“Fuck off!” Haven hissed.
My head throbbed suddenly. So suddenly that I very nearly released the bitch.
Dizziness and nausea swarmed within me. A strange pain erupted on my arm. It felt like thousands of needles numbing my skin. That was the only description I could think of. It raced from the tips of my fingers, up my arm, and then down my body.
Suddenly, I couldn’t move.
I kept my eyes squeezed shut as I was kicked unceremoniously onto the rocky ground. It was the strangest sensation to not know if you had a body. To have your sense of sight ripped away. To not feel your toes wiggle or your fingers grasp at dirt. Only my brain existed in this strange world. I was disembodied, a shell of myself.
“Making eye-contact may turn you into stone, but my snakes?” Her lips touched my ear, and I wanted to shiver in revulsion. “They paralyze you.”
Well.
Fuck.
I finally dared to open up my eyes.
Haven stood over me, smirking, and as I watched in rapt horror, she bent down to pick me up. I may have been skinny, but I wasn’t a short damsel. Still, the Gorgon didn’t struggle as she dumped me over her shoulder.
“You know, I might’ve liked you, Z. We could’ve even been friends.”
Somehow, my lips were able to move. They were the only thing besides my eyelids that were able to.
“Please don’t.”
Haven released a heavy sigh.
“I wish I could,” she said softly. I almost wanted to believe the sincerity in her voice, but I wasn’t stupid. “Aaliyah gave me life in exchange for this one task.”
“Me?”
“I’m not ready to die,” she said earnestly. “Between you and me, I choose me.”
Hatred did not begin to encapsulate what I felt for this motherfucker.
I opened my mouth to retort something snarky, probably along the lines of, “But I choose me, cocksucking bitch” when I realized I couldn’t get my lips open. Panic settled heavily in my chest with the strength of a tsunami, drowning me.
Would my breathing go next? I wondered if it would be horribly painful to choke from lack of air.
Stomach sinking, all I could do was focus on the twinkling stars blinking in and out of existence. I would be like those stars if Haven had her way with me.
“It’s not like you’re going to live much longer anyway,” she continued. “I know denial when I see it. I can sense death-” Her voice broke off abruptly.
In a span of seconds, I was dropped to the ground, but no pain registered. I moved my eyes rapidly to the side just in time to see Haven’s blank gaze and pretty head.
Disconnected from the rest of her body.
The snakes were dead as well, cascading around her in a kaleidoscope of color. A figure dressed in black stood over her, a katana sword held in his or her hand.
Terror blinded me, momentarily overcoming the paralyzation from the snake bites. This motherfucker had just killed a Gorgon with an ease that left me baffled. He - or she - knew exactly how to stop the bitch.
I was jostled as I was grabbed once more, head nestled beneath someone’s chin. I couldn’t see who was holding me, and my body thrummed with pent-up tension.
As we walked, we passed the statues of my mates. I was relieved to see the stone chipping away to reveal skin and vibrant colored hair. I nearly sobbed with relief. They were alive.
The unknown figure gently set me down on a stone bench, and I felt fingers brush my hair out of my face - the only part of my body that wasn’t completely numb. There was so much tenderness in that one gesture that my heart caught in my throat. I willed my head to move, to look at the figure, but it remained stubbornly frozen.
There was a ruffle of fabric, and I knew my savior was gone.
Just like the stars.
NINETEEN
Z
The next couple hours were chaos.
If you could call it that. Chaos didn't even begin to encapsulate all that occurred. Someone, probably a noble girl and her lover, were dallying in the garden when they came across my prone body. My prone, unmoving body.
Well...
Screaming at the top of their lungs that they found Zara dead did not bode well for them.
In a span of seconds, I felt tantalizingly light fingers brush my hair, the palm of his hand curving around my cheek. He let out a broken sob, burrowing his face into my neck. I wanted to tell Ryland that I was still alive, still breathing, but the words got stuck in my throat. I couldn't even blink anymore, my eyes trapped in a perpetual state of awkward staring.
"Give her to me!" a different voice growled. I recognized it, but I had never heard it like that before. Raspy, almost. Distorted with a guttural growl. Ryland hissed something indecipherable before I felt my body being lifted.
Felt. The irony of that term.
Bash stroked my hair rapidly, repeatedly, his hand trembling with each desperate movement. I wanted to yell at him to stop. My body, if I had been in control of it, would've tensed.
It was all fine and dandy to act like you actually gave a shit about somebody when you thought they were dead. Despite the whispers of love, I couldn't stop thinking about his hand in Cassie's as she pulled him away. What had they done? Where had they gone? I knew I wouldn't like the answers to either of those questions.
Still, I allowed myself to be held by him. To pretend that he actually cared about me, maybe even loved me. But with any fairytale, there was always a catch. The clock striking twelve and turning the prince into a frog - or however that story
