BLOOD LEGACIES
Chapter 410: Wounds

Chapter 410: Wounds

TRIGGER WARNING: SELF-HARM

EMMA

~

"Emma!"

"Emma!"

"Emma!"

"Please talk to me please"

The voice booming along with the banging against the door.

"I-I c-can’t" It was a mere shaky whisper, my body trembling from an unseen cold, my body was icy cold, and it gave a nostalgic feeling to the sea. The cold dark water... a haunting nightmare. Every passing minute it felt like I was still there, that dark cold place and my life slipping away from me.

I pulled my knees to my chest, as I shook further. When I woke up at first I didn’t understand what was going on and my mind was a completely blank memory, not until Grayson embraced me and cried in my arms, telling me how sorry he was and how he couldn’t protect me. Everything else came back and it was haunting. I haven’t moved from this spot in my bed, shaking and cold, with an itching throat that hungers for something.

"Emma please"

I shook my head like a lunatic before I broke into another feat of tears. I wanted to be alone, my body felt like it wasn’t mine, I felt like a stranger in my own body and the images wouldn’t stop. The picture of Dace in pain as I shattered our bond, the blood, and the feeling of his teeth ripping my skin open, even now I saw the blood, the sheets once white now covered in crimson, I didn’t know if it was my imagination.

Maybe it wasn’t because I was clawing at that very wound, over and over again until the heavy smell of blood filled the room.

The door badged open and Grayson rushed in, when he saw what I was doing he rushed to my side and stopped me.

"I-I can’t stop, it w-won’t s-stop!" I broke, wanting to break my own skin open again.

"It’s okay, I’m here okay? You’re not there, you’re not in that sea,"

My lips quivered as more tears spilled from my eyes "I-I-I can’t feel warm, it’s too cold,"

He hugged me in spite of the blood pooling from my side. "Please don’t shut me out again, don’t be alone, I’m here I promise" he made promise after promise but it did nothing to stop it, it didn’t end it.

It was either I opened up the wound to my side and locked myself in that moment of my nightmare or broke and cried until there were no tears left to spill.

My eternal torment.

It never ended.

~

PRESENT

I sobbed awake, shaking as I gripped my side tightly, thankfully I didn’t dig into the skin too much this time, I haven’t for 2 years now. A breath of relief found me when I realized it was just a dream or perhaps a memory of the past. The past seemed closer than ever and just as I have always done to hold my sanity, I pushed it behind a door, locked it far away, and thought nothing but the present.

Where am I again?

This doesn’t look like my room. Sitting up I hissed at the sting from my ass and it all came back, a heavy blush found my cheeks just at the mere glimpse of memory, the heavy impact yet withheld spank on my ass. That image will live in my head rent-free because I can still remember how heavily aroused it made me feel.

I shook my head.

This is not the time to think about this, I have to find Grayson, I have to make sure he’s okay. I looked at the nightstand and observed the clock. It was 2 am, so late. I forced my body off the bed while grunting, the sting on my ass was painfully stimulating and hurting, and rubbing against it I felt something gel-like.

What is it?

It had a peppermint smell to it, a balm maybe?

The sudden sound of something clanging caught my attention and I was already finding myself out of the room. The sound came from the kitchen and it was the only source of light in the whole dark place. Tip-toeing I made my way to the door and peeked.

I almost dropped to my knees at the sight. There Dace was, shirtless with just sweat shorts, with his full back on display. I drew sharply in my breath as I observed the tattoo covering his entire back. What is that? It was so ridge and unexplainable, black ink markings forming something I can’t make describe, spreading to the back of his arms singularly and up to the back of his neck.

Completely compelled by the art I took a step into the kitchen and the closer I got the more I could see what the strange marking depicted, not exactly clear but it looked like relic flames, in some sort of spiral, and the more I looked at it the more it felt like I was pulled into a dark hole. Something tells me he didn’t just get this done at a tattoo shop because I wasn’t so sure any artist could create this.

It looks supernatural.

He moved and his large muscles followed, facing the burner and I finally caught notice, he is cooking? At 2 am?

I observed at a distance as he took the glass of what I assumed to be whiskey, taking a drink, and my heart almost leaped out of my chest when I saw his bruised face, in fact I just noticed it right now, he was covered in it, and the cuts on his cheek didn’t go unnoticed, almost like he was in a fight.

A fight?

Why didn’t he heal?

I opened my mouth but I didn’t know what I could say, so I just stood there like a creep, ogling him.

He dropped the glass on the counter before flipping the egg in the pan and I gulped when I felt a pulse between my thighs.

Watching Dace cook is a definition of unmatched perfection and I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel. He turned off the switch and placed whatever he cooked on a plate and dropped it on the Island with the bar stools and shifted it to the end where I stood and I looked at the nice meal he made. My heart is doing a flip-flop.

"Eat", it was short and simple, a command no less.