the snow.

Her fury blinded her and boiled her blood, making her numb to the cold and everything else around her as she wandered away from the center of town. She needed to be alone. She needed to think. Sheneeded silence.

She wasn’t sure where she was going, but her feet seemed to have a mind of their own. Leading her away, away, away.

She walked past the last signs of civilization and into the woods. Part of her knew she should go back, but she didn’t feel lost. She didn’t feel any panic, only determination. So, she walked and walked, until she ended up at a path that led up to a decrepit cottage surrounded by skeletal trees andnot much else.

When she took her first step into the clearing, her head began to throb so violently that she bent in half, cradling it in her hands. She shut her eyes tightly to block out the blinding expanse of white that blanketed everything around her.

Once again, her mind was plagued by images of that dreadful red mist and the shrill echoes of screaming. She just wanted it to stop, but it only became worse. A figure emerged from the mist. It was her. Or something that looked like her. Blackness swallowed its eyes and a thick coat of blood clung to its skin from the neck down. Around it, mutilated bodies lay strewn everywhere and everything went silent. There was a moment where it felt like it had set its eyes on her and then the throbbing cleared.

Rhiannon returned to a standing position. When she glanced around, she was relieved to find that everything appeared normal. Grey skies clung to the treetops, no red in sight. No bodies in sight. She breathed deeply as she continued onward.

She circled the cottage once, feeling as if it was familiar even though she’d never been this far north. She was surprised to find that the roof and overall structure were still intact even though it looked abandoned. Vines with blood-red leaves had attached themselves to the stone walls, making it look as if the cottage was seeping trails of blood.

Adrenalin flushed hot within her when something black emerged from the corner of her eye. But when she turned to investigate, everything blurred and all she knew was she was falling. She didn’t even feel herself hit the ground, wherever she went.

Rhiannon regained consciousness in the dark. Her head throbbed and her muscles ached. She was restrained by something that kept her in her seat. The wood floor creaked beneath her, groaning with age and abandonment. The air was heavy with the scent of dust and earth. Darkness clung so heavily to everything that she couldn’t even make out her own limbs, let alone anything else in the room.

While her mind was still in a fog, she knew she wasn’t alone. The darkness shifted and breathed, as if it were a living thing. Eyes sat heavy on her, waiting impatiently for the fear to make its way into her eyes from where it unfurled in her belly. She knew there was someone—no something—in the room. It was all around her. Watching her, tasting her, touching her. She could feel the weight of it on her skin, deceptively soft and smooth as silk but firm and possessive in its exploration.

She was ashamed at the panic that sprawled through her at the touch. A whimper escaping her throat against her will. The loss of her sight and deafening silence were disorienting. She couldn’t protect herself if she wanted to, bound as she was. She had been stripped bare of her defenses.

Her only assurance that she was still alive and not in the afterlife was the noisy thumping of her heart. It beat against its cage like a wild animal. Like she wanted to against these restraints.

When she thought she might unleash a scream just to disrupt the quiet, it wasbroken for her.

“Shhhh…” a voice breathed against her ear, the drawn out syllables lulling her back to sleep even as she fought against it.

When she woke again, it was as if she was floating out of her body. She couldn’t feel her limbs. Her head felt weightless. Her mind was scattered.

She blinked several times to bring the room into focus. The flicker of candlelight danced on the walls, providing a glimpse at her surroundings. A bed sat in the corner to her right and a table cluttered with glass bottles and dried herbs to her left. A long shadow sprawled out in front of her.

It stood to full height causing the shadow to somehow become larger. Its impenetrable inky depths now leering heavily over her. Fear blazed sharply across her skin as her imagination went wild. She needed to know what monster lay beyond her sight. Slick sweat rolled down her neck and trembles wracked her body as she refused to release the scream building within her.

But then, he spoke. “Hello again, Rhia.”

Her heartbeat was thunderous in her ears, but there was no mistaking that venomous, gravelly voice that hauntedher nightmares.

It was Silas, and he sounded murderous.

She pulled against her bonds. They pulled back. A new roll of fear whipped through her as her worst memories were being relived before her very eyes. The large black snakes circled the floor around her, hissing and lashing at her. She couldn’t even flinch away inher restraints.

“Rhia, Rhia, Rhia.” Silas clasped his hands in front of him, a sly grin tugging up the right side of his lips. “We meet again. I must say, even though I knew you hadn’t died, I’m surprised to see you soalive.My, how you’ve changed since ourtime together.”

“Unbind me and I’ll show you just how muchI’ve changed.”

He scoffed. “Not just yet.” He closed the distance between them with those unnervingly fluid movements of his. Within a blink, he was wrapped around the back of her chair, his fingers trailing down her arms. He dragged the edge of his nose along her jaw, his breath warming the path that followed.

“I’m going to make you scream for mercy before I take everythingaway from you.”

“I’m not afraid of you.”

His thumb caressed the column of her throat, resting his fingers on the point where her pulse jumped.

“Liar, liar.”

“Do you want to know the truth?”

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