Chapter 2: Stranger In The Darkness
1984 Words
AVA
My pulse spikes.
My brain scrambles for logic, but panic gets there first.
How did it slip off so easily? A mask I've worn for years. Did it finally give in?
The thought bolts through my mind, and a single moment coincides with it.
Joanna! The itch behind my mask when she tried to tug my hair behind my ear!
She… did this on purpose!
I look up, and there’s that damn smile of hers. Wide, smug, and impossible to ignore.
She planned this. She's been playing me from the very beginning.
But just as I make sense of the moment, the weight of reality rests on me like a damning anchor.
The entire room's gone dead silent.
Everyone's staring…
…At me!
At every mark. At every burn. At every sore and cut… the aftermath of a past I've tried so hard to hide.
It's all out in the open.
What do I say? What do I do? Where do I go from—
“So that's what she's been hiding” one murmurs.
I turn to her, and another flinches like I’m contagious.
“God, what happened to her face?” Another chokes back a laugh.
I hear it.
I hear it all.
Crystal clear.
My chest tightens, but I pretend to stay afloat.
All their whispers, mutters and stares echo a single, undeniable detail:
…I’m a Monster!
“Ava?”
Jason’s voice cuts through the noise, sharp as a knife.
I look up as he pushes through the crowd, moving toward me.
His eyes widen, then flatten, then widen again. Is he disgusted, surprised or unsure of what to do next?
It doesn't matter. He's here. He'll definitely—
“Is this some sort of joke? He murmurs. “You told me you'd recovered.”
W… what?
I act like I don't notice, but a flicker of that familiar look that disappeared earlier lasts in his gaze.
That same look… that I ignored before.
“Jason I… I didn't know what you'd think of me if you saw me like—”
“Did you plan this?” He asks. “Is that why you've been so damn jumpy?”
What?
“Jumpy? I wasn't—”
“You wanted to humiliate me in front of the entire clan?”
“Humiliate you?” I try to take a step towards him. “Why would I—”
“Don't come near me!” He snaps, and I flinch back, stunned.
His eyes are hard now, full of something ugly.
Disbelief, maybe hate.
The kind of stare an incurable disease would get.
“I… I didn't lie to you” I say. “I just didn't know what you'd think of me if you… saw me like this. I was scared” I stifle. “I was scared you'd act exactly like you are right now.”
But my words hang there, useless. Swallowed by the silence.
Until he speaks again.
“I’m sorry” he says.
But he’s not talking to me.
He faces the crowd.
“I’m sorry for the scene. I’m as shocked as you all are. I didn’t think she’d be…”
“She’d be what?” I take a step, but his glance stops me cold.
“I didn't think she'd be… this.”
My heart plummets.
He clenches his fists, and the final blow slips down his tongue.
“I, Jason Hale of the White Lotus Pack….”
“Jason, wait.”
“...reject you, Ava White…”
My mind scrambles.
This is why I've been hiding it.
My face. My mask. I'm nothing without my—
“...as my mate.”
The very second the words leave his mouth, my lungs collapse.
For a moment, I forget how to breathe. Everything, everywhere goes silent.
Until…
…my muscles tense, crushing against each other in an uncoordinated rhythm. I feel my insides burn, my soul being ripped right out of my flesh as the mate bond is torn in half.
My strength falters, and my knees buckle underneath me, but right before I can crash to the floor, I set my foot out, planting my stance to the ground.
I can't.
I can't give them the satisfaction of seeing me fall.
I have to… stay on my—
A round of applause, sharp and mocking, cuts through the room.
“Bravo, little sis” her voice rings through.
“You always knew how to put up a fight” her heels click louder, echoing through as she walks for me. “Just never knew when to give up.”
I lift my chin, just enough for our eyes to meet, and that darkness in her eyes greets me.
Why?
After all these years, why would she return just to shove me in the same ditch she left me in before?
Then, I see it.
The faint look. The same one she had on when she visited me in the hospital after causing the attack that left me like this.
That look… of satisfaction.
“I see. You could never stand it when they looked at me instead of you, could you?”
She leans in, keeping her faint smile.
“Well they're looking now, aren't they?” her whisper burns, the silence between us cementing the tension around the room.
“I apologise too, ladies and gentlemen” she stands straight up, putting on her own ‘mask’ before addressing them. “I too was caught unaware by my sister's condition. It's a shame our noble heroine's been living a lie all this time. And I can only imagine…” she steadies to sink the finishing blow, “...if she's been lying about this… if she's been hiding this, then what else has she been hiding? Her name? Her strength? Maybe even the attack on the Clo—”
“You know, maybe you're right” my words cut hers in half, and more out of shock than suddenness, she turns back to me. “Maybe I have been lying.”
Clutching my chest, I force myself to straighten, remaining firm on my two feet.
“...at least then, we would finally have one thing in common, right… Jason?”
My attention shifts to him, and the sudden hesitation locked in his stare.
“Don't loop me any further into your—”
“I won't.”
I take a step, and feel my muscles crush underneath a strength I'm trying so hard to keep.
But I don't care.
Another step forward. Then another. And another. Right until I'm right in front of him.
“I think it's time we put an end to this lie. Once and for all.”
His face speaks confusion.
But deep down, we both know what I'm referring to.
“I… accept your rejection.”
He stumbles back, trying to numb the shredding pain, but collapses to his knees, clutching his heart.
The crowd of guests collectively shriek, wanting to rush to his aid but too afraid to come anywhere near me.
So much for being fated mates.
In the midst of the commotion, her voice rings clear.
“This is the part… where you leave”
I don't glance back, yet I can almost see that look in her eyes even while eyeing the entrance.
“For the first time in years” I breathe, “I actually agree with you.”
They all watch as I limp out.
The glares, firmer than ever.
The murmurs, too audible to unhear.
But this time, my hands aren't trembling.
I'm not faking perfection, hiding behind a mask. And I sure as hell am not carrying the crushing weight of a living lie across my back.
The cold whoosh of the southern wind hits my face the moment I step out.
My sores ache in pain, but I strengthen my resolve…
…until I'm far enough to let my tears down.
“Vera?” I call out, but no reply.
I'm too weak to shift.
Throwing one leg in front of the other, my muscles tense, and the pain shoots up my spine, forcing me to the ground.
I crumble to my knees, gasping for as much oxygen as my lungs will take.
“I knew it!” I whisper into the cold night. “I knew I should've never come down here.”
Suddenly, I hear it.
Before my mind can plague me, I get a response.
“You know, I was just thinking the same thing”
Heh?
I notice movement, but my vision’s too dim to catch it.
“Told you we'd run into her again” a different tone echoes, this time from my right.
“My, My. What a wonderful night” yet another glides in with a playful, almost taunting voice.
“Rogues?” I mutter, trying to get my body to move, but I'm too weak to lift a finger.
“You didn't really think we'd let you run around scott free after what you did” One finally becomes visible.
Walking out of the darkness, he reveals his emotionless gaze. “You're the masked one, aren't you?”
That face.
I remember that face.
They're not Rogues.
They're… from the Clover Pack!
How did they—
“No way we got annihilated by a woman too” the one to my right scoffs.
“Oh, she's the perfect being then” the blonde with a playful voice smiles. “It's a shame she looks like ‘that’”
If I could, I'd wipe that stupid smug off his face.
But I can't move a muscle. I can barely even breathe.
“Don't worry. I'll make this quick and painless.”
He lunges, sparing neither time nor emotion before baring his teeth and extending his claws.
This is it. The end. All in a single night.
I brace for pain…
…but right before he can near me, a black flash tears him away.
What the—
“What the hell was that?!”
“Someone's here. In the darkness!”
“Huh?” I try to glance in the direction of the sudden surge, but before I can manage a slight move, another scream echoes from the darkness.
“Johnny!?! What the hell is going on?”
The rogue that scoffed just a couple moments ago is now the only one standing.
“You! You're trying to trick us again, aren't you?!” He hurls, blitzing in my direction. “Not if I kill you fi—”
His claws sear through the space between us, moments from ripping through my skin, when the same blinding force tears through him first.
Snarling, growling… and then… silence.
What's going on?
Who… who's there??!
I blink through the haze of pain and leaves, trying to sit up.
I still can't see…
…Until the moonlight catches him like a halo.
Tall. Powerfully built.
Eyes glistening like silver in the sunlight.
I try to speak, but I can’t. The air is gone.
He turns to me, steps deliberate and slow, like he’s inspecting a puzzle that doesn’t quite make sense.
“You shouldn’t be out here” he says. Low. Like rumbling like thunder in the bones.
I flinch, still recovering, though I feel an unconscious whisper slithers through my mind.
“Who… who are you?” the air escapes my lips, but he doesn't answer.
He just crouches down in front of me, gaze never leaving mine.
Pulling off the cloak around his shoulders, I notice an emblem on it right before he places it on me.
A White Sun.
I've seen it somewhere before!
“You’re safe now, Ava.”
My breath hitches, my eyes returning to his lips.
“How do you… know my name?”
He smirks, just slightly… and right before I fall unconscious, he answers.
“Because I’ve been waiting to meet you.”
- Writer
