Page 85 of Into the Heartless Wood
You are only a monster because you choose to be.
Choose.
Choose.
The night grows very dark.
The rain clings
like ice
to my hair,
my skin,
my gown.
You are only a monster because you choose to be.
I never knew I had a choice until you.
Choose.
But how do I choose not to be a monster?
I cannot atone for the souls I slew,
for the blood I shed on the forest floor.
I cannot undo what I did to Owen’s mother.
Choose.
I am what my mother made me to be.
I cannot shed the form she gave me
like a snake sheds its skin.
Can I?
Chapter Thirty-Three
OWEN
IRUN BLINDLY THROUGH THE DARK,SOAKED THROUGH WITH RAIN, branches clawing at my shoulders.
I followed the tree siren into the wood.
The siren with violets in her hair.
I burn with anger. It propels me on and on, makes the trees shrink back from me.
She said my soul was strong. She brought me to her mother.
I want to claw my eyes out, but even if I did I would remember Seren, gleaming silver in the rain while my mother’s blood poured red onto the earth.
She bound me to the tree.
