The Queen's Conquer

Chapter 11 : Fighting for Sanity

Dystychiphobia • [dis-stick-fo-bee-a]
The fear of hurting someone.

🖤

~+~

I can barely breathe against my racing heartbeat. I can barely feel my toes or my fingers or my body anymore with the roaring blood pumping its way through my veins.

Under the dim lights of the foyer, I take in the unknown man's features for a split second—dirty brown hair, dark eyes, tanned skin, and one deep scar that runs through his left brow and missing eye where an obsidian mechanical one replaces it—before I take several wavering steps backward while he stalks forward.

"Who the hell are you?" I choke out in a gasp.

"It's lovely to meet you, too, Anastasia," he purrs. I swallow. Hard.

"Get out of my house." The words barely release in a clear, coherent sentence from my throat as he inches closer.

"Unfortunately, I can't do that," he begins, pushing me back until I hit a side table against one of the foyer walls. Something rattles against it once my body contacts the wood. "Maddox won't stop talking about how much he's been dying to meet you. In fact, he asked me to help out with his little family reunion."

Nothing but horror runs through my bones at the sound of that name—at the realization of why he's here. I feel around for something—anything—to grab against the table behind me and pick up some heavy glass object before chucking it at Scar-face's head.

All I manage to make out is the sound of something shattering, but I'm already bolting. I don't allow my legs to stop regardless of how much they burn with every step. I'm frantically patting down my pockets for my phone, fully prepared to call Samuel, but I don't find it on me. Anywhere. My heart nearly stops at the realization—I forgot it in Sterling's car.

Scar-face continues to push over objects and shove furniture out of the way just to catch up to me, but I'm swift with my movements as I weave through rooms and soon enough find myself in the spacious kitchen. My eyes take one look at the knife block before I grab the largest one without a second thought—but Scar-face seizes my wrist before the blade can fully be pulled out of the wood and clenches my bones so tightly I find myself crying out in agony. The pressure forces me to release the knife as it clanks against the granite counter.

I'm flipped around so quickly that the room begins to spin. But my free hand throws a fist into the man's face, hitting him square in the nose. "Get away from me!" I scream out. My blow catches him off guard as he topples backward, releasing my wrist to catch his balance against the island.

With strands of light-brown hair now falling in front of my face, I catch my breath as I grip onto the counter behind me like it'll keep me grounded to the earth a little bit longer. Scar-face wipes away the blood that's now running from his nose, looking back up at me after observing his now crimson-stained hand. "You bitch," he growls.

Just as he moves for me, I whip around to snatch the large knife again before aiming the tip of the blade for his face. The downturned knife comes to an abrupt halt as he grabs my wrist for a second time just before its sharpness meets the flesh of his last good eye, leaving a fraction of a centimeter between the two things. I gawk at the sight of it—at the fact that he was able to stop the attack only a millisecond before the knife could slice through him.

The man captures my throat with one of his large hands, choking the life out of me as he attempts to knock me out. My blade drops to the floor, now completely out of reach. My only free hand grips his bare forearm, digging my nails into his skin as if it'll force him to remove his hold. The room begins to fade into darkness as my consciousness slowly slips out of my grasp.