Pov Anna
The world shrunk down to the space where his skin met mine. His hand, large and cruel, was wrapped around my throat, pressing me into the cold wall. I could feel every ridge of his fingerprints, every pulse of blood beneath my skin. My heart was a wild, trapped thing beating against my ribs. I was frozen, a rabbit in a snare, waiting for the final twist.
He looked at me with those dark eyes of his—eyes that had once made my stomach flutter but now just made it clench with fear. A slow, cruel smile touched his lips. One finger, surprisingly gentle, traced the line of my jaw. "So quiet tonight, my little bird," he whispered, his voice like velvet wrapped around steel. "I've been waiting to hear you sing for me."
Then he moved.
The first touch was his tongue—a wet, hot stripe from my collarbone to the spot just below my ear. My whole body went stiff with revulsion. Tears I couldn't stop welled in my eyes and traced hot paths down my cheeks. He wasn't kissing me; he was tasting me, like a chef sampling a new dish. Then his teeth closed on my skin—not enough to draw blood, but enough to make me gasp with the sharp, surprising pain.
"Shhh," he breathed directly into my ear, his voice intimate and terrifying. His other hand found my waist, his fingers digging in with brutal force. I knew I'd wear the bruises tomorrow. "Your fear tastes like honey, Anna. So sweet on my tongue."
I couldn't speak. My throat had closed up completely, choked with terror and disgust. I tried to swallow, but it was like trying to swallow sand. *Just get through this*, I begged myself silently. *Just survive this moment, and you can survive the next*. I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to escape to somewhere, anywhere else in my mind.
But the only safe place my memory offered was poisoned now. It was him—Alex. The man I'd loved, or thought I'd loved. I remembered the way he'd smile at me across a room, how his hand felt holding mine, the sound of his laugh. It was a stupid, weak thought to have now, but it was all I had. Before I could stop it, his name slipped from my lips, soft as a prayer.
"Alex..."
The air in the room turned to ice.
William went perfectly still against me. The heat that had radiated from his body vanished, replaced by a cold so deep I felt it in my bones. He pulled back slowly, his head tilting like a wolf that's heard a strange sound in the forest.
"What," he said, his voice dangerously quiet, "did you just say?"
My eyes flew open in horror. Cold dread poured through my veins. "I... I didn't mean..." I stammered, my mind scrambling for any excuse.
He moved faster than I thought possible. With a roar of pure rage, he threw me onto the massive bed. I landed hard, all the air rushing from my lungs in a painful whoosh. Before I could even think to move, he was on top of me, his weight pinning me to the mattress. His mouth crashed against mine in a rough, punishing kiss that felt more like an attack than any kind of affection. When he pulled back, his lips were pulled back from his teeth in a snarl.
"You dare say his name?" he shouted, tiny drops of spit landing on my face. "In my bed? While I'm touching you?" His voice grew louder, shaking with raw fury. "I'll carve his name from your memory! I'll make sure you never think of him again!"
He buried his face in my neck and bit down—hard. A sharp, burning pain shot through me, so intense my vision went white at the edges. I screamed, a raw, helpless sound that seemed to come from somewhere deep in my soul. The pain was so overwhelming I couldn't see anything anymore.
But in the darkness behind my eyes, I heard a voice. My father's voice. It was warm and strong, just like I remembered from when I was little and he'd read me stories before bed.
"My Anna," he whispered in my mind. "My brave, beautiful girl. Don't let them frighten you. Remember who you are. You've always been stronger than you know. Get up, my darling. Get up and fight back."
My eyes snapped open.
"NO!"
The word exploded from me, filled with all the fear and anger I'd been holding inside. I pushed against his chest with every bit of strength I had left. He was so much bigger and stronger than me, but my sudden movement caught him off guard. He lost his balance for just a second, and I used that moment to roll off the bed, crashing onto the hard wooden floor below.
Fresh pain shot through my body from the impact, but I ignored it. The door—freedom—was only a few feet away. I started crawling toward it, my movements clumsy and desperate.
A hand closed around my ankle, hard and unyielding as iron. He pulled, and I fell forward, my face smacking against the polished wood. My head whipped back and hit the leg of a small table nearby. Bright spots danced in front of my eyes. A book fell from the table and landed beside me with a heavy, metallic 'clang' . The book name was writen in dark colour , it said The Legend Of Shou Feng .
It was the strangest book I'd ever seen. The cover wasn't leather or cloth, but some kind of dark metal. Strange symbols were carved into its surface, and in the flickering candlelight, they seemed to shift and move like living things.
"You think you can run from me?" William growled from behind me. He stood up, his shadow falling over me like a dark blanket. "You belong to me, Anna. You're mine. And I'm going to break you into little pieces and keep the prettiest one to remember how much fun this was."
He lunged toward me.
Without thinking, my hand shot out and grabbed the metal book. It was heavier than it looked and felt strangely warm, almost like it was alive. With a desperate cry, I swung it upward and threw it with all my might.
He dodged easily, but the book wasn't meant for him. It flew past his head and struck the glass door leading to the balcony.
What happened next made no sense.
The glass didn't shatter into pieces. Instead, it dissolved into fine, sparkling dust that hung in the air like glitter. The whole thing happened in complete silence—no crashing, no breaking, just eerie, unnatural quiet.
The book landed on the balcony floor. The red light from the blood moon didn't just shine on it—the light seemed to be drawn into the book, pulled from the sky like water going down a drain. The symbols on the cover began to glow with an intense, white light that hurt to look at.
A deep THUD echoed through the room, so low I felt it in my bones more than heard it. The floor vibrated beneath us.
William didn't seem to notice or care. His face was twisted with rage. He grabbed my neck again and lifted me off the floor like I weighed nothing. "What kind of witchcraft is this?" he screamed, his eyes wild.
But he never got his answer.
The doorway was no longer a doorway. It had become a hole in the world itself. Where the balcony used to be, a swirling mass of red light and black emptiness now spun silently. Though it made no sound, I could feel its pull, like an invisible current dragging us toward it. The air grew cold enough to see our breath. All the candles in the room went out at once, leaving only the ominous red glow from the void.
The swirling mass pulsed rhythmically, like a giant, sleeping heart.
Then the pull became impossible to fight.
It wasn't like being caught in wind—it felt like the universe itself was sucking us in. We were lifted off the floor, weightless. William's hand tore away from my neck as he flailed his arms, his face a mask of fear and fury. My own scream was swallowed by the emptiness around us.
For one terrifying second, I saw the book fly open. The pages didn't just turn—they unraveled. The words and illustrations lifted off the pages and swirled around the room like golden ribbons. I caught glimpses of maps showing strange lands, drawings of mythical creatures, and charts of unknown stars. Each page revealed a different world, a different kind of madness.
The golden ribbons of text and images began circling faster, forming a whirlpool of knowledge and magic. The symbols from the book's cover glowed brighter, burning into my vision. William was shouting something, but I couldn't hear his words over the roaring silence. The red light from the void mixed with the golden light from the pages, creating a dazzling, terrifying display.
I felt myself being pulled toward the center of the storm. William reached for me, his fingers brushing against my arm, but the force was too strong. Our eyes met for a final moment—his filled with rage and shock, mine probably reflecting the pure terror I felt.
Then everything went dark. The last thing I remembered was the feeling of falling, the scent of old paper and ozone, and the cold certainty that nothing would ever be the same again.
The world dissolved into shadows and whispers. I couldn't see William anymore, but I could feel his presence nearby, a dark, angry heat in the cold nothingness. Strange voices whispered in languages I'd never heard, telling secrets I couldn't understand. I saw flashes of things—a forest with black trees, a city made of bones, a sky with two moons.
End of the chapter.