Devil's Snare

Chapter 23- Burning her

Trigger warning- Mention of Blood and assault.....

Alzea was sweating bullets the entire morning thinking about what Rafael will do to her or her friends; every phone call and every notification terrified her and made her believe the worst; she had not been sitting still or paying attention to anything except for the kid.

Soon, the dining hall was filled with its inhabitants. Rafael walked down along with Victor and Maya. Soon the maids served breakfast, and everyone started eating. Rafael had not glanced at Alzea once; this made her even more frantic; why was he calm? What is going through his head? He was a monster last night and is now calm as the Atlantic Ocean.? Is this the calm before the storm? On the other side, Rafael was enjoying her state; he knew what she was thinking. He enjoyed every bit of her restless stares, the constant checking of her phone, and her pale face. He wanted her to have that fear of him, which made it easy for him to achieve his goal. Soon everyone left for their respective work destinations.

Alzea decided to check on her work as the kid was sleeping, and she wanted to take her mind off Rafael, she would deal with him when it came to that situation, and she was not going to give him power against her. Before she knew it, it was already evening, and she had left for her school. The classes went well, and she decided to get home as she would not stay in that haunted mansion tonight. It was a vital semester, and she was swamped getting things together for her thesis.

She walked out of the college building, feeling the darkness in the air. As fall was close, the weather was getting chillier, and the days were getting shorter. She walked out of the building but not far enough from it, checking her phone to make sure not to miss any notifications when she sensed someone was following her. Still, she thought it was just her nervous jitters due to her encounter with Rafael; she dismissed it as her paranoid self just getting scared because she had been on edge lately.

She passed a dark corner as she put her phone back in her jacket pocket and zipped it up. She looked up when three men suddenly grabbed her covering her mouth and not giving her enough time to react or shout; one held her hands, and the other had her legs while the third was keeping watch.

She tried to fight them and get a good look at the person trying to attack her, but they were wearing ski masks and face coverings. She tried to scratch his face trying to get DNA under her fingernails, but the men seemed to understand her intentions and grabbed her arms and pinned her down on the ground; she tried to resist as much as possible, but the man slapped her hard enough to form a bruise, this made Alzea struggle even harder.

The man holding her legs moved to her upper body and tore her top; this made her trash her legs even further, assuming the worst outcome of the situation. But the man holding her hands pinned her elbows using his knees. The man hovering over her took a lighter and knife; she was unaware of what was happening. Was she being mugged?

Alzea was unable to struggle now; she was crying hysterically, but her cries were muffled; he then pulled her bra down and held the lighter closer to her body, so close that it started to burn her skin, it was like he was enjoying burning her and he wanted her to get a taste of what is coming for her. Alzea shouted hard, screaming and crying for someone to help, but in vain. There was no voice coming out of her mouth except for tears. The third man was capturing the entire incident, she couldn’t see anything, she wanted to get some form of identity from the man so that she could use it later, but she couldn’t; the only thing that she was the tattoo on his right arm.

The man who held the lighter brought it closer to her chest, ensuring that Alzea’s skin melted and that the tattoo beneath it was also melting. Alzea was in unbearable pain, losing consciousness. Still, the pain on her skin kept her awake simultaneously like plastic melting under candlelight, the outer layer of her skin started to melt, causing blood to ooze out, but the man did not budge; instead, he pulled a knife, heated it, and touched her skin which made Alzea kick her legs wildly in pain, but with restricted movement, there was nothing she could do. After ages, all the men left her on the ground to die, ensuring that her tattoo was burnt without a trace.