Novel Full Chapter 129. Nightmares
Chapter 129: 129. Nightmares
Jericho
For sixteen years, it was always a recurring nightmare. It never eased, never got easier to manage. What did get easier to manage was the fear.
So long had passed since that dreadful night and I still couldn’t stand close to a fire without flinching. Neither could I go to bed without a harness, lest I hurt myself. Not many people knew that. Just my brothers. And the Queen.
Soren thought sleeping with Maisie in my arms would stave off the demons that sat on my chest every night, in the same way it did his.
He wasn’t exactly wrong.
With her scent in my nose, her cheek pressed against my chest and her arms tightened around me and her thighs tangled firmly in mine in a snuggle I was sure she wasn’t even aware of, I relaxed, even if I hadn’t meant to.
And I slept.
When I dreamt, I wasn’t in a cage. Neither was I being torched and burned alive. No. It was a different kind of nightmare.
It was Maisie in my place. Screaming. And it didn’t matter how fast I ran, how long, or how far. I could never reach her. The distance tripled, until she was a speck of dust in the distance, her beautiful skin turning to ash.
"Jericho."
Her lips cracked first. Her hair that I loved so much was on fire.
"Jericho."
Her screams filled my ears in the same way my mother’s did. She was screaming my name. I thought I was roaring hers too.
Couldn’t reach her... couldn’t save her...
Pathetic. Fucking. Weakling. Useless.
Pain. There was so much pain in my chest. My gut. It felt like I was breathing and exhaling hot glass. A bayed breath escaped me.
I was turning to ash, too.
There were hands on me, shaking me. But I couldn’t move. Didn’t want to move. I was content with burning too. Couldn’t they see, I was nothing, no one without her? I wanted, needed to die with her.
There was always a part of the story I didn’t like to share. The part I glossed over how many I killed in that state. Guilty. Innocents. It still haunted me, even if I had had no control over it. It was why I always returned to that cage every night.
Because really, while we were all monsters, there were some of us who didn’t deserve any kind of redemption. I was one of them.
"Jericho!" that voice came again, tunneling through the darkness I’d closed around myself, the darkness I was drowning in.
It felt warm. Like a light house after being lost at sea for a long time.
There was a softness against my lips, a warmth that spoke to me in a voice that warmed the chill inside. "I’m here, Jericho. Breathe."
The darkness recoiled, twining tighter around my limbs, refusing to let go.
"Please," that voice said again. There were hands on my face, caressing softly. "You found me. Open your eyes, Jericho. Stay with me."
My lungs cracked open and my body jerked upright with a sharp intake of breath. My eyes snapped open.
For a second, I didn’t understand what I was looking at. For a moment, I couldn’t disconnect the darkness outside the bars of a silver cage, from reality.
Electric blue eyes found mine in the dark. They were filled with such gentle light, I almost couldn’t bear to look in them.
My gaze shifted and I saw a furry, clawed hand, wrapped around a delicate neck. Squeezing hard enough to shatter bone in several, different places.
There was a bit of a disconnect.
Then I realized I was staring at my transformed hand.
Around Maisie’s throat.
I drew back from her so forcibly, the bedframe groaned beneath me.
"Fuck."
The word tore from my chest.
Maisie coughed, sucking in air.
I scrambled backward, out from under her body draped over mine, no doubt as she had tried futilely to wake me up, and I nearly fell from the mattress. My pulse thundered in my ears. My Lycan was too close to the surface.
Under my skin. Pushing. Clawing. Thrashing. Hungry.
A tremor tore through my arms. My fingers curled involuntarily, nails lengthening for a split second before I forced them back.
No. No. No.
Not here. Not her.
My lungs wouldn’t fill.
I looked down.
Bruises.
My fingerprints ringed her throat. There was blood. Not much. Just a thin trail sliding down her neck from a wound already healing.
But it was enough. Enough. Enough.
I had hurt her. Again.
The room suddenly felt too small. Too hot. The walls pressed inward. I couldn’t breathe.
I stared at my hand. I didn’t recognize it. Saw another hand. Larger. Furred. Covered in blood.
A breath choked out of me. Blood. Bodies. Screaming. Fire.
Another pained inhale and my gaze snapped to her, waiting. Waiting for it. The fear. The horror that I’d seen in the eyes of every person I’d ever let myself go with. The revulsion when they finally saw that the facade of control I sold was just an illusion I’d perfected to hide the abominable thing underneath.
Not a prince. Not a man.
Just a fucking monster.
Maisie’s blue eyes were wide.
And then she was crawling... to me...
"No—" I rasped, the word strangled. She needed to get the fuck away from me.
She kept coming. There was fear in her eyes. But not of me. She wasn’t scared of me. She was scared for me.
The shock of it hit me so hard, I jerked away so violently my shoulder slammed into the headboard. "Don’t touch me."
The words were layered. He wasn’t close. He was here. My Lycan surged. I felt more fur erupt from my skin and heard the rip of fabric.
Felt my fangs lengthen. My vision flickered red.
Needed air. Needed space. Needed out. Needed out—
Maisie was on top of me, straddling and grabbing my face. "Look at me," she snarled at me.