Page 111 of How Does It Feel?

My eyes caught the still-open door where the beast had entered, and like the coward I was, I ran for it.

I couldn’t do this—I couldn’t—even if it meant I could no longer go home, that I left half of my heart—I couldn’t do this.

Gods, why hadn’t he just let me die! It would have solved everything.

I spared a last look at Mendax and the beast. Tears streamed down my face, hot with terror and sadness, as brown dust from the arena flew around us like a tornado. Mendax’s eyes happened to catch mine at the last second. His sharp eyes hardened with an edge of pain as he took in my tears, my stance.

Do. Not. Follow me. My eyes pleaded with his as I tattooed every feature of his beautiful face into my memory and prayed with everything I had that he stayed where he was.

I took off like a cannon. This was the only way to truly save us both.

Cold air shredded my lungs in deep gasps as my legs pumped harder with each stride that hit the dusty brown floor. With every hard slam to the ground, the open door drew closer. The deep blue of night had settled outside of the gridiron’s lights. The ominous moonlit freedom beckoned me through the other side of the large door frame. I would run out this door and to the portal of the door to the left and be free forever. The guards were behind the barrier Mendax had put up so they wouldn’t stop me.

Tangled blonde hair whipped across my face blocking my vision as my side slammed into the ground with the force of a bus. I was grabbed around the waist and lifted with such force my bladder let loose a little. Unmerciful claws dug their harsh tips into my skin. The monster had apparently realized I was the only real prey inside the arena and had given up on Mendax.

Blood-red scales and thorns on the beast’s face were so close I could smell the musty reptilian-like odor emanating from its mouth as it squeezed me painfully in front of its face. Black eyes as empty as a puddle sparkled in front of me with hunger. The heat of its open mouth hit my legs as I whimpered out what would have been a scream of terror had my lungs not been crushed in its massive grip.

With haste, it shoved my legs in its gaping mouth, the fabric of my pants tearing and slicing alongside the flesh of my leg as it slid across the beast’s sharp teeth.

The red devil stilled with half of my body already in its mouth. I felt it slowly grab me again and pull me out, and the action caused another rip of skin and fabric on my right leg as I was pulled free from its damp mouth.

I tried and tried to loosen the beast’s grip. It pulled me out of its jaw before setting me on the ground so gently that I thought I must have already been dead and dreaming.

As I looked into its black eyes, I saw a smokey-looking sheen. As soon as I was set safely on the ground, it stepped away from me as if hypnotized.

I glanced to the right to see Mendax, only a few feet from me, as still as a statue staring wickedly at the beast.

Mendax looked to me, and for the first time since I’d met him, he looked terrified as his blue eyes trembled full of emotion. His gaze quickly changed as his pupils grew somehow darker. He looked back to the beast and thundered a war cry that made a vein protrude in his neck and forehead, his face now contorted into undiluted rage.

The creature stared unfazed at the prince, his face expressionless as if he were some kind of zombie. He deftly lifted his sharp claw as if he were a puppet being commanded and—

He was a puppet being commanded.

Mendax was impelling his mind.

It was unfathomable to see someone hold such control over anything, but to see him so effortlessly inside the mind of a beast the size of a house felt incomprehensible. The prince’s body was tight with furious tension. I watched, terrified, as his muscular shoulders settled ever so slightly. The beast held up his giant claws before digging his talons deep into his chest with a sickening crack, tearing through its rib cage to pull out a present for his puppet master.

Without so much as a whimper, the zombie-like monster dropped to its knees, a cavernous hole that leaked inky black gore now resting in the middle of its protruding chest. Its hand opened to dump its beating heart onto the ground as it slumped to the ground in a lifeless heap of red scales and black blood-coated claws.

The wet heart shuddered once more before going as still as its owner that lay next to it.

I couldn’t believe it. My human brain fought to block out the information.

“She switched the doors at the last minute, Callie. I-I almost lost you,” he shouted at me. “Everyone of them will pay for it, that I promise. I will never be without you, Callie, never.” Fear snaked through his tender voice, cracking it.

The amber lights of the stadium flickered across us, and the open night air tossed our hair gently in different directions as silent muffled sounds from the audience and queen still trying to get passed the shield echoed against the still night.

I shuddered, the taste of rancid betrayal on my tongue. Tears streamed down my face as salty reminders of corruption, trailing into the corners of my mouth before running off my chin in a waterfall of deceit.

God, why had he followed me!

I studied the door before I readied myself. I knew I couldn’t outrun him.

“I’m so sorry, Malum,” I whimpered softly as the tears blurred my vision.

Our eyes locked, and he ran to me, his face wrinkled with anxiety as he pulled me against his chest. The tears fell harder at the deep swell of comfort I felt pressed tightly against him.

I closed my eyes and forced myself to do what I had been sent here to do this whole time.