[BOOK 2] "𝙞 '𝙢 𝙣𝙤𝙩 𝙨𝙖𝙮𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙮𝙤𝙪'𝙧𝙚 𝙡𝙮𝙞𝙣𝙜, 𝙗𝙪𝙩 𝙮𝙤𝙪'𝙧𝙚 𝙡𝙚𝙖𝙫𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙤𝙪𝙩 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙩𝙧𝙪𝙩𝙝."
As Junior Year begins, lies are unravelled, truths are revealed, and no one ever expects an angel to set the world on fire.
A...
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ASPEN didn't know how long she'd been knocked out cold for when she finally regained her consciousness. Her heavy eyelids fluttered open slowly, her vision blurry at first as she tried to observe her surroundings. Her skin had somehow gotten even paler, and even though she couldn't see it— the marks on the back of her neck where fading very quickly, nearly gone.
A couple seconds later, her vision began to clear up, losing it's blurriness. The first thing she saw was a plan, white wall. She was seated in a chair, but when she looked down— her eyes widened in horror when she saw she was restrained to it.
She tried to tug at the restraints, but they were too tight and her supernatural strength was something she'd been struggling to have control over.
Her mind instantly flooded with panic as she turned her head to either side of her, only to be met with more plain walls and slate ground. The chair she was tied down to was placed directly in the middle of the cell, and it was the only thing in there with her. The chair was also built into the ground, so she really was trapped.
"Hello?" she called out with a trembling lip, "Is anyone out there?"
She couldn't hear anything on the other side of the door, making her heart rate increase more with every silent moment. She relentlessly pulled on the restraints around her wrists, tugging and tugging until the flesh around them grew red. She looked up to the ceiling in search of a vent of some sort, but there was nothing.
"Can anybody hear me?" she called out again, praying to hear the sound of the door unlock.
Which it did.
But not in a way that she'd hoped.
Aspen heard the sound of the key turning the door open, and seconds later, a man was strolling on into the empty cell with an amused expression all over his face. Aspen looked up to meet the man's gaze, her heart sinking when she was met with the sight of the head orderly—who'd been out to get her since she set foot in this place.
"I see you're awake," he spoke, folding his arms over his chest as he stood in front of her.
"What do you want with me?" Aspen asked with no hesitation, trembling in her voice. The truth was, she was ready to die if she had to— if her death was to mean something. For example, dying to save Stiles' life. That— she was ready for. But from the way Brunski was looking at her, she figured he wanted something far more complex than having her dead. And the girl wasn't fearless.
"Aspen Bellator..." Brunski spoke her name like it was the most interesting thing in the world, "Do you have any idea how long we've been waiting?"
"What're you talking about?" Aspen asked with a weak voice, her hair falling over her face as her head dipped with fatigue.
"We've waited seventeen years." Brunski began, "seventeen god-damn years for a Bellator to set foot in this place again. We wanted your brother at first, he appeared to be the more interesting out of the two of you... but he got out of here while he still could. You, though... no, you stuck around. You stuck around long enough to fall into every single laid-out trap there was, that led you here. To us. To Eichen House. Back where it all began."
