Chapter 181

My adrenaline-drained muscles begged for a break, the sound of my running the only thing I could hear.

I crouched by a tree, catching my breath that had been lost somewhere in the fight for my survival.

I still held a violin bow in my hand, as if it would save me from something. However, my mind was focused on who was trying to kill me and how I was going to get out of there. How would I get home when this was a vast forest, and I had no idea which way to go except the one I used to take every day?

Wasn’t that house supposed to be safe? How could there be an intruder?

Or was it not?

I wiped the sweat from my forehead with the back of my hand and stood up, alert to any unwanted movement.

At any moment, he could appear.

At any moment, I could die.

Please.

I need to live.

"You run more than you should."

I managed to make the weapon fall from his hand, but his ability to adapt was quicker than mine, leading him to place one hand on my neck and the other pressing against my torso, making my chest race.

That voice reminded me of no one, which only heightened my desperation, along with the aggressive need to escape. I tried to fight back, headbutting and kicking, but the man was strong enough to keep me immobilized.

My body searched for any area that was agile enough to break him, until my elbow hit his face, making him stagger and growl furiously.

"You bitch!"

When I turned around, his image—brown hair, poorly-kept beard, and casual clothes—was completely unfamiliar to me.

I didn’t know that son of a bitch.

The man ran to grab his weapon from the ground, but I got there first, attempting to shoot or do whatever I could. My irrationality wasn’t helping me think straight, which delayed my reaction and gave the man the chance to punch me.

I collapsed on my back, but I didn’t drop the weapon. I wouldn’t drop it, even if I died right there.

I positioned myself, ready to fire at him, but the first shot missed, only causing a few birds to take flight. The second time didn’t happen. The trigger wouldn’t pull.

There were no bullets.

His disgusting smile sent chills down my spine.

He didn’t hesitate to attack me, trying to suffocate me now that the weapon wasn’t an option.

I tried to get his filthy hands off me, but the pain kept expanding, reaching my lungs. I nearly broke my teeth from the suffocation, about to see stars behind my eyes.

I couldn’t die.

I wouldn’t let that bastard kill me.

I could have asked so many questions, thought about so many things to help me understand what was happening, but the fight to not be killed by that man made me grab my bow and slice his throat.

My rage made the cut deep, without any shame as the blood poured over my clothes, even touching my face, around my mouth.

His open mouth in pure agony quickly stopped making any sound. He stopped breathing. He stopped moving. He stopped living.

His dead body fell onto the old grass, forming a pool of blood that stank, scared me, and broke me.

I didn’t stop.

The fear of him waking up coursed through my veins, and I stabbed again. In and out of his torso. His stomach. Even his face. I screamed loudly, the hate coursing through me bringing out a dark, primitive side of myself.

I kept sinking the bow into his lifeless body, not stopping until the blood was like water on my clothes. I didn’t stop until I picked up a stone nearby and smashed his skull, the bones cracking in the forest, his eyes nearly popping out of their sockets, his brains almost having a life of their own, painting the disaster I had created.

That was cruel art.

The old grass turned into a red lake.

My fingers nervously trembled. My body pulsed sharply. My heart became a pump.

Unconsciously, I stood up, swaying to the side, heading toward wherever my body would take me.

I stared at my hands in disbelief, speechless, unable to occupy my mind with anything.

I felt empty.

Lifeless.

Destroyed.

I killed someone.

Everything in me hurt as if I had cut myself with the bow.

As if every shot had hit me and drained every ounce of my sanity.

I killed someone.

But I also killed myself.

Any purity in me had evaporated.

Before the sun set, I spotted the door that would take me home. It was a long walk in which I felt like I was leaving behind the pure fragments that still belonged to me. Now I was made of bones, chaos, and demons.

I had the same demons as those bastards. I went down the stairs, feeling my legs burn, and the moment my feet hit the ground, Jaxon appeared.

I didn’t have the courage to look at him. I didn’t have the courage to even breathe in front of someone. I was numb, dysfunctional, lost in my sanity.

He didn’t approach. The only thing I heard was:

"Dante, you better get here."

I shrank back in fear as I heard his footsteps approaching.

However, my magnetism was stronger, and as soon as I locked eyes with him, my body reacted.

His irises spared no sign of the calamity crackling within them. His face was covered in steel, entirely shaped by storms and wars.

Dante stared at me as if I were the reason his most perverse and destructive side would appear.

He looked at me as if the Universe were too small and finite for what he would do the moment I opened my mouth.

"Who hurt you?"

His rage could have killed someone from a distance.

My voice froze. Not from fear, but from the lack of courage to say what happened. What I had done.

Dante stepped closer, gently holding my face, inspecting the marks the man probably left on my neck, on my dirty clothes, and on my pathetic state.

"Who did this to you?"

There was no feeling other than a storm of rage in every damn word.

Dante was a storm ready to crush anyone.

Yet, my voice was timid. I didn’t want to confess. What I had done was too much to say.

"Tell me you killed the son of a bitch. Tell me you wiped him out because if I know he's still breathing, I'll burn the entire city down and I don’t care who dies."

"Dante…"

"Say it, Emília. Say it."

My chest vibrated intensely.

"I killed him. God, I killed him."

The crying came uncontrollably, a loud scream from what was reacting inside me.

I only felt my body being lifted, my head settling on a shoulder, and Dante’s shallow breath against my neck.

"I killed him," I repeated, breaking the syllables with the tears.

"You were a good girl. No one who hurts you should get away with it. No one."

My crying continued. Emptying my pain. Emptying my rage. Emptying the fire inside me.

"Cry as much as you need, and I’ll take care of you," he murmured.

"And kill everyone who thought they could try anything against what’s mine."