White Orchids {BOOK 1 COMPLETED}

Chapter 11

Half of my throat is covered in ice and frost, it looks like you could break it apart. The other half is filled with blisters and red marks. You can see the holes where the girl's nails dug in, they remind me of Nine's arm. No blood, just open cuts that reaches deep into the skin. I touch them gently. I whimper when it sends out waves of pain.

I can't stop thinking about how close I was to dying – again. Can I even call it dying if I've already died once and don't have a body to return to? It makes me think of all the dangers there are that can make me fear death again. All these questions makes my head spin and I have no answers.

It's been over a day. Clover said he would contact me when Blomst had time, but I haven't heard from either of them. I've stayed at my room since then. I haven't been in the dining hall or seen if there was any other contract that I needed to take part in. I've gone out in the corridor, but I've never dared to take the last steps that leads me to the Eleven.

When I slept, I dreamt of her. The cold and scorching hands against my throat, the smell of death and the scream that shook my entire soul. The pain and the disgusting injury around my throat are constant reminders.

I remove my hands from my skin. It's impossible to hide, everyone will know that Clover's apprentice was stupid enough to try and handle a shattered soul on her second contract. It wasn't even my contract; it was Clover's job to deal with it and I stole it. Not because I wanted to, but because I believed that Clover wanted me to handle this monster. Instead, it was one of the Fractured that saved me. I had to accept help from some obnoxious, greedy creature that devours souls – and he called me a disappointment. If it hadn't been for this specific creature I wouldn't exist now, or I would have been such a shattered and distorted version of myself that Clover would have to reap my soul too, if it was even possible.

There was no point in hiding the wound. If I can't even take off my shoes, I doubt I can put on a scarf or some other article of clothing. It would disappear from my body within minutes.

I don't want to look at my reflection another second. I sit down in front of the pinboard and focuses on the photographs and the comments mom has written. Jonna. Emma. Mikael. Kristina. I repeat the names like always. I sit there for ten minutes, a while I wonder if I should grab a notebook and write down the names like Wolf had told me to do. But I decide to leave the room. I don't care about what others will say when they see this disgusting injury on my throat, I must get out of here.

When I step out of the building I look up at the black-pink glass sky. I think about how blue and endless the sky had felt in the forest, when I laid in the meadow and looked up at the crowns of the trees.

The creatures stare at me – or rather my throat. Let them stare, I think. What is the point in staying inside and hide? Gossip tends to go from mouth to mouth no matter what.

I study how the well reaches out through the glass globe, how the blue liquid floats like a waterfall on the sides of the tower. Clover had said that most didn't go there. Not that it was forbidden.

I push myself through the crowd. There are surprisingly many today, both creatures and soul wanderers. I go further than I ever gone, past the dining hall's building and up another hill that leads out of town. When I stand at the top I can see everything beyond the settlement. There are some buildings that looks like farmhouses, in the paddock stands a few animals that are gazing in the dark blue grass. They look like black cows with long, painted horns formed as spirals. The houses are made of the same white stone material as the other buildings I've seen here, but the roofs are made of straw. The black stone slabs lead down to the farm, but they are far apart and dark blue grass grows between them. Further away you can see woods of moon-trees, beyond that lies the well that looks even bigger from this angle.