Avenging

Prologue

The wind cut her like tiny daggers. December evenings were a fine sight until it came to running up a hill barefoot. The blood stains painted her skin giving it a new colour. Every breath she took felt like ice and fire. She didn't know how long she would last or would she make it up the hill in time for the sacrifice. The celestial event.

She was the sacrificial lamb. The baby was a mistake. A foolish one. She was chosen. Chosen. And if that meant making her unborn child an additional sacrifice, so be it. Abraham was not without love for Isaac when he drew the dagger, a pity, Abraham never got to complete his sacrifice. Darkness surged within her as she held her swollen belly. She wouldn't make that mistake. She'd give herself and her baby up. She would be remembered. Unlike the ungrateful family she came from, Darkness had welcomed her, nurtured her, awakened her. It had kindled a fire without even trying, an emotion deep enough to let her earn the right to be the one to start the Awakening. Her fingers brushed the rock she leaned on. She was beginning to get wary. But her spirit would not let her rest till she made it to the top.

The Stars were all aligned in the form they were supposed to be. It would be easy to channel power from them. Lightning graced the sky with her power as thunder roared. It felt like they were approving of what she was doing. She had the elements of the night to support her. She would not let them down.

She reached the top. She envied Cruxanta, the first of her kind to draw from this power. An act of evil for them, an act of power for us. The altar was ready, they had let no detail slip by. The black roses shy of thorns growing like a vine around the altar. There she would sleep. The bed of roses. It would coax her into a deep sleep till she melted into the darkness, till she becomes the darkness. And she would cross over. She prepared herself for the ceremony. She pressed the brush into the dark liquid and painted her lips. When women wanted the shades of blood to coat their lips, she coated them with blood itself. Pulling the dagger that stuck out from one of the plants, she placed it carefully on her shoulders. Balancing, she gently braided her hair into two and then curled them up . She lets the dagger slip through her hair trusting it would hold her hair well. Letting the black silk robe fall she slipped on the altar.

The time had come. She mentally made no apologies for her sin, but divulged in them. Drawing the evil out of them. Darkness appeared like a mist. Curling slowly around her body, linking each mark she'd drawn on herself before with blood. When it finally reached her heart ,it hovered over it. She waited. The final event. The divine one. But it never happened.

A pair of hands dragged her out of her cocoon. The smell of night and ice hung around her. Too quick. And certainly the most delicate choice of time. She should have let the shadows clog her intruder but she didn't. Darkness swirled around him. He was the darkest of the kind she'd ever seen. Then it dawned on her. He was the one who would put her out of her misery, forever. His hair was so black that she couldn't tell where the darkness ended and his hair started. In the moonlight, his tall and fine physique with the ghost of a smile on his face that made him look like an angel of death. She laughed at the irony of the thought. He had come for her . She wouldn't let him take her down. She belonged to darkness and no one would separate her from that.

"The prophecy. You bear it, don't you?" He said, his voice void of emotion. "I'm not going to hurt you, Cecily."

"And you want me to believe that?"she spat. "I don't want your help. Go away. I won't help you. Nor will I let the prophecy come true. Let another bear it."

"You can't let the child die. Crossovers don't just happen. If you truly bear it, you could not destroy it. You can't take its fate into your hands."

"Perhaps I can." Her voice matched his.

"It is not your decision to make." He waved his hand. It seemed like a common gesture but then her body started to weaken. Her bones were melting into nothing.

"What are you doing?" She breathed.

"Letting darkness take over you." He smiled. The kind that promised torture that could possibly follow you into afterlife. "Not just the way you wanted it to."

She started to say something but her mouth would not shape the words. "Darkness will draw you, my dearest Cecily. It will end you just like it ended all those who attempted it before you. Just like I ended them. But fear not, for I will make sure the awakening will begin, just in time. But on my terms. On my given name."

Just as the darkness caved her in. She heard the words. The last of any words she'd ever hear.

"The Avenging has begun."