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Her core ached. She trembled, darkness snaking a chill around her form before receding into the space she opened her eyes into.
Where was she?
She rose, wiping her eyes with hands she had not known since–
Her throat rang dry with the echoing cries that shook the stone walls of the shrine. Lights ripped at the edges of her vision burning black against the shadows that coursed through her and–
This wasn't her. It wasn't her and it hurt and Dad help it was dark and it hurt it hurt Help please it hurt it hurt it
Memories flood back, bright and flashing and dark . Sensations blur and lights flash as she crumbles down and everything's gone wrong.
“It wasn't your fault.”
She was shaking. Her hands trembled into a grasp that circled her fingers in anchoring warmth as she clung to the hold of another.
That voice. Focus on that voice. Her gaze shifted, blurred, shifted again.
Her breathing steadied. She flinched, awaiting the roar of the shadows or the crumble of the ground to tear the illusion of silence from her shaking grasp once more.
But nothing had hurt her yet.
“My name is Faroe.”
The voice was a girl’s. Her eyes spoke a tale of their own, her tragedy mirrored in the eyes of another. Addison nodded. Tears claimed the edges of her eyes. When had her eyes started burning?
“Addison,” she rasped. The words scraped the edges of her throat with a name she had almost forgotten. “That was my name when…”
She faltered. She opened her mouth, tried to explain–ask anything, say something , scream like the shrine and the monster and the lights and
“Help.”
The word was a whisper.
“You’re safe here,” Faroe spoke. “He can't hurt you here.”
Father couldn't hurt her here .
The trembling receded, the chill fading into Faroe's hold as Addison's hands relaxed. Warmth settled into her core, an all-encompassing hold that called to Addison to feel it.
Perhaps she could allow it, just this once. Nothing had hurt her yet.
“You were cold when you awoke.”
Faroe’s hand left. For a moment the cold crept into Addison’s empty hands, cold like at the shrine and the ritual and he can't hurt her the searing cold creeping into her skin as–
“It's okay.” A voice, again soft enough to sear the memory. “You're safe here.”
She was here. Addison was here, and she was safe, and Father would not harm her, and nothing had hurt her yet. Faroe held her, squeezing her hand in a moment’s gesture. I am here, it said. I am here, and you are safe.
Addison was safe.
And yet she wasn't. And yet safety was a dying wish left to crumble in the brick of a shrine and the cold of the darkness and the cries of a girl left to die. Safety wasn't real–not here, not at the ritual, not
Faroe had not left. Addison didn’t let go.
There was something in her palm now–red, small and smooth. Drops of dew dotted its speckled surface.
“When you feel ready,” Faroe spoke, placing the apple by her side. “Hunger is often the first… physical feeling, here–”
“What am I?”
The question escaped Addison. She almost laughed. What could be the response? She had killed, she had taken minds, she had tortured and harmed and killed. What was she but a monster, made to kill–
“You're human.”
She blinked. Human.
“Father never let me be human.”
Faroe paused.
“Did you want to be?”
Silence. Dead silence, cold and dark and
“I don't know.”
“What did you want to be?”
Addison pauses. Breathes. Holds the question in her mind, the fragility in the answer held tight in her quivering palms. Father had never asked her what she wanted to be.
“Not alone.”
The girl grasped her hand, squeezed it, warmth coursing through interlocked hands as Faroe held her–as Addison held Faroe. Her hands found Addison’s, gripping into the warmth as the darkness receded once more. This was going to disappear soon, wouldn't it? It would disappear, just like the safety, just like everything had in that ritual, and Addison would hurt again.
But nothing had her her yet.
Addison clung tighter. Faroe did not let go.
“You're not alone anymore.”
The silence was warm, leaving only Addison, Faroe, and the apple by their side. Addison was safe. Nothing would hurt her here. Addison was safe.
Perhaps she would begin to believe it.