LAST OF THE IMMINENT BEING (The Being Book 1)

C H A P T E R. 1

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Please.

Amina watches with terror filled eyes while he stalks towards her, each step threatening death. She presses herself harder against the cold concrete behind her, hoping that by some miracle, the wall will absorb her. Saving her.

Her head bows, lips trembling in immediate submission. His presence is overwhelming and his dominance too strong for her to fight against. He crouches down before her, his breath warmly grazing her cheeks. She can't muster up the courage to look at him, Amina can only shiver in silence. Suddenly, he grabs a fist full of her hair, roughly jerking her to her feet.

SLAP!

Amina's head whips to the side as her frail body tumbles over. Cyrus bends forward and grabs her neck with rough, unforgiving hands. He squeezes. Amina can feel the blood rush to her face as her throat closes up. He towers over her; a 6'3" to her 5'11". Even if she manages to escape from his grip, all Cyrus has to do is stretch out his arm and he'll have caught her instantly. There's no use in fighting him.

But, she doesn't understand the cause of his anger. She's been on her best behaviour all day. She cleaned and ironed and scrubbed and washed. She pruned and weeded and mowed and raked. All the laundry has been done and the house is picture perfect. So what did she do wrong?

Please, I'm begging you.

She wracks her brain thinking just as the stars began dancing in her eyes. There's no air in her lungs. Cyrus is choking her with the intention of killing her. It'll be so easy to snap her neck, he thinks, something like breaking a twig in his hands.

Against her wishes, the terror in her chest fires up and explodes. She doesn't want to die, she wants to live. She wants to hold on a little longer, but he isn't letting go. Cyrus's eyes glint the familiar gold of a were-beast nearing transfiguration. He says something: a question, his tone low and menacing, close to a growl.

The kitchen. Food. Dinner?

Amina tries to shake her head. She's almost never allowed inside the house without permission, let alone being able to handle the food that they'll be eating. No. Amina only cleans. She only cleans and maintains the integrity of the house. No! There must be a mistake. A misunderstanding. Why is he blaming her?

SLAP!

His hold on her neck softens only for him to use his free hand to backhand, sending her flying across the room. Hot fierce tears pour down her face as she gulps for air, winded from the impact. Her cheeks aches and burns, both from the hit and her jaw dropping repeatedly to let oxygen through, as saliva dribbles down to her chin. A head-splitting ringing pierces through her already delicate ears. She can't hear a single thing.

Amina curls herself into a ball. She doesn't dare to get up.

Cyrus walks towards her with each stride in silent fury. Everything in her body feels like it's beating at the exact same time in her chest; rapidly and violently. He stops in front of her and raises a leg, each word he speaks is accompanied by a boot to her body.

"-Cecilia-"

Cecilia? I didn't. It was not me.

Amina cries out as he brings down one foot on her shoulder. There's a pop, and a painful numbness. Her arm drops loosely at an awkward angle on her side. She knows it instantly from the familiarity: he's dislocated her shoulder.

As if angered at her sheer audacity to not make a sound, Cyrus braces his leg back before using his entire force to kick her stomach.

CRACK!

He misses. Amina would've hollered in pain had the wind not been knocked out of her. Shards of her shattered rib-cage already puncture into her lungs. Amina tries crawling away as the air struggles to enter her body. The natural healing of her nature takes long to mend her broken bones, so Cyrus watches her as her skin turns blue. There isn't a single emotion in his eyes. Nothing but a strange coldness that hurts Amina more than his violence.

"When is... Reece... getting here?" A voice so frail and weak, the mere attempt to speak has strained it. "I feel kinda sleepy."

Amina can feel her rib-cage mend itself, each chip and splint finding its way back to its original shape. Cyrus steps back, away from her, letting her heal, and for a second, Amina wishes she can't. At least he wouldn't break what's already broken. Right?

He watches her wallowing in the corner before glancing back at the sofa behind him. For a second, a look of gentleness graces his face as he sees Mavis hugging Cecilia in her arms. But when his eyes travel over Cecilia's skin, the fury returns. They turn hard, along with a sharp fiery glare sent Amina's way, but he doesn't approach her.

"Soon, baby, just hold on, okay?"

Cecilia nods weakly as Mavis strokes her hair. Neither of them even offer Amina a small glance. Not a single blink. Not even slight head turns in her direction. It's as if she doesn't exist to them. The world goes on right in front of her, and she isn't in it. Or rather, not invited.

"You better hope this isn't serious." Cyrus says to Amina, his voice so low, it's strenuous to hear.

The hives make Cecilia look sickly. They broke out shortly after dinner. Amina wasn't there to witness because she had already begun the dishes. As soon as Cecilia noticed them, she screamed and nearly fainted. The only thing that she had touched since coming home was the food ─ food that Amina hadn't prepared, but dished out.

She had been immediately accused of doing something to the food. Regardless of her denials, her words feel on biased ears. Cyrus hit her for denying, then he hit her for not telling the truth. When Amina tried to explain that by the time dinner was prepared, she was still outside waiting to be let in, he hit her again. This time under the impression that she was putting blame on Mavis's cooking for Cecilia's condition even though that wasn't what she meant. To him, Amina is the only probable cause, she's the only logical reason, and no one seems to disagree.

Cecilia's head rests on Mavis's chest. She briefly opens her eyes and does something Amina doesn't expect — to look down at her. And for a second, Amina is so sure she can see pity in her eyes, maybe...maybe even remorse... but the look vanishes, leaving behind an apathetic disdain and disinterest. Cecilia lets out weak shaky air through her nose, and allows her eyes to flutter shut.

Amina holds her breath, looking from Mavis to Cecilia, pleading for help. Mercy. Somewhere, a door opens and she feels fearful. Mercy. Amina is just so tired. Tired of being afraid all the time. Tired of being in pain. Tired of being unsure and walking on pins and eggshells so as not to offend. She is so tired...mercy, please.

"I found her." Reece says, entering the lounge. "She was at the main house."

Following in behind Reece is a concerned Lilac making a beeline to where Cecilia sits. It takes only one simple look over her for the in-house doctor to conclude that Cecilia is just having a normal but intense reaction to the incoming heat season. Since she's quickly approaching s****l maturity, her body is adjusting and preparing itself for her first heat. The hives are just a physical manifestation. She's going to be alright.

So tired.

Cyrus nods slowly, happily relived it isn't poison or something worse, before glancing back at Amina with the corner of his eyes. Lilac follows his eyes to her, only noticing her presence now.

There's a look of... shock? Lilac's eyes widens but before she can say anything, Reece stands up and gathers Amina in his arms. He isn't doing her a service, he holds her more like a coroner carrying a corpse. He doesn't even bother adjusting her arm to accommodate her dislocated shoulder. He walks to the kitchen door, swiftly kicking it open, before heading out back to the shed.

The small wooden structure is rotting from termites and dead wood. The door has a latch that can easily be opened from the outside, but impossible from the inside. All he has to do is push it up and the door swings wide open.

He drops her on the old mattress that is her bed, his body already turning away before she even lands. He doesn't say a single word, just closes the door behind him and enters through the way he came.

Amina stares at the old piece of wood that's the only thing keeping her locked in, with fresh tears wetting the dried salt on her face, her one eye swollen shut and the other red and pulsing. The breath she doesn't even realise she's holding coughs out of her throat.

Quickly covering her mouth so that her breathing doesn't make a loud sound, Amina staggers up from the mattress and balances herself against a beam that forms the base of the pillars holding the roof of the shed. She reaches over her small laundry pile and grabs an old sock that once belonged to Lilac, putting it in her mouth before leaning into one of the beams.

Using as much force as she can muster, Amina hits the corner of the shelf to knock her dislocated shoulder back into its socket. A scream rips a way through her throat as searing white pain shoots through her body, the sound only muffled by the thick winter sock in her mouth. Then she crumbles down to the ground, missing the mattress entirely, utterly weak and drained.

Amina cannot move her body.

Amina cannot feel anything.

Amina cannot hear a sound.

All she can do is watch through the small crack at the base of the door that gives her full view of the house, and in turn the lounge window. And through it, she sees Reece pulling off the shirt he's wearing, tossing it into the laundry room. He then turns to Cyrus, who in turn laughs at something Reece says. Lilac is checking Cecilia's temperature, doting on her sweetly, while Mavis gets up and disappears into the kitchen.

Life has gone on as if they hadn't bear witness to what she suffers. As if there isn't an injured girl living just outside their house, cold, broken, afraid.

A little while later, Mavis comes to the shed, opening the door to place a bowl of food for her. Leftovers. When Amina reaches out, Mavis flinches away from her, as if she's an infectious disease capable of starting a plague, before leaving and locking the door.

She said something. Under her breath. "It'd been better if you were never born."

Darkness shrouds her as despair blankets her body. She hugs herself and sinks deeper and deeper and deeper until the crack in the door is the only tether holding her to this world.

Amina wants to be in her family too.

Please, love me too.

☽ ◐ ⬤ ◑ ☾