𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐅𝐀𝐋𝐋 𝐎𝐅 𝐀𝐑𝐓𝐄𝐌𝐈𝐒✔️

FORTYFIVE|CADENCE

ARTEMIS

We returned to the pack house in the early hours of the morning, right as the sun began to peak over the tips of the trees casting the land in gold.

His hand in mine was warm and certain, bring with it a strange new feeling of comfort and protection. I beamed up at him as we broke through the clearing, and he smiled back, I enjoyed the bronze cast of his face in the fresh hour light. And then suddenly he broke my gaze, the smile falling from his face, replaced by a something far more sinister.

I looked in the direction he was staring to see a small crowd gathered around the entrance of the pack house and Ozymandias headed towards us with a grave look on his face.

"What?" Theos asked him as he approached, "What is it?"

Ozymandias, who I had never known to show any signs of weakness before, shed a tear as he told us.

"The girl..Dalia.."

He didn't go into details, he didn't have to. The little he said about how they found her was enough to make me sick to my stomach.
I wanted to vomit. I wanted to scream. I wanted to punch something, anything.

She was just a child.

"Who could do such a thing!" I cried, glancing between the old man and the Alpha who shared a grave look. "Who!" I demanded.

Ozymandias seemed to freeze, his whole body going rigid as he stared at something in the mouth of the forest.

Theos and I turned in unison.

My stomach dropped.

There, at the lip of the trees stood what was once a woman.

Even from fifty feet away I could see that all that remained was a shattered shell of a being, matted thick with dark brown blood and tear stains.

Some her own, some not..

A kind of hush fell over the land, not a soul dared to speak as the figure limped towards us, until there she stood.

A silver dagger clutched limply in her hand.

"Flick.." Theos whispered.

"Don't." Her voice broke and shook light a frightened bird, unable to quite gain enough traction to take flight. "Don't you EVER speak my name again."

Her unblinking gaze switched to me as she stumbled forwards as if in a trance, wielding the blade.
"And YOU." Tears cut through the thick haze of red that covered her. "You're lucky you're even still drawing breath!"

She lunged, but her feet were clumsy and uncoordinated as she drew back the dagger aimed at my heart.

She was thrown to the floor like a rag doll by Theos.

"Careful Theos," I whispered, putting a gentle hand on her forearm. "The baby.."

Flick began to laugh, a psychotic, neurotic cackle that permeated the air with its vicious pungency.

"He's dead. You killed him. Both of you. Together."

She still held the dagger, clutching it closely to her chest as she clambered time her feet. Her eyes were mad and flickering as she spoke, breaking into a shrieking scream. "This is YOUR fault! Everything that has happened is on you Theos!"

I looked to Theos who's face didn't break the stoic mask until Flick spoke her next words,
"Your child, your mate, your sister! Their deaths are all on you!"

She quietened her voice, cocking her head in a mocking manor. "How did it feel Theos.. How did it feel to watch her swing from the end of a rope, to watch as the last light drained from her eyed and her body became limp. All because of you..
All because you were too blinded by your own grief that you didn't see the truth that was right under your nose the whole fucking time!"

"Lies.." Theos whispered, shaking his head in denial. "You're lying."

"Am I? Did you really think that Mare was so entirely spineless as to kill a child, the very being you loved most in the entire world.. out of jealousy?!"

"No..no.."

"It was me!" She screamed, "It was me all along!"

She pointed the dagger at me though her hands that hadn't before now seemed to shake, fixing me with all of the fury in her piercing eyes. "And as for you!"

"You're just as guilty as he is." She hissed, spitting like a wounded snake as she flickered her vile forked tongue with every lie that she spoke.

"You murdered an innocent child!" I cried, watching as the fire behind her only grew. Brighter and brighter until she was consumed by the inferno of her own rage. "She had no part in any of this and still you killed her!"

"Only because I thought she was you! You murdered MY fucking child!"

It happened so fast I barely saw it, as she lunged at me a second time.

She was fast but Theos was faster. Throwing himself in front of me and tackling her to the floor. The screamed like a wild animal caught in a snare as he stood over her, staring down at the once beautiful girl, now ruined by her own jealousy.

Her screams turned to sobs as all her walls slowly crumbled and the weight of her actions hit her like a freight train. "My baby.."

Through the blood and the madness, the grief of a mother shone through as her body was wracked with violent sobs. "My poor baby..."

"Theos.. leave her." I pleaded, placing a hand on his shoulder, guiding him back to me. "She's done."

He came back with a defeated kind of sadness. Broken by her spiteful words that had pierced deep beneath his thick skin, burying them selves there, so they would no doubt leave scars for years to come.

"Flick no!" Ozymandias yelled as she reached for her dagger one final time.

Though this time, she didn't try to spill foreign blood.

She had finally drowned in her own grief, swallowed beneath the waves of sadness for her lost child as she placed the dagger to her own throat, and carved a scarlet smile to end her sorrows.

She fell as quickly as she had stood, letting the pain ebb away with every fading beat of her dying heart.

No one ran to her aid, not a soul dared to move, be it by shock or by horror. Everyone stood, frozen in place as her breathing grew shallow and her face became pale.

And then the hellfire rained down upon us as the anarchy hit and the air around us seemed to explode with screams and howls as the pack mourned its lost member.

***
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