Lost in Darkness

Chapter 31-Because Of You

Chapter 31

Cole's POV

Alarm stirred within me when I felt the demon's hands on our throat. Even though this body was not my own, I could feel Lucius' grubby fingers digging in as if it were happening to me. I felt Raven growing weaker and weaker, even as I stayed curiously unaffected. 

'I don't want to die.' Raven's thought floated through my mind, hitting me like a lethal blow. Never again did I want her to sound so helpless, so sad. I longed to comfort her, to hug and kiss her until that sadness disappeared from her voice completely. 

"Raven! Raven, stay with me!" I yelled. I could feel her slipping away. No! I couldn't lose her too! She was all I had left in this world. She was my light, my rock, my partner in crime. And now she was my lover as well. I couldn't lose her when I'd just found her! 

I needed to save her. Lucius held us in a merciless grip, that wretched hand tightening even now. Its black orbs glinted dangerously, and I knew that it wasn't going to stop until it killed us. Just as it had killed her family. Just as it had killed mine. 

On instinct, I tried to use my power, but I drew up short. This wasn't my body. Somehow, it was different here. Try as I might, I couldn't clone myself in Raven's body. I wanted to cry with frustration.

"I can't do it! I can't use my fucking power!" I roared. I felt so caged, so trapped. It was like I still had those bloody chains on. Because I was just as helpless now as I was then.  

Raven's thoughts grew murkier still, swimming around in her mind like drunken fish. And I knew. I knew that if I didn't do something soon, she would die. Would be ripped away from me forever. 

 "Raven, stay with me!" I cried helplessly, reaching out with my mind as if I could grab her and physically pull her mind back from the edge of the cliff. 

And suddenly, I found myself thrust into another body. I fell to the floor in shock, but quickly snapped out of it when I saw that Lucius still held Raven by the throat againat the wall. My bottled yell of fury escaped my lips as I charged at Lucius. Caught off guard, it shrieked in surprise, finally letting go of Raven. She slumped to the ground, unconscious. 

Lucius and I fell to the floor, me on top. I swung wild punches at its face, uncaring of its repulsive black blood. Satisfaction coursed through me when I heard its nose crunch. It yowled in pain, the shrillness of the cry paining my ears. It took advantage of my momentary distraction to flip us over. 

I kneed him in the balls, trying and failing to switch our positions back around. In retaliation, it elbowed me in the neck, making me choke and wheeze as all my breath left me. 

Rage boiled inside, hot and potent. I felt a strange, foreign current ripple through me, igniting a spark somewhere deep within. Lucius yelped, twitching in obvious pain. And I realised that I had somehow tapped into Raven's power and shocked him. 

In that instant, I noticed that I wasn't nearly as tall as I should be; I was small and slender, petite. My hands were tiny, delicate, looking out of place with the splatters of demon blood marring them. Long, brown hair brushed my shoulders. I hadn't cloned my body, but Raven's. I'd duplicated Raven's body! 

But I didn't have time to focus on this. It all passed through my mind in a second.

Grinning at the demon's pain and forcing myself to think only in the moment, I focused on my anger, bringing it forward as I thought of all the evil that this creature had done. 

I thought of the glassy, blank expressions on my parents' faces as they fell to the floor, limp. The blood that oozed from their lifeless forms. 

I thought of Raven, innocent little Raven, watching her mother and sister being murdered in front of her.