Page 75 of Decimation

I am helpless.

Ezra is half-asleep by the time we pull up to the villa. His small body is a dead weight against my chest, his breath shallow and uneven, still reeking of fear and adrenaline. I don’t blame him. He’s obviously been running on fumes since Portugal. I cradle him carefully as the car rolls to a stop on the gravel, the crunch of stones under the tyres loud in the oppressive silence of the mountains.

The driver cuts the engine. Mateus, seated beside me in the back starts to say something. Some inane observation about the drive, the weather, I don’t know. I don’t care. I’m already pushing the door open with my shoulder, stepping out into the cold night air with Ezra bundled against me.

The villa looms ahead, a sprawling, palace-like silhouette of ancient stone and rotting timber, every window a dead eye. God, I hate this place. It festers. It seeps into your bones like damp, like decay. We should have let it burn, we should destroyed it the night Ines died. But no, he wanted to rot here, to sit in his grief and let it consume him, and now the whole world has to suffer for it.

I’m halfway to the front door when I hear it.

A scream.

It cuts through the night like a blade, raw and guttural, a sound that doesn’t belong to any human throat but to something wounded beyond reason. It claws its way out of the house, through the thick oak door, and buries itself in my spine. I freeze. Ezra stirs in my arms, a whimper escaping his lips and I feel his body tense, ready to bolt.

“Mateus,” I snap, turning back to the car. “Take him. Now.”

No, I don’t trust him, but right now I have few options and I’d rather he be with Mateus than he witness whatever the fuck this is. Ezra’s eyes flutter open, glassy and confused as I hand him over and I press a hand to his cheek for just a moment.

“Stay with Mateus,” I tell him, low and firm. “Get back in the car. It’s armoured, you’ll be safe. Lock the doors. Do not come inside, no matter what you hear. Understand?”

Mateus nods, already retreating with Ezra clutched to his chest. I don’t wait to see them comply. Instead, I turn and run.

The front door groans as I shove it open, the sound swallowed by another scream. It’s closer now, reverberating off the marble floors, bouncing down the corridors like a trapped animal. My boots slam against the stone as I follow the sound.

I know this house. I know its every shadow, every cursed secret.

The screams are coming from the east wing, their wing, their sitting room with the frescoed ceiling and the fireplace that never quite draws properly. I move without thought, my body a vessel for pure, cold fury.

The door to the sitting room is ajar. Light spills through the crack, dim and flickering, candlelight maybe. I push it open and step inside.

The first thing I see is Leandra.

She’s trembling so violently that her bones seem to rattle against the floor. Her hands are pressed to her face, fingers clawing at something, bandages. Thick white gauze wrapped around her head, covering her eyes. She’s sobbing, her voice a shattered, keening wail that rises and falls with each ragged breath.

“I can’t see! Oh God, I can’t see, please, please, I can’t…”

And then I see him.

Konstantine stands by the fireplace, one elbow propped on the mantle, a glass of whiskey in his hand. He’s watching her with an expression of mild, detached interest, the way one might observe a particularly tedious insect. His shirt sleeves are rolled up. There’s blood on his cuffs. Blood under his fingernails.

The world narrows to a pinprick, and a roaring fills my ears.

I don’t move, I don’t speak. I stand in the doorway, my hands curling into fists at my sides, and I force myself to breathe.

In through the nose. Out through the mouth.

I cannot react. I cannot let him see. If he sees, if he knows how much this undoes me, he will use it. He will twist it.

But God, the fury. I have never felt rage like this. This is a white-hot, obliterating inferno that threatens to consume every rational thought.

He hurt her. Did he take her eyes?

I look at Leandra, at the ruin of her face, and I feel something crack open in my chest. I didn’t expect this. I knew Konstantine was capable of cruelty, I’ve been on the receiving end of it for long enough, but this? This is a desecration. She was supposed to be a pawn, a distraction in his endless, twisted mourning for his wife. I thought he’d dress her up, parade her around.

I didn’t think he’d take a blade to her.

Her eyes were wrong - that’s what he’s going to say. I already know it. Ines had blue eyes. Leandra’s are brown.

Bile rises in my throat and I swallow it down, forcing my tongue to work. “What the hell happened to her?” My voice comes out flat, controlled despite the rage inside me.