Enter the Shadows (1st Edition) [SAMPLE]

Those Red Eyes - 2 | iv

April 28 - 10:33 pm

So here she was, sitting in the woods. It was drizzling, steadily getting heavier, but she took no notice. Everything he told her played over and over in her mind. The memory of all those people trapped in the stairwell. Lochlan said it had to be a mass compelling. Maybe they were aware of what was happening and silently panicking inside, or they had absolutely no clue what was happening to them. He wagered they did. Her silent tears were all she had left in her. All she had to give for all the lives lost. No amount of apology could bring them back. No amount of wishful thinking could take her back to that day.

Lochlan watched her from the porch. His heart broke to see her like that. Her screams of pain at hearing the news of the complex being blown up with all those people trapped inside had ripped a hole in his chest. He had tried to avoid telling her, but when she asked, he told her everything. He could see the thin streams of blood staining the back of the shirt she wore. Not fully healed, some of the wounds had opened again. She didn't notice that any more than she noticed the rain beating down on her head.

After the fighting that had taken place. The cameras that would have caught everything. The bodies that had been left behind, they had to cover their tracks. The casualties had been a message to both of them. This is what you get for interfering. This is what happens when you defy us. He got the message loud and clear. Penny was either to go to them quietly, or people would get hurt.

For days, Penny wandered around the house in a fugue state. She never spoke. She spent hours sitting in one place, staring at nothing in particular. She barely ate. Only came out of bed when he carried her. It was painful watching her punish herself. Her back was healed, but the wounds went deeper than that. Deeper than he could reach to heal. This she had to do on her own.

At night Penny laid awake, staring into the darkness of her room. Heavy drapes at her window blocked out the sun by day, and the moon at night. What it couldn't block out were Black's mournful howls. Or the screaming in her head. Lochlan did all he could to comfort her. He could stop the dreams that had her fighting herself awake at nights. He could numb the guilt that rode her hard. But he couldn't erase what had happened, not really. He could compel her to eat, to forget, but he couldn't give those families back the loved ones they had lost.

Penny knew she could ask Lochlan to make the pain go away. He would do it without question. But what right did she have to peace? What right did she have to forget all that had happened? Her role in it when so many others out there were mourning? The loss of a mother, a father, a child, a wife, a husband. So many homes were broken now because of her. She knew what loss felt like personally. The heart-rending jolt you felt every time you remember you will never see that person again. Never speak to that person again. She knew what it felt like, and she had caused it ten times over.

This was her punishment.

Howls woke Penny from her sleep has it had so many nights before. She was about to drift off again when she noted the difference. She listened. It wasn't Black's usual broken howl, there was a sound of urgency. Of warning. Penny threw off the sheets running to her closet. The howl was coming from inside the house, and he was not alone. They were not alone. A pair of hiking boots, sweats, and a shirt later she was running out of the room, catching her hair into a knot at the base of her neck as she did.

At the top of the stairs, she stopped. Just a third of the way up there was a gray wolf. Its eyes held hers as it stalked up the stairs towards her. Head low, tongue flicking out to lick its teeth. Black was on him a second later, both their bodies rolling down the stairs to the living area. There, there was a second gray wolf. Penny, despite the warning from Black, made her way down the stairs, gripping the railing for dear life. It was two of them and there were two wolves. She would even the odds - somewhat. While they fought inside Lochlan was no doubt out in the woods with their master.