"There's something in her . . . She's teetering on the edge, you can see it in those dark eyes you're so fond of. If you unleash it, she'll be devastation in the worst sense there is. She'll ruin us, she'll ruin you. Leave her be, and maybe there's a shot at redemption for all of us. We've been dead since we burned ourselves with that damned Mark, but SHE didn't choose this. Don't do this to her. Don't tempt fate. We know, better than all of them that for us, it doesn't happen to be kind."
"WHAT the HELL are you?" "What the hell are WE," She corrected, an eternal fire shone in those eyes that bore into you as if looking into your soul and seeing all there was, and so much more you didn't even know existed. "There will come a time you will know I am nothing to fear." I was hallucinating. "This isn't real." She gave a heavy sigh and turned away from me. "Oh I assure you this is very real, you aren't hallucinating darling. I understand, you can't accept me yet, but trust there will come a day. Until then, I'll be here, waiting. After all," she called behind her as she receded into shadows,"I've got an eternity."
"YOU don't know what you are. If you did, you wouldn't be begging" The blade was removed from Maia's throat, the woman backing away from her. "And I'm supposed to believe that you do?" Her kidnapper turned, her back to Maia she called out behind her, a gesture she found vaguely familiar, though she couldn't for the life of her remember why. "Of course I do." Anger boiled inside her gut, making her see red. "Then enlighten me oh wise one," Maia sneered. "Enlighten? Oh, you have no idea how wrong that statement is." Maia clawed at the rope binding her, Jerking back and forth with a fury as she let the hate take her over with a violent force. "WHAT THE HELL AM I?" Maia screamed, and the woman's grin faded from her pretty face, replaced by a satisfaction that made Maia's blood run cold.
"Why, my dear. YOU are THEIR destruction."
Wren's life is about to change forever - but not how she expects it to. Kidnapped on her wedding day, she finds herself trapped in a mountain cave, unable to return home with no company outside of the inhuman creature that took her.
***
"Wait, Wren! Not that way!"
It was darker here and panic limited her vision, but she could see it reaching for her; its wings like two huge looming shadows behind it.
"Get away! Don't touch me! No, let me go!" She shrieked.
She screamed in earnest as a hand took hold of her arm, and then even more when her own hand reached for something to hang onto and grasped at empty air. She had been scrambling towards a sudden drop! The hands hauled her back, but she still struggled. She didn't want to look at it, and she still wasn't sure she wouldn't rather take her chances with the open air instead.
"Stop it, I'm not going to hurt you! You'll hit your head on the rock or something. Wren, please!"
It knew her name. Somehow it knew her. She was going to die!
"Let me go! Stop touching me!"
She was sitting on the rocky floor now with her back against an uneven wall, and it was trying to pin her down and hold her still. She kept her eyes turned away and struggled helplessly, but it was no use. It was strong like a human man too, and she couldn't keep it off of her. The wings had moved until they curved around them both and shut out a lot of the light. Its face was so near hers that she could feel its breath brushing against her skin.
"Please just look at me for a second. Just look. I'm not going to hurt you."
One of the hands grabbed her chin and forced her head to turn, and then she was looking straight into a pair of dark brown eyes. It had a human face too. She had been expecting something monstrous or ghastly, and the surprise made her falter for a moment. He looked young, with a bad haircut and an earnest expression on his face.
"I'll let go of you, okay? Just don't lunge around like that anymore, you'll get hurt." He whispered.