Fireborn

32 ¦ Fiery Rage

The Creator was such a bastard.

Even though my treatments drained the life out of me, Father still woke me up at the crack of dawn and ordered me into his office. The arrogant scoundrel sat on his obsidian throne on a basalt stone dais as though he was the god of all creation.

I wanted to punch him in the face.

After only one week of treatments, my aggressive feelings had already begun to surface. How could the chemicals work so soon? Even with Peter's help, would the treatments destroy my soul?

"What do you want?" I snarled.

"Time is of the essence." Father steepled his fingers under his chin. "We shall double your treatments and your physical fitness training."

"Are you serious?" I exclaimed. "I'm having bad reactions to the chemicals already. People can die from these treatments."

"If you were going to die, it wouldn't matter whether you took single treatments or double ones," he said with a casual shrug.

We might as well have been discussing the weather. Father had almost a bored expression, and I wanted to smack it right off of him. I clenched my fists in a vain attempt to stem my rage.

Didn't he care?

"It's the change that the body rejects," he added, "not the dosage."

"That makes no sense."

"We have lots of experience."

"In killing people?"

"Trust me," he said with a sly grin.

I wouldn't trust you with a bucket of weeds.

"I've been throwing up all week," I said. "On that metal gurney, I convulsed like a person with the shaking disease. How am I supposed to do physical training like that?"

"Fight or die, Liselle." Father narrowed his eyes at me. "That's a natural law."

"You have no right to spout off at the mouth about the natural law after you forced me to become a monster."

"I'm not asking you for permission," he replied, his tone stern. "I'm merely explaining the situation so that you can acclimate yourself to the idea. Treatments start tomorrow in full force."

I scoffed, speechless.

"You may leave," he said, opening the door with another casual magic wave.

Asshole.

"Do you even care? I'm your daughter. If I died, would you even notice?"

He stared at me wide-eyed. "Everything I do is in your best interest. If the Gatál attack, you need to be ready. You have to be strong to survive. I won't bury you at the graveyard in Minningen."

I shook my head. You can't reason with an insane man.

"Good-bye, Creator."

When I returned to my room, I slammed my door, not caring if I woke anyone with the racket. In fact, I hoped it would start a fight so that I could slam someone to the ground.

Why do I feel like this? Anger raged inside me like a category three hurricane. I want to just smash everything in sight. This isn't normal anymore.

Clenching my fists, I leaned against my dresser. I drew deep, ragged breaths that became more shallow until I roared at the top of my lungs and flung everything from the dresser.

Decorative china crashed to the floor, shattering into a thousand shards. Yet it hardly dented my rage. Like Bragda, I wanted to smash an oak table into nothing but a pile of kindling.