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“ T here’s got to be another way down there.” Wesley looked at Clay. “Was there anything in your books?”

“I barely found the door,” he spat, pushing his hand through his hair. “There’s nothing in the book about this!”

“This was a trap.” Wesley turned on me. “Did you have anything to do with this?” He questioned without malice. He wanted to know if my head was in charge or my heart.

“No!” I closed my eyes and shook my head.

They blame you for it all.

That little treacherous thought swirled around so loudly. It was so easy to believe it.

Wesley’s hand was on my cheek when I opened my eyes.

“Are you sure you don’t know what the Manor wants?” His voice was quiet, his touch so delicate, there was no trace of viciousness there… “Think.” he pushed his other hand against my chest. “With this.”

Was his tone always so soft? Had he even accused me?

I couldn’t sort through the lies anymore. I knew it was making me see things.

“Let’s just get this over with and deal with her after,” Clay growled, his jaw and voice tight with malice as he turned to glare at me with disgust .

“Deal with me?” I whispered as Clay turned his attention back to the door. Fear clawed and tore at my chest, trying to find purchase around my heart. “What–”

They’re going to kill you.

You’re a monster.

“No.” Clay knelt before the door, examining the ancient lock. “Deal with the door.” His brows furrowed when he looked back at me.

“Are you alright?” Wesley asked in that soft tone, leaning in a little closer to search my eyes. “We see right through you. We know what you are,” he whispered.

I shoved backward out of his reach.

“Aye!” Wesley barked, looking down at his arm, a streak of red beginning to weep with blood along his forearm.

They are not your family, Florence.

My head pounded.

They don’t love you.

Wesley stepped forward. "Give me the knife,” he asked. “Work faster, Clay,” he urged over his shoulder. “Florence…” The edge returned to his voice.

They want you dead.

You’re nothing but a hunt for them.

My hands trembled around the knife, the blade slicked with Wesley’s blood, and my heart pounded so quickly in my chest that I thought it might explode from me.

“We can talk through this once we get Koen free,” he said, lowering his shoulders so our eyes met. “I see you're slipping. I see you, Vengeful. But we’ve got to get him out first and I can’t save you both at the same time.” His words were soft and struck true, burrowing themselves through the shadows around my vision.

It will never be you.

My heart constricted in my chest so painfully in that moment of realization that I felt as though I couldn’t breathe. I was never going to escape this place. There were no chances left for me. I had run my course. It wasn’t them I needed to convince. It was the Manor.

“Stop,” I screamed, “right now!” I yelled again. “You don’t listen. You’ve never listened!”

“Enough!” Wesley yelled back.

“No!” I pushed back against him, fighting against the dark intentions to find the person in me who could still make a reasonable decision but, it was like wading through wet sand. With each labored step I took to find myself, the woman who would do anything to keep them safe, I was dragged back into the endless dark and false love that had once felt safe and welcoming.

The comfort of a suffocating love I had known and survived for years was right there, reaching out its hand and begging me to come home, but…

“Florence?” Clay’s voice broke through but it was weak and, even though I could see him, darkness curled at the edges of my vision.

The pained tremor in his voice dislodged something in me, that slid into place in my soul and locked. I did not belong to anyone. I was not something to be owned. Koen’s warm laughter echoed through me, and I heard his voice over the venomous whispers. “ Your dreams are my dreams” .

Vicious claws tried to reach out and snatch away the thoughts as they came, when I then heard Clay, from the first day in the flower field, “You could be anything you wanted now- given the chance.” I had wanted so badly to be given such a chance. Then it was Wesley's hazel eyes, dark and serious, and full of something I had yet to uncover. “You are not a monster. I was wrong.”

You belong to me.

The Manor’s hold was everlasting.

I looked down at myself, dressed in my skirts and corset, and hissed. There was never any chance of me escaping my prison. It had welcomed them in because it had known there was no possible way for me to be freed, unless it allowed it. Everything was always at the behest of this place, its walls a foreboding barricade that no one could breach- least of all me. It could play with time, with my mind, and with my life, allowing me to heal or suffer at its own discretion. It was too strong.

The Manor was too strong. For me and for them. Koen’s hollow screams of agony cascaded up and pushed like an anvil on my back. An idea sparked and my shoulders tensed with resolve. It could keep my body but my heart was my own and I could choose who it belonged to.

There was no other choice. I shut my eyes, delving deep into the anger the Manor so desperately wanted me to succumb to, swimming through the rage and finding a dark chamber within my heart to cower in while I did what must be done.

The only thing I could think of that might save them all.

“I never wanted you here, and I don’t want you here now. You were never anything more than unwanted guests. If you don’t leave, the Manor will take you all, and I won’t stop it. ”

“You don’t mean that,” Clay whispered.

“I do.” I stepped back from him. There was only one way to be convincing, to convince the Manor that my betrayal was real. “Did you think I could love you?” I said to him. “I never did. I was using you. I’m a monster, I’m not capable of love.”

“You’re lying.” Clay shook his head, tears pricked at the corners of his eyes. “You can say it, you can scream it, but you don’t believe it. I don't believe it. ” His eyes followed mine as I shifted to look at Wesley, who had gone still.

Koen’s screams flooded the hall.

“This is not the time for you two to fight,” Wesley growled.

I dug deep, down into the dark depths of my heart and soul, the place where the Manor had embedded itself like glass shards into my skin, and I ripped the hatred from my flesh.

“I mean every word.”

The door clicked open.

Everything opened, it was a visceral feeling that rattled through the Manor as every window and door that had once been barred tore open.

“Go!”

Wesley didn’t wait but Clay stood staring at me at the top of the stairs.

“I don’t believe you.” His tone was low and tight.

“Get Koen,” I urged him, just trying to hold it together long enough for the house to believe it. “And get out.”

I had to stay.

I was the heart of the Manor.

But they were mine.