Chapter 34

If death was a sound, I think I could hear it. I had only been hearing the sound of my breath and an occasional whistle of birds, everything else was a ringing in my ear and complete numbness. A pungent smell of nearly blown-out candle vapor violently hit my nose, a painful reminder that I was still alone, and almost in complete darkness. But at least the stab wound had stopped leaking… still so very painful, but my body had reacted well considering.

I couldn"t explain what was going on in my head, there was pressure and cloudiness. The pitiful stinging of my skin between my thighs burned like a fire had been lit under my flesh, another reminder… that I was nothing but property to a deranged man, who was nowhere to be seen.

That fucking morbid asshole. The illicit dull ache at the tips of my female organ, right near my stomach made my chest hurt. This was raw and bitter. I crumbled, letting all my senses flood me into a heart-wrenching state of overwhelm. At least no one would see me die like this. And no matter how much I cried out, no one would hear me. The cabin was practically soundproof, it was very well structured so nothing could get in or out unless you had a key or a battering ram. It didn't have windows, nor gaps, not even a tiny any would be granted entry… or exit.

I eventually lured the strength to open my eyes again, drawing them to the tiny flame on the candle wick as it fought for survival… like me. I watched it fade and glow again, before finally subsiding to darkness and into nothing but a puddle of dried wax on the wooden beamed floor.

I sobbed for however long time allowed me, letting it swallow me like an unholy realm. I knew for sure that I was going to die here. Alone. Unless by some miracle Huxley found me, if that was possible. Damon had darted off into the sunset like Usain Bolt never to be seen again, the coward. The thought of him suffering ached my heart. I wondered all the ways of how the void would hurt Huxley, or rather, what she would make him do to himself.

Because what else do you do when you're staring at the same four walls with nothing but the sound of the tick-tock thump in your brain from your own heartbeat? Nothing but wallow in your own vicious mind. The silence was loud and painful. And when you have been through hell, it was very easy to fall into a pitiful shitshow. The voice, she was like a siren, or an ancient goddess maybe. Able to manipulate and tangle her thick venom under your skin and right through your veins. I trailed off remembering that he had roman type numerals on his journal, and rune-like lettering on his ring.

She was strong like she had a direct link to his veins and mind. She had said that she could feel him, and all that he felt. But was she just false perceptions? It was often he appeared high on a drug, with instant personality changes. Maybe that was all it was, though that doesn"t explain why I had heard the voices. The hallucinations had clearly been hard enough for him to control as it was, especially at dusk. It made sense why he was like a wolf under the moon at sundown… because when the sun goes does, the darkness rises. Sleep and eternal rest live there, and if you don"t pay up your end of the bargain, guess who comes knocking?

I shook my weary head, pushing aside the ridiculous theory. Hallucinations. A God? One, maybe more that weren"t the only one in the Holy Bible. Was I living a lie? Was I even real? I blinked hard as if to double-check that I was human, and doing human-like things… my theory confirmed… I was definitely human. Of course I was, I had memories. I had a past before all of this. I washed back into the recollection of what my life was like back at home… before the shadow man.

Home.

My mornings were spent making coffee and burning breakfast toast with Tilly. Laughing on the couch under her warm crochet blanket, watching stupid movies. I didn"t realise how much I would miss school. But I did. Even the cafe, and my shitty ass boss. How could I miss that? I couldn"t tell, but I did. Drawing butterflies in my room, spending hours taxidermying them before putting them in beautiful little shadow boxes and hanging them on the wall. Listening to Imogen Heap painfully loud in my room.

I started to hum the lyrics to Speeding Cars, my ultimate favorite song of hers. I remember coming home from college one day screaming with excitement and showing Tilly, Imogen"s music, which I had only discovered that day. I would give anything to be back home with her, even if it meant being forced to watch that stupid fucking movie Fifty Shades of Grey and listening to her sexual encounters without scoffing at her profanity.

My poor Tilly. My heart broke and heaved. But I decided that maybe… he hadn"t killed her, knowing that it would hurt me. I needed to hold onto a fray of hope at the very least. Not even Huxley, nor Damon, nor any of the Whitlock brothers had hurt me like the pain I feel right now. And not in the physical sense. This was emotional pain and one that was much stronger than physical.

I cried a long time, and sadness and more beads of sweat cloaked me, though I had no tears left to sob. Then, with heavy eyelids, I let myself drift once more. Welcoming the darkness like an old friend.

I fought every cell in my body to force my eyes open again, which was getting harder and harder to do each time. Because were they really open or not? I couldn"t feel them… my face was still numb and my hands were tied behind my back. And the darkness was so dark, I couldn"t tell if they were open or closed… I was blind. Physically or mentally? I didn"t know. My breath was weak.

Another pitiful reminder of the hellfire that was my reality. When I finally pried them open, a faint but blurred ray of light tickled from the door frame behind me, and reflected on the walls again. But the vision was gone as fast as it had appeared, and I fell apart like a broken record for what seemed like hours. I cherished the memories that pained and comforted me… some feeling like a hallucination that I was actually experiencing.

Others were like a nightmare that I was certain I experienced. I was losing the lateral difference between reality and fiction. And I had started talking to myself. I knew I was losing my mind… lost my mind. Because despite how much I wanted to be home and reverse the clock back to how it was. I wanted to be in the arms of Huxley, more. He was my ultimatum.

My shadow.

I talked with my imaginary self again, having not much else to say other than hearing her sing lyrics from the song The Sound of Silence by Simon and Garfunkel.

Hello darkness, my old friendI"ve come to talk with you againBecause a vision softly creepingLeft its seeds while I was sleepingAnd the vision that was planted in my brainStill remainsWithin the sound of silence

In restless dreams, I walked alone…

I didn"t hear the rest, because, like the light in my eyes, the border between day and night fell in pattern. And I faded along with it. I collapsed my head forward over the back of the chair, and darkness and silence swallowed me whole all over again.

I woke once more, greeted by a faint ray of light and sweltering heat. Like my body was engulfed in flames, realising that my breath was barely existent, struggling to split oxygen from moisture. My head pounded and my throat was hoarse, my mouth failed to pool saliva for me to swallow, no matter how many times I asked it. I managed to stay mostly awake, and it had taken me too long to make sense that the lines were daylight reflections beaming through the tiniest of gaps in the door. I was counting the lines on the wall. But I was sure they were just deliriums.

The shadows with time, recoiled a 180-degree pattern before fading into nothing again, my proof that another day had passed.

I grumbled as I came to once more. I didn't want to wake up anymore, I was done. Exhausted. Praying to whoever would listen to me, to just let me die. God wasn't on my side, or so I thought. Fuck that monotheistic piece of shit. I was always loyal to Him… there would be no way He would let me die this way… if He was real. The Bible had been wrong all those years. I scoffed mentally, maybe Satan and Death were real? Who cares, you"re a goner anyway.

I had counted consciously three times that the subtle pattern of light had moved from one side of the cabin to the other. The heat of the summer"s day heating the cabin, made a regular sauna back at home feel like a fucking fridge. My brain fog had only gotten more defective. As, despite the outrageous heat, the sweat had stopped sprouting from my skin somewhere along the way. Evident that I was dehydrated and deteriorating.

The tingling sensation that began over my face, and the tips of my fingers and my feet had spread to midway through my arms and legs, trailing down my spine. And for some strange reason, my face didn"t move the way that it was supposed to, even when I had tried to scrunch my face up. It felt… saggy? If that wasn"t bad enough, the voices had gotten so haunting they became my only friends. Hearing them teetering in and out in echoes. Some were close, and some were far away, almost like someone was calling out for my name. But I knew for sure that they weren"t. I had to pay my deliriums no concern because that was all they were.

I had been in here for three days. Talking to myself had become a hobby and somewhat pleasurable. I had begun seeing things that weren"t there. I had seen the horns of Huxley's shadow, which was impossible. I had hallucinated being in my old room at the apartment… he was climbing into it from the window. Only this time I welcomed him in. He even took off his mask and lay beside me, telling me about his day in the lab. He was a biochemist… just a regular guy who liked to sing and play piano with his wife… me. We kissed, loved hard, and then he brushed my hair to sleep. But then, I woke up. It was a kick to the guts.

I had never felt so hollow and broken in my life. I felt empty without him. I eventually wore tired of arguing with myself and drifted into gloom again.

A dull, distorted voice echoed in my brain, no different than it usually did. I stirred but remained heavy within my body. My breath crackled, like phlegm had built up but no strength to cough it up. My head pounded to the rhythm of my heart, which was slower than it was the last time I had woken. Which was however long ago now. I lost count after counting to three days. All I knew, was that I had been here long enough for a human body to shut down.

I knew I was dying. Everywhere hurt. Everything ached. Everything was numb. I had lost control of my body, and now apparent that I was sitting in a puddle of my own filth. Not that I had any memory of shitting myself, I couldn't be certain of when I had eaten last. How embarrassing. At least no one was here to see this.

I tilted my head slightly, hearing the same vocal note echo again. I sighed, damn these fucking apparitions. It was almost like the sound was loud so many miles away, but by the time it had reached me, it was nothing but a faint murmur. I hated arguing with myself that they weren"t real because I think living delirious beliefs was worse than hearing them in the first place. I heard it again, making sense that it really did sound like a siren. I sighed again in defeat, knowing I was for sure on my way to death. Had the hallucinations really come that hard? The voices always sounded so realistic.

"Esmeralda." A warped voice hooted. It was much clearer this time, and closer. I fluttered my eyes but the blurred fuzz wouldn't budge. I tried to pull myself together, but all I could manage was a faint moan and I fell into darkness again. I welcomed it, for it took my pain and phantasms away.

I blinked from the odd sensation of the blacks of my eyelids suddenly going red. Yet another string of light bellowing into the cabin from behind the door. Light… Jesus. Heaven!

I could see an Angel or mythical being float down from the ceiling, casting a beam of white light. My life flashed before my eyes, only realising that it wasn"t my life. They got it all wrong. The myths. Your life did not flash before your eyes… your life as how you wanted it to be, did. I was certain, because all I saw in my flashes, was my future with Huxley, and nothing of my past. It was like a camera scrolling on screen, flashing from one memory to another. Living in his mansion, I was sleeping peacefully in his bed.

Another playing the piano with him. We wed, gosh he looked beautiful in a suit. All the brothers except Damon were there. Ruby and Tilly were my bridesmaids. There was not a chain, rope, lake or shadow in sight. He lived in happiness with me without his mask… without his shadow. Then he was in the garden holding a pink blanket, cradling a baby. A daughter. Our daughter. Feeling a sense of honor in taking a murderer"s last name, Esmeralda Jane Whitlock, and to birth his child. The visual took my breath away. I suddenly coughed, spluttering briefly back to consciousness, I was fading fast. But the Angel standing before me was in no hurry.

I took a wounded breath and closed my eyes again in a drift to dream of my shadow… if I couldn't die in his arms at least I would die with him in my brain as my last thought. Albeit, it made no sense, to fall in love with and dream of a murderer. But he wasn't just any murderer. He was mine. And I was his. I wanted nothing more right now than for him to hold me as I took my last breath. I will die here alone, in moments to come… I think. I was sure I could feel it. I felt truly sad if it was possible to feel sadness before you died. And no one other than Mother Nature itself would find me, as my carcass would eventually be consumed by insects and other flesh-eating creatures long before anyone found me.

And then those insects will eventually diminish six feet underground, then maybe a tree will blossom from my flesh. That theory made me happy. The circle of life. Although mostly cruel, there is beauty behind it. Like those girls in the lake. They too will recycle back into Mother Nature. New life will form, grow, and live. Like Alison Krauss from the movie Bambi quotes. Even when you can"t see it, inside everything, there is life. After the rain, the sun will reappear, there is life. After the pain, the joy will still be here. There is life. For it"s out of the darkness, that we learn to see. And all that we dream of, awaits patently.

I could hear soft voices from the white light that was an Angel before me, almost like the pearly gates were calling. I made mild sense of my body being nudged and tugged, the Angel was untying me to take me to heaven. Apparent that my arms were no longer bound behind me, and my limp body was cradled like a newborn infant in the being"s arms. My hair was tenderly brushed away from my face.

I wondered what Angels looked like, but if I were to open my eyes would it disappear and not take me to the abode of God? Because that was something I remember my mother telling me as a child, with the Tooth Fairy and St. Nicholas, if I stayed awake they wouldn"t come to me. And so, I summoned with what little strength I had to pull my nearly lifeless eyes up to see the light, to see heaven. But it flickered by too fast before I collapsed again. And what I saw was no white-winged, halo-wearing mythical creature and there had been no pearly golden gates, or harps being played. It was an unfamiliar stature.

A man with pale skin and two big, bright amber eyes as soft as lambs was burning into me. He was glowing like a hypnotic realm and had deep scars trailing down his face. I had never seen a more beautiful and terrifying being in my entire life. He was panting heavily as though he had searched the earth below and the sky above for me. A tear had formed under the gleam of his eye before he spoke.

"I am yours to the very end. I will set this right, I promise. And then you will be mine." His voice whispered tenderly, with need and desperation. Almost identical to the way Huxley spoke to me in my hallucinations. And it was again, just another helpless delirium.

With a deep barely existent, shallow breath my body stilled and fell heavier than the last. I never thought I would relish my last breath, the solace it brought me as the welcoming scent of pine, blood and moisture filled my nose. And that glowing green amulet pulsating against his bare chest as it flickered between my eyelashes, letting it become the last thing I saw.

The darkness closed in on me without permission, and I accepted it gladly. Because my shadow… Came for me. Hunted… Hunter.