CHAPTER 41: FIRST PHRASE TRIAL: GUILT

TRIGGER WARNING: ABUSE AND MENTION OF ABUSE

🌙 𝐋𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐡

Her arms wrapped around me, warm, steady, real. My throat closed as I clutched back, desperate to bury myself in her like I was still a child—but my arms wouldn’t fit. They were too short, too small, straining uselessly against her sides.

Panic flickered. My breath hitched. Why couldn’t I hold her?

Her hand cupped the back of my head, pressing me into her shoulder. I felt it then—wetness. Not my tears, but hers, sliding down against my temple. My mind scrambled for answers, for sense, but then—

Crack.

The sound ripped through the star-strewn air. A lash. A belt.

It landed across her back. She flinched hard, her grip tightening on me.

I froze, my pulse plummeting into terror.

And then I saw him.

Landon.

His face contorted into the familiar mask of rage, every vein and tendon standing out, the hatred rolling off him so thick it made the air curdle in my lungs.

"You bloody whore!" His voice thundered, echoing against the impossible sky. "If you can protect the brat of that monster, you must have wanted what he did to you! Who would believe your story when you love the bastard’s child so much you’d take a beating for her?"

The words sliced through me like blades, sharper than the crack of the belt.

I stared at my mother, but she only tilted my chin up, her hazel eyes brimming with tears and love. Her palm cradled my cheek like it always had.

"Don’t listen to Daddy," she whispered, her voice breaking but gentle. "He’s angry. He doesn’t mean it."

But Landon roared again, and the stars themselves seemed to tremble.

"I am not her father!" Spittle flew from his lips as he raised the belt again, his fury blotting out the light. "What twisted world would ever believe that? She’s got his eyes! She’s his filth! And you—" the belt cracked down, tearing another scream out of the night—"you must be sick to love that thing!"

"No!" I lunged, trying to shield her with my tiny body, my child’s arms too small, too weak. "Stop! Please!"

But his shadow fell over me, massive and scary. My eyes bulging as I shook. His hand clamped around my middle with brutal force.

I screamed.

And then I looked down—

My legs. My arms. My whole body, shrunken, fragile, wrong.

I was four again.

He lifted me like a doll, my limbs flailing, my voice cracking with terror.

"See?" he bellowed, his rage scorching me alive. "This is what you protect. This thing that should never have been born!"

And with a roar, he flung me.

My body flew through the starlit dark, weightless for one sickening heartbeat before the wall slammed into me.

The impact shattered the air from my lungs, pain blooming white-hot as the stars blinked above me, merciless and distant.

My vision swam, pain rattling down my bones as I pushed myself up from the wall. My tiny hands trembled, my knees wobbling beneath me. And then—I saw her.

Not just him. Not just my mother.

Her.

Aunt Agnes.

She stood in the corner like she’d been there all along, shadows clinging to her frame. Her eyes, sunken and rimmed in smoke, followed every movement with cold detachment. A cigarette dangled from her lips, its ember glowing like a watching eye.

She hadn’t moved once. She’d just stood there. Watching.

"Please..." My voice cracked into the silence. My small feet stumbled toward her, my nightgown tangling around my legs. I collapsed against her, tugging at the thin fabric, my hands clawing desperately at her. "Stop Daddy. Please. Make him stop."

For a moment, she only looked down at me, exhaling a stream of smoke that curled like a noose between us. Then she crouched, her face lowering to mine, the stench of tobacco wrapping around me.

"You know it’s your fault," she whispered, and her words fell heavier than the lash of any belt.

My breath hitched. "W-what?"

She tapped the cigarette once, ash falling to the polished floor. Then, without warning, she pressed the glowing tip against my skin. I shrieked, jerking back, but her hand held me steady. The burn sizzled into my flesh, sharp and hot, my tears spilling faster as she leaned close.

"Every time she suffers," Agnes murmured, her voice almost tender, "it’s because of you. They love each other, your parents. But then you came. And you... you ruined everything." Her dark eyes gleamed with cruel certainty. "You stressed him. You dragged out the monster in him. He deserves his release, doesn’t he? Especially on a woman too sick to see you for what you are."

Her words didn’t make sense. None of it did. My child’s mind twisted, reaching for meaning where there was none. Who was this man they kept talking about? What did she mean?

But then another crack tore through the air. My mother’s scream followed, high and raw, echoing like it could split the stars above us.

I turned, frozen in horror, as Landon brought the belt down again. And again. His spit flew with every word. "Whore! Filth! Protecting that thing—" He pointed at me, face red with hatred. "She has his eyes! His eyes!"

When finally he was done, he spat on her. A wet, degrading sound that echoed louder than the belt ever had.

And then he left. Just like that. Storming into the shadows, leaving the wreckage behind him.

My legs moved without thought. I stumbled over, tears blinding me, until I fell against my mother’s crumpled form. Her body was curled on the floor, blood streaking her lips, her breath shallow.

"Mommy..." My voice was a child’s again, broken and high. I squeezed myself against her, pressing into her side, as if I could protect her the way she always had me. My tiny fingers lifted her hand, dragging it over me, arranging it like a blanket so she could hug me.

Her one good eye fluttered open, hazel and endless, swollen but still full of love. Blood stained her teeth when she smiled, and still—she smiled.

"Sweetheart," she whispered, weak but certain.

Her hand twitched over me, holding me close.

And for one fragile, fleeting moment, I believed that if I just lay still enough, if I just pretended hard enough, everything could be normal again.

That the belt, the screams, the fire in my skin—none of it had happened.

Just me. And her.

Her smile.

Her love.

Even when the stars above us pulsed, cruel and watching, like they knew the truth I wasn’t ready to face.

This was a memory, one that was distant and now I remembered.

And then—something shifted.

I wasn’t small anymore. My arms weren’t too short, my body wasn’t fragile. I was me again. Grown. Full-sized. My limbs strong enough to wrap around her, to pull her close the way I had always wanted to.

I held her properly this time. Crushed her to me, burying my face in her hair, breathing her in like I could stitch the scent of her into my lungs and never let go.

But even as I clung, the truth pressed against me. This wasn’t real. Couldn’t be. She was gone. She had been gone for years.

And still—I whispered it anyway.

"I’m sorry, Mum."

The words tumbled out, broken, ragged, each one carving me open further.

"I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. I should never have been born. I should never have stayed. I wish you hated me. I wish you despised me."

Her hair was damp beneath my lips, her blood still warm against my hands. My chest ached with a grief too heavy to carry.

"I don’t deserve your love. I never did. I will atone for the pain I caused. For all of it."

My voice cracked. I squeezed my eyes shut, clutching her tighter. "I swear I’ll make it right. Somehow. Even if it kills me."

Her fingers twitched, brushing weakly against my cheek. And then, even with her teeth red and her body broken, she smiled. That same smile. The one that made me ache because it was too much. Too forgiving.

And it gutted me more than the belt ever could.

And then—she was gone.

One moment my mother’s bloodied smile was pressed against me, her hand twitching faintly against my cheek, her warmth sinking into my bones—and the next, nothing.

My arms clutched at air.

I lurched forward, my chest hollowing out in an instant, my cries echoing too loudly in the star-strewn chamber. "Mum?" My voice cracked. I spun, stumbling across the polished floor, hands clawing through the dark as if I could drag her back into being. "Mum!"

But the stars above only pulsed, uncaring, their cold light pricking at my skin.

A whisper slithered through the silence.

"Guilt."

I froze.

The word wasn’t shouted. It didn’t need to be. It threaded through the air, low and knowing, sinking into me like a hook.

When I turned, she was there.

An old woman, cloaked in black and silver robes that pooled around her frail form. Her hair was hidden beneath a hood, but her face—what I could see of it—was lined and blind. Her eyes, white and sightless, still pierced me deeper than any gaze I’d ever endured.

She stood steady as stone, her presence heavier than her withered frame should allow.

"Guilt," she repeated, and the word seemed to echo from the very walls of the Sanctum. "It drives you forward. And yet it binds you, keeps you crawling in circles you cannot escape."

I staggered back a step, my throat dry, my palms clammy. "Who—who are you?"

Her lips curved, not in kindness but in recognition, as if my question had been asked a thousand times before.

"Your first trial to Ascension." she said simply.

The air thickened, pressing against my lungs until every breath burned. My heart slammed against my ribs, frantic, because I didn’t understand. Didn’t want to understand.

"No," I whispered, shaking my head. "That wasn’t real. It can’t be. My mother is gone."

"Her memory remains," the woman countered, her voice soft but merciless. "And your guilt festers. You carry it like a relic, polish it like a jewel. You tell yourself you deserve it—that pain is the price you must pay for the love you could not protect."

Her white eyes lifted, unblinking. "And so it shall be your chain, unless you choose to break it."