Queen of the Ashes

I awoke lying in a bed of leaves in the jungle. I felt hungover, my head throbbing worse than it ever had before. I pulled myself up onto my knees and looked down and the knife I had been clutching. A large, blood covered hunting knife sat in a small stain of dried blood on the ground, the knife was huge it could've taken down an elk. It's for hunting the ultimate prey a foreign voice whispered in my head. I ran my blood stained fingertips over the black octopus. I'll help you, the voice whispered again. Around the hilt of the hunting knife, tightly woven around, was Lucy's locket.

I knew what it meant, whose blood this was. I wanted to feel horrible, guilty; but all I felt was numb. It was as if someone had sucked all of the feeling from me and left a shell of the person I once was. To help you forget your old humanity.

I retrieved the knife and headed back towards Castle Rock, it wasn't far from here. With each step back towards camp I felt better. A weight had been taken from my shoulders. I could feel little bursts of electricity coming from the tattoo, I was empowered, I was different than the others. They all had the bruises, the grip of the octopus, my mark was different, I was indoctrinated.

The fire burned low atop Castle Rock, which was good, leviathan only wanted who he chose on his island, those he deemed brave enough to create a whole new world. I doused our the fire just to be sure.

"Why did you do that?" Behind me Rylee sounded wary and emotionally eroded. I didn't turn to look at her. "Blair, I have to tell you something. Something happened while you were gone, something awful. Jackie invited us to dinner but Patty refuses to go, she said she would sit with a bunch of savages. I told her I'd go, try to make sense of what's going on here. While I was there they each told all the terrible horror stories, truly terrifying stuff, it was so real, so... believable. I was so scared and when we heard something in the bushes we were all sure it was what Lucy had seen." I looked down towards the other camp to see Patty, impaled on spears near the shore. I thick pool of blood slowly making its way toward the light waves begging to lap it up.

"You killed her." I said flatly finally turning to look at Rylee. She nodded and began to sob. She walked over to the edge and sat with her feet hanging over, I didn't follow quite that far. Release her. "You weren't made for this place. You haven't got it in you."

"Blair? I just want to go home." She pulled her legs back off the ledge.

"I know, I want to help you Rylee, I do." I could see she was beginning to notice I was different.

"Why did you put the fire out? Where is Lucy, did you find her?" She was standing now.

"I did." I pulled out the knife with her necklace attached. "She helped me find my freedom." I walked towards her, blocking off any chance of running.

"I want to go home." She sobbed. " I want to go home!" Rylee's yells had alerted the girls below, who were now standing at the shore near patty's body.

"I know, I know." I whispered soothingly as I placed the knife against her neck. She was too close to the edge to try to wiggle free.

"Why?" Tears streamed down her face.

"I'll do anything to survive." I said flatly as I slit her throat. Her hands gripped her neck as she collapsed to her knees gasping. Blood flooded from her neck and cascaded off the rocks into the waterfall crashing down towards the others. "Now you're free, and no one will interfere with me ruling over the chaos. I don't have to be in your shadow anymore." She choked and warped her face in confusion as the light slowly left her eyes. "I'll be the queen of the ashes."