Beloved Beast

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Elle sucked in a sharp breath, her heart leaping to her throat as Seraphine slowly extracted an object from within the folds of her loose-fitting cloak.

            A queasy sensation gathered low in her belly, its sudden presence exacerbating her fear tenfold.

            A wooden hilt. A sleek, symmetrical blade, tapering to create a sharpened point.

            Her sense perception rendered the instrument ... a dagger.

            Her father had one similar to it. She had touched it many times. Familiarized herself with it should she ever need to use it.

            It glinted menacingly in the barely visible light, foreshadowing the gruesome things to come.

            Elle shoved to an upright position, bracing her hands on either side of her in the grainy dirt as she focused solely on the weapon; her chest rising and falling with rapid, shallow breaths.

            As if sensing the imminent danger, Abby lurched awake and began to wrestle furiously with her binds.

            Esme, too, had awakened, but sat rigid and unmoving, regarding her captors with an ashen face that belied her stoic calm.

            Solomon prowled closer, gravel crunching beneath his weight as he flashed a mangled grin, his ruined mouth revealing broken, discolored teeth. "Time to liven things up a bit. Which one are we sticking it to, then?" he asked with depraved delight.

            Sera sidled around him, and as she did, Elle felt the unnerving presence of magic skate across her skin in the form of gooseflesh. It was also present in the peculiar shine of her glowing eyes; that physical manifestation of fixed energy poised to do a song and dance of magnified brutality.

            The witch's feverish eyes alighted upon a distraught Abby. "Bring me that one." She motioned with a shaky, crooked finger.

            Abby's pallor turned sickly as Solomon started for her, his disfigured face bunching hideously with a botched smirk. "Come now, wench, it will only hurt a little."

            He chuckled deeply in his mammoth chest as he reached for her.

            "No, please!" she wailed, a panicked whimper expelling from her throat as she thrashed to evade his hands. "I do not want to die!"

            She began to twist more forcibly at her restraints, coming alive with hysteria, flailing, and kicking her legs like a wild animal desperate to flee.

            But she was trapped.

            Horrified, Elle watched in soaring alarm as the girl was jerked roughly to her feet and hauled before Sera. She struggled, fought with as much strength as her depleted body could muster, but the girl was no match compared to a man of Solomon's size as he shoved her unceremoniously to her knees.

            Abby folded to the ground with a muffled cry, her shoulders stooping with despair, her head hanging low.

            Elle wanted to scream at her to fight, to not surrender so readily but she knew there was no saving her. There was no escaping. There was nothing either of them could do for Abby and it was only a matter of time before they too would meet a similar end.

            Sera stepped closer to her slumped frame, glowering as she eyed the weeping girl with open distaste. "You humans and your weak spines." Leveling the dagger with her trembling chin, the witch hoisted Abby's face aloft.