[Completed] Amira is a human who finds herself thrust into a world she doesn't know. Once she wakes up in the strange town of Woling, she has to fight to regain the memories of the evils she committed in order to keep her past from destroying everyt...
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A soft breeze whispered through the house, carrying the smell of wet grass with it up the stairs, down the halls, and into my room where it woke me up with a tickle under my nose. The smell stirred something similar to nostalgia and before I even fully woke from the deep sleep, I was already padding out of the bedroom.
I paused for a moment at the top of the stairs, no one was out and about. No one even guarding the door to my room. I stared at the beautiful picture on the wall, blinking away some of the sleep.
Slowly I made my way down the creaking steps, cringing at each squeak and hoping no one would wake up and make me go back to the room.
The front door hung open wide, which had me halting my trek. This place was usually pretty hellbent on security now that The Council was here, I highly doubt that someone just left the door wide open– then I saw Axle outside, leaning against a wooden pillar on the front porch with an unlit cigarette between his lips. Like the Marlboro man, but he wasn't trying to sell smoking, in this moment he owned it, it was a trademarked part of him that no one could take away. Just like his honey eyes, and his woodsy smell that a perfume company should just figure out how to bottle already.
"You know, smoking kills," I stepped out, leaning against the opposite side of the same beam. The night was the kind of still that you only get right after it rains, when all the animals are sheltering and the bugs burrowed deep in the ground.
"There are a lot of things in this world that kill," He mused and flicked open an engraved silver lighter. "I like being able to control one of them."
"Poetic, but I think that's been said before."
"Probably."
Typically, I don't think I would've found the smell of smoke comforting. Even when that scent was heavy on Axle, but at this moment, with the cicadas singing in the trees, and the light smoke mingling with every outdoorsy smell that there was, I had never felt more at ease. Axle was just an insanely calming presence, nothing about him was chaos, or unstable. He's the anchor.
He existed now with that cigarette in his mouth just like he always had, and always would.
"I'm sorry," Axle spoke after a long moment and I peaked further around the pillar with my brows furrowed.
"What for?"
"For not being able to protect you sooner," He blew out a long breath. "When you first came into the diner, I was so... so completely blindsided that I could barely even see what had happened to you. I couldn't protect you then, and now.. now I'm trying. I'm really trying."
"There are more things that we can't control in this life than things that we can," The cicadas sung louder.
"There are more things in heaven and earth–"
"–than dreamt of in your philosophy," I completed and Axle looked at me with a small smile.
"You know Shakespeare?" I puffed out my chest.
"I think everyone on Earth can quote that line, but yes. Hamlet. There aren't many things to do in that room up there you know," I teased and Axle winced.
"I'm sorry that we haven't been able to spend more time together, and that you've been so... trapped."
"You have nothing to be sorry for. I'm sorry. I come into your life, bleed everywhere, bring this elusive Council to your doorstep– really I'm far more trouble than I'm worth," Axle chuckled and dropped the cigarette onto the ground. I frowned as it mashed up under with the toe of his boot into a smoldering mess on the damp step, leaving only a wisp of ash in it's wake. "Littering, that's something that you can be sorry for."
"I needed to get it out of the way for a moment," He replied absently, pushing himself off of the pillar and I blinked at him confused as he walked around to stand before me. "I'll pick it up after this."
"After what–" I cut my own words off, my air catching as his warm breath fanned over my cheeks, the smell of him filling my nose. Intoxicating.
"You're beautiful you know," My cheeks burned.
"Like a thousand wildflowers," His hooded eyes were bright in the dim light, a content smile pulling at the corners of his lips when I spoke. Dad had said that once, I had nearly forgotten it, forgotten what it felt like to feel loved.
"Like a thousand wildflowers," he echoed.
The callouses on his hands were rough, but welcome against my cheek, leaving a trail of tingling sparks in its wake. The complete and utter adoration in his eyes had me standing unable to catch my breath in front of him, entrapped in his honey eyes even as his lips met mine.
Gods.
I was so lost within him, within this moment. For the tiniest of eternities, nothing existed but us. My hands combed through his hair to try and disguise their pleasurable tremble and pulled him even deeper into the kiss. The best possible kind of flutter in my stomach- nothing had ever felt so right.
And then it was over.
Pain like nothing I had ever experienced raced through every nerve in my body. A strangled cry was the only noise I could even manage making Axle immediately pull away, frantically searching over me to try and find out what was wrong. Gods, what could be wrong? It had all been so fucking perfect!
His words felt like a million light-years away, and I could barely even see his lips moving behind the flashing lights in my head, let alone hear them.
Raging red eyes flashed before me, words hissed but I couldn't make them out.
The necklace.
It pulsed against my skin and was obviously the only logical source for the pain. My hand blindly grabbed at it, teeth grinding together as the sensations increased tenfold the moment I hooked my fingers around the chain. How that was possible was beyond my scope of knowledge because it already felt like every single cell in my body was being pried apart from the inside out.
There was a warm touch on my back, and somehow it gave me the smallest amount of strength I needed to yank as hard as I possibly could.
Everything stopped.
Maybe it stopped because that killed me.
No, that would be too easy.
The glittering chain fell onto the ground at my feet. The pain was gone, the only evidence I had felt it at all was how unnaturally fast my heart was slamming away in my chest.
Axle took me up into his arms and I buried my face into his chest, getting drunk on his warmth and how safe he smelled. I didn't even realize I was crying until a salty drop made its way between my lips.
Funny how you never notice how loud and confusing your head is until it's calm, and quiet, and free.
Free.
I was free for the split second that it took for me to place one of my dominant emotions.
Fear spawned by heaven and hell crushing rage.
Gods, Eon was pissed.
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