Chapter 14 The Descent 3 (first encounter)
Eloise
She had found me.
My sister had found me at last. She'd come to take me away from this horrible place.
I stumbled a step forward, my cheeks hurting by how wide I was smiling. Mae's smile was doctor as she stepped forward too. I faintly heard someone call my name but their voice faded into the background.
Mae finally got to me and wrapped me in a hug. I hugged her back with the same enthusiasm but something felt wrong. I couldn't shake the gnawing feeling that I was forgetting something. I shook it off. There was nothing I was forgetting, my sister was here.
“I'm so sorry I abandoned you, Eloise.” She muttered as she gently stroke my hair.
“You found me.” I choked out a sob.
“I'm sorry it's too so long, dear sister. We can go home now. I promise to make it up to you.” she purred.
Her caress became softer, almost like she was trying to convince me, but I didn't need convincing. I wanted to go home so badly.
Home.
Home.
Ho–
I couldn't leave. I needed to finish…something. I needed to get back to it now. My thoughts were scattered. I couldn't remember what I was doing. I tried to, but each time, I came up with blank results. It was like a mental wall had erected in my mind, blocking my memories.
I have to finish it.
“Eloise, come home with me.” my sister's comforting voice came again.
I shook my head slightly, unsure why I was refusing to go with her, but more than willing to figure it out.
The smile on Mae's face wavered slightly, her eyes twitched. It only lasted for a second, but it was enough for the mental wall around my mind to collapse entirely. I backed away immediately. Only then did I hear Aeron, screaming my name from where he stood.
Aeron.
The Descent.
And just like that, I snapped out of it. Unintentionally, I summoned a faelight, just in time to see my sister's face melt away, and replaced with someone else. I stumbled backwards as Father stood before me, his favorite whip in his hand.
I knew that whip very well. He'd brought it out the first time I tried to run away. He had never used it on me, but the promise of it had been enough to keep me in line. Maybe today was the day he finally used it.
I stared back to see Aeron rooted in a spot. He seem to be fighting a physical war with his body but he couldn't move.
He couldn't move.
The confusion settled in me as my faelight glowed brighter. I expected the intense pain I had felt earlier when I summoned the faelight, but nothing came. It was just my unstable, too bright that it blinds, faelight.
Father, or thing that was wearing his skin, strode towards me, his whip wrapped tightly around his hand. With every step he took forward, I took another one back. I couldn't let him touch me, I had a feeling I wouldn't survive it.
Aeron was screaming something now. I threw a quick glance at him and the sight almost made me vomit. His eyes had turned white, just like the girl we saved had, and the veins in his body bobbed like it was about to pop. His right arm was twisted at an unnatural angle.
I tried to focus on the words he was mumbling but he was speaking too fast, too loud. But one word had caught my attention regardless.
“Illusion.”
My gaze snagged back to Father and he grinned widely. He raised his hand and–
Crack.
The first hit of the whip came. My hands shot up, taking the brute of it and protecting my face. Pain sliced through my arm and I screamed.
Illusion.
Another whip appeared in his hand, this one was longer and more sturdy. Before I could fully register it, the hit came, faster and more painful. I fell to the ground, clutching my side.
I brought my fingers to my face and recoiled at the sight of my own blood. But when I blinked, the blood was gone. The pain in my side remained, and it seemed to increase with each passing second. The faelight above outr head glowed brighter, like my pain was fueling it.
“Look at you, slumped to the ground, dejected, just like the disgrace you are.” Father sneered.
My eyes transfixed on his shiny, spotless boots. I couldn't bring myself to look at him, to see him use that whip on me again and again and again. So I remained on the floor, curled to myself.
“You're a disgrace, Eloise.”
Crack.
“An anomaly.”
Crack.
“You're a weakling that doesn't deserve to live. You only hurt people around you. Your unstable magic puts everyone in danger. That's why everyone left you. Maevyth, your parents, even your own wolf abandoned you.”
Crack. Crack. Crack.
I felt the hit of the whips all over my body. I felt the pieces of my uniform tear, blood trickling down the open wound. I was kneeling in a pool of my own blood. Every word I had ever thought to myself was whispered back to me.
The memory of my eighteenth birthday flashed across my mind and one thing suddenly stood out more than the other. The fear on their faces, in their voices, their uncertainty tainting the air, and Mae's last words.
“Remember that I love you, Eloise.”
“You don't deserve to be loved. You deserve to die alone in this place.” The thing that was father said.
I almost believed him, almost gave in to that convincing voice in my head that told me he was right. That I didn't deserve love, I didn't deserve to live. But–
“Remember that I love you, Eloise.”
“Do you think Maevyth ever loved you?” the thing snorted in amusement. “She lied. Everything in your life is a lie. Nobody loves you. Nobody ever will.”
“Remember that I love you, Eloise.”
I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to ignore the small voice that sounded a lot like Father's. Instead, I focused on my sister's last words. I held onto it tightly like a lifeline. I replayed my cherished memories in my head to drown out the last memory I had of them.
I replaced the fear with happiness. I replaced Mae's grief with her encouragement. The hits from the whips had grown lesser. My thoughts had ebbed away the pain and I no longer felt it.
But the voice was still there. It grew more persistent as it asked me, forced me to give in. To believe I had no one. To believe I deserved to die.
A sharp sting in my arm forced me to snap my eyes open. The first thing that filled my gaze was the sight of dark, golden hair. The girl we had saved.
I looked down at my arm to see a dagger impaled in it. She pulled it out roughly and the metallic scent of blood filled the air. I stared at my arm to see a small trickle of blood. The heavy pad in my uniform top had reduced the impact of the dagger. Aside from the small sting, I didn't feel any excruciating pain. Not like the one I felt when Father had whipped me.
I looked down, expecting to see a pool of blood, but nothing except sand and stone was on the ground.
The girl unsheathed another dagger on her hip and threw both of them at Aeron's arm. He fell forward, his veins retracting and his eyes returning back to normal.
“Physical pain reduces the effect of the illusion.” The girl said quickly.
I rushed to Aeron and gently removed both daggers on his arm. I tossed them on the floor. The girl picked them up and returned them to their sheaths. Aeron took a few heavy breaths, his hands patting his body as if he could still feel his veins popping.
I knew how he felt, the phantom pain from the whips still stung even now that I knew they weren't real.
“How?” Aeron choked out, pointing to the faelight I summoned.
I didn't know how to explain it, but my magic wasn't fueling the faelight, my emotions were. But before I could explain it, the girl snapped at us,
“We have to leave now before it returns.” She paused like she felt something in the air. “The countdown is near.” she added with a little more urgency.
I dragged Aeron up, making him lean on me, but I ended up leaning on him. He was a few inches taller than me.
My faelight didn't flicker out so we were able to navigate our way easier this time. The girl was at the front, leading us to where she appeared from.
“Thank you for helping us.” I said but she merely nodded her head.
We walked hurriedly in silence for a few more seconds.
“The countdown, you can feel it. How?” I asked.
The girl threw me a look over her shoulders. “Does she always talk this much?” she asked Aeron. He gave her a blank stare instead.
The truth was, I had to do something. Anything to remind me that I was no longer curled on the floor, taking the hit of my father's whip. Anything that would banish the images of my family's fear from my mind.
Maybe the girl saw that because she sighed loudly. “The cave grows hotter as it draws near. I'm Fireborn, we can feel the heat. But I already found the exit, we'll be out of here soon.”
“You found the exit and you came back for us?” Aeron asked.
The girl didn't respond but the slight tension radiating from her body was evidence enough. The heat in the cave grew until both Aeron and I could feel it.
“It's ending in seconds. We have to be quick.”
We broke into a run as the ground began shuddering beneath our feet. It shook more violently than the start of The Descent and we ran faster. The uneasy feeling I had just before the illusion took over earlier creeped into me.
I wanted to slow down but I forced myself to keep moving. The sounds of stone collapsing filled the air. We hand mere seconds left. I almost wept with joy when I saw we reached the mouth of the cave.
We made it.
The girl ran out first, then Aeron, I wasn't far behind either. Just a few more feet away. A cold, invisible force wrapped around my ankle and yanked.
I screamed as my body hit the jagged stone floor, dragged backwards, away from the exit. I heard someone shout my name but the sound was lost as stones rained down.
The cave groaned, one last violent shudder, before it collapsed. And darkness swallowed me whole.