Page 153 of Into the Heartless Wood
My mother taps one finger against my neck. A hardness comes into her eyes. “The Eater is working magic. But no matter.”
She smiles again, that cruel twist of her mouth.
She laughs
as she sends her power searing into my heart.
She laughs
as she yanks her hand from my chest, and I collapse on the ground.
She laughs
as I writhe in pain and horror,
as I feel her power flowing through me
with every beat of my heart.
Pulse.
Pulse.
Pulse.
I am my mother’s monster.
As I always have been.
She mounts the heartless lion, her bone skirt scraping against the needles of its body. “Come, daughter. We have work to do. The Soul Eater is near. Let us go hunting.”
The heartless lion leaps into a run.
My mother’s power jerks me after.
In the ruined wood
I see her.
Roses in her hair.
Ashes on her lips.
Agony in her eyes.
I kneel beside her.
My mother reins in the heartless lion.
She looks at what I have found:
my sister,
dead at the Eater’s hand.
My mother snarls in rage.
There is something else.
