10. Florencia

10

Florencia

I had officially declared myself insane.

Driven to madness, possibly from exhaustion, but likely from cabin fever, trapped inside the stony walls of my captor's castle.

Calling him my captor was the only way to silence the noise in my brain anytime the image of him sucking his fingers clean appeared behind my eyelids. Desire flooded down to my core at the memory, forcing me to clench my thighs to relieve the need.

Kame's head nudged under my palm, forcing it behind his ears, as if to demand a scratch.

"Well, your master let us walk, so let's not waste this freedom, shall we?" I hummed under my breath, giving him a final scratch between his eyebrows before we both moved our legs.

The Stonecrux dared not move as we exited the castle grounds, as if commanded by their ruler, though I was certain there had not been time for him to give out orders. Still, it was unnerving walking past them, even with Kame at my heels warding any threat off.

Holding my breath with every step until the gigantic, faceless stone guards were out of my peripheral, I took in my surroundings.

It was vast.

Vast, dark, nothingness.

The kind where, even with my hands just a few inches from my face, it was impossible to see. Lifting my chin up into the night sky, a gasp fell from my lips.

Not the night sky .

Pitch-black above. No moon, no stars, not a twinkle of light that gave some sort of sign of life in this world. I could have sworn I had seen them before, that first night when he brought me to the tower. The full moon, the constellations, Venus!

But there was nothing now.

"Kame?" I called out in a panic, shifting my gaze back from above, but the all-encompassing void was dizzying, disorienting, and I stumbled back.

His large body caught me, a low growl, like a warning to me. "I'm sorry, boy. I didn't realize it was so–"

Frightening.

Inside the castle, there were lights, there were sounds, and yet here, just a few steps from the walls that separated us, it was like an entirely different world. The silence was deafening, terrifyingly muted, making it so Kame's breathing was the only thing noticeable.

Or was that my breathing?

The rustling of trees blowing in the distance had the hairs on my arms coming to a stand, a squeak of a whimper leaving my mouth despite my jaw never unclenching.

"Maybe this was a bad idea," I whispered to Kame, knowing he would keep my secret.

I'd never let Camazotz see just how little it would take if he really wanted to scare me.

A sorrowful wolf howled in the distance, forcing my head to whip in the direction of the sound. My heart was suddenly the loudest thing out here, its thumping so violent, I could feel my rib cage moving with every ounce of blood that passed through its ventricles.

Kame's head nudged my hand again, this time more urgent, like he was trying to tell me something. I willed my heart to quiet, and in the process, I swear those heartbeats began to sound like paws beating the ground, getting louder as the beast approached in the darkness.

My guardian growled another warning, but there was nothing I could see. Too afraid to turn around, I began to take a step back, then another. Maybe with enough steps, I'd somehow find myself back in the light of the castle, back in the protection of its walls.

Instead, I tripped over something like a rock behind me, sliding under my foot and taking my legs from beneath me. A yell tore through my lips, but before the pain of the ground could reach me, I had been caught. Strong arms held me in the dark, my heart hammering with a speed I'd never felt in my entire life, in any previous nightmare.

"Did you find what you were looking for, my sweet, Haxia?" Camazotz's voice was a comforting sound for once, my body melting on command at the realization that I was, in fact, safe.

Safe .

With him.

Shit.

"A way out?" I snorted, deflecting with sarcasm to avoid letting my mind plant wayward thoughts into my head. "Unfortunately, it's too hard to see out here to find a way out of this place."

If he could sense my fear, he was playing it off well, allowing me the dignity to feign bravery and use him as a whetstone to sharpen my claws before digging them into him.

"You will refuse my brother when he visits you." His words came out dry, with little to no emotion as he made his demand.

I turned to face him, the darkness still enveloping us and keeping me blind. "And what if I let him save me?"

In an instant, we were inside the castle walls again. Whether he dragged me or flew me or teleported me, I couldn't tell. It was the dark abyss, and then suddenly, it wasn't, and being out of my wits and confused was starting to become the norm.

"You will not escape! He cannot save you!" His blue eye looked red.

I bit back, "I don't need saving."

Kame let out a loud huff, slumping to the ground below us as if annoyed and refusing to take a side.

The blue returned to his unmarred eye, his expression softening before he spoke. "You know nothing, witch."

That made me laugh, a loud, cackling, wicked witch of all of fucking Oz type of laughter. "No, you know nothing, Zotz." I poked at his chest plate with my index finger. The metal was hot, black, unlike anything I'd ever seen in real life, with a matte finish that had me believing it had been a part of his physique until just now.

But it was armor.

My eyes wandered, finally taking him in fully—not just pieces or parts of him, but Camazotz in his entirety. The mess of short, wavy black hair that fell over his face, the four scars that dragged over his black eye, his nose, lip. The cloak was gone today, his leathery, bat-like wings on full display, expanded like a prideful peacock.

"You stole me from my family with no warning, gave me crumbs of information that I'm simply supposed to accept, and you expect me to play along? It's you who knows nothing, god or not. There's not a Morales alive who would leave her sister scared and alone in some wasteland. My sisters will tear the fabric of reality, time, and space apart to rescue me."

"Scared?" he parroted back to me, focusing on the single word.

My one mistake.

"I am not a toy for your amusement." I did my best to fight back any sort of emotion, knowing he'd only gain pleasure from my pain or sadness.

His index finger grazed the side of my face, slowly smoothing down my jawline as he tsked. "But you play with me so beautifully, my doll." A dark smile stretched from ear to ear, one I'd yet to see on his face, one that chilled me down to my very bones.

I didn't dare push his hand away but allowed my eyebrows to show exactly what I was feeling, the folds between them proving my anger was not something he could easily placate. "I'm hungry."

Camazotz drew gratification from my request, pulling away before speaking. "There is a bath drawn in the tower and fresh clothes set out. The Silent will wait to escort you to the dining hall."

I shook my head furiously. "N-no. I'll eat alone, in my room." I wasn't convinced it was my room. In fact, I was almost positively sure that it was his, but instead, I'd practically camped out in the space.

His upper lip peeled up, something like distaste or annoyance finally reaching him. "You will dine with me or not at all, Haxia."

Before I could argue, a hoard of bats emerged between us, their wings a loud drone enveloping all around me, forcing me to shield myself from them.

Then, he was gone.

I dined with him.

Not because he deserved my company, but because I was starving and the idea of punishing myself to send a message sounded far too irrational, even in my desperate state.

The clothes set out for me were ridiculous, perfectly fit for another time, some other occasion, any other woman other than me. Then, I remembered that even the dresses, the clothing available to me here, were part of someone else's fears. I chortled at the thought of this long, midnight blue dress with dramatic, bell-flared sleeves being the cause of someone's anguish.

I stood in front of the mirror, displeased with my appearance. My hair was drab, unbrushed and frizzy. I wanted it out of my face, but before the wish could fully settle into my mind, I felt an invisible nudging beside me. A bowl of bobby pins, more ancient than the ones my grandmother used on us before fancy occasions, sat on the corner table.

I smiled, amused, confused, and every emotion in between. Had the bowl been there all along and I never noticed it? No, that would have been entirely too odd. Had it materialized from my need? Is Camazotz's domain only capable of fulfilling a wish in the most nightmarish way possible, even for a task as simple as putting my hair back?

Biting my lip with amusement, I picked the first pin between my fingers, separating the two ends before using it to hold back the first piece of stray hair. Shoving four more pins between my teeth to hold them until I was ready, I moved back in front of the mirror, diligently working to put my hair up in a makeshift French twist.

It was no glamorous look, but at least now, it was out of my face, and with this showboat of a dress, I didn't look like such a fish out of water.

Camazotz was already waiting for me, his eyes fixed on the wine glass beside his empty plate. I held my head high, fighting the trembling in my calves as I passed one of The Silent, waiting for their master's order.

"So you came." The satisfaction in his words made every part of me want to turn on my heels and march right back up that tower.

To fight him on it.

To exert my free will.

Instead, I stiffened, pausing briefly before recomposing myself and sitting on the chair to his left. Clearing my throat, I made a show of dropping the napkin to my lap before clarifying, "I'm still fighting with you."

He breathed out a laugh. "I do not fight my captives. You fight yourself."

Camazotz was brutishly annoying, so much so that my displeasure somehow kept me from fixating on The Silent's freaky long, gray fingers serving our dinners before us.

"Captives?" I hiked an eyebrow up, "Have there been others?" I stabbed at the food on my plate, not even bothering to gaze down to see what I'd be putting in my mouth before shoving it in.

I was starving. It didn't matter. I would have probably eaten barbecued Kame on a silver platter with an apple in his mouth if any more time had passed.

The thought made me wince.

Holy Mother, Florencia, that was disturbed.

"No." His tone sounded no less annoyed. "Only you, Haxia."

"Send me home," I demanded, putting my fork down and crossing my arms over my chest.

He chuckled softly, attempting to take a bite of steak as if it was somehow a fruit and failing when the sirloin wouldn't break on his front teeth. I couldn't hold back the laugh but quickly masked my amusement.

We were still fighting.

He dropped the chunk of meat back onto his plate, his tone sobering. "No."

"But you can do it?" I pushed.

He raised an eyebrow. "Is that the question you want answered?"

"No. Tell me why I'm here. All of it . No more vague answers, no more half information. If you want me compliant, if you want me to trust you, then give me something, Zotz." The nickname forced a physical reaction from him, one he tried to cover, but not before I could notice.

He brought his tongue to the front of his teeth, sucking on something imaginary, as if it somehow helped him think. It was the most human he'd looked yet.

"You are here, Florencia Morales," he waved his hands as if gesturing to the castle, "because, I'm tired of watching my brother win, tired of everything belonging to him. You cannot go home because someone long ago convinced him that one day, you'd be his bride and that it would somehow fix everything."

"What does that mean?" I snipped, my frustration growing with only more questions.

"I do not know." He turned his head to the side. "It was not my prophecy."

There it was again: the envy .

I cleared my throat again, moving on as quickly as possible in the hopes of getting another answer from him before he decided he was no longer in an enlightening mood. "How did I get here? Where was I when you took me?"

"I do not know. It was not I who crossed you into our realm." He squeezed the stem of the wine glass between his fingers, twirling it in his hold before he brought it to his lips.

Something in my stomach sank, the food no longer fulfilling but contributing to my anxiety. "W-what do you mean? You came to me right when I arrived. You–"

"I sensed your presence. I can feel everything here, from a singular rock to peeling bark on a tree. The minute your foot touched the precipice of that canyon, I felt you. I'm sure Elio did as well, but I was quicker." He finally sipped the wine, his nose wrinkling with distaste before he spit it back into the glass then wiped the bottom of his lip with his thumb.

My heart took off before my head could truly wrap around it all. Racing inside my ribcage, it fueled my panic. I sunk my nails into my palm, trying to get my mind out of the spiral I was heading toward. I needed to bring my body back to me, to gain control of it before I unraveled in front of him.

My memory wasn't reliable, my mind wasn't a safe place.

When my powers started, I had to touch someone to enter their dreams, had to be a willing participant. When I turned fifteen, when Elisa killed our father, things changed. My OCD became impossible to control, my emotions, my trauma, my skewered thoughts took the driver's seat, and they all steered in one direction: madness.

My mental state deteriorated, and I began getting dragged into dreams. There was nothing in my control. One moment, I was at dinner, the next, I was underwater, chained inside a shark cage with no oxygen tank to keep me alive. A bad dream couldn't kill you, but that kind of life could drive a person insane.

At least, I didn't think a bad dream could kill me. After all, they weren't my dreams, I was simply a bystander invading someone else's mind. I spent my entire young adult life aching for some sort of control, living in a house with six sisters who were scared of my father. Their fears became the stuff of my nightly activities, vanquishing my father at least twice before the clock struck midnight.

Never once could he kill me—whether because they were simply dreams or because my sisters' protection was far beyond his reach.

With time, the more my powers ran amok, the more my compulsions tried to control my environment, the more I became frustrated and unreliable. Like a self-feeding cycle, one drove the other, fueling on like a famished ouroboros. The OCD got worse, my magic went haywire, my mental health struggled more, as did my powers. Days and nights were blended, reality and dreams impossible to discern from one another.

I became a paranoid shadow of myself. It all happened when I was so young that I couldn't quite remember how it was to feel free. Silly me thought if I was physically here, in the land of dreams, with no humans to bother me, that meant I could finally sleep in peace.

At least I wasn't missing big chunks of the day anymore, which told me that either The Silent, the guards, and Zotz couldn't dream, or they never slept. Whatever it was, it almost felt safe.

This was the longest I'd spent without being dragged into someone's fantasies or fears against my will. Tears welled in my eyes, and I looked down to my plate so Camazotz would miss it.

"What is that?" he asked, looking furious.

I chuckled miserably, wiping my tears with the back of my hand. "What? You've never seen a woman have a nervous breakdown before?"