I began etching shadows, switching for a wider brush and scooping more and more paint, shading in wide, cathartic slashes. I squeezed out a blob of black and layered more ominous darkness, breathing fast as my brush dragged and slashed and stabbed, a thing wholly independent of me.
I leaned too close to see the bigger picture, painting details in the clouds like black veins of lightning, adding a stormy quality to the sky —except for two vivid blue sections in the middle that glared as brightly as the sun. They defied the dark storm.
It should have been a glimmer of hope, but when I sat back, my eyes aching from concentrating so hard, I caught a full glimpse of the painting and my stomach roiled.
The piece was full of blackness and ominous shapes, the sort of sky that crashed ships into rocks, and plucked planes from the sky to send them hurtling to their deaths. Those two whorls of brighter blue weren't glimpses of hope in the darkness—the darkness was bleedingout ofthem, infecting the rest of the painting.
It was the same shade of blue as Anatoly's eyes.
I scrambled off the bed and away from what I'd painted, what I'd accidentally given physical form to, but I couldn't stopstaring. That was what lived inside me, bleeding its poison into my soul, infecting every part of my nervous system.
One second I was in the sanctuary room, staring at the painting in horror. The next, I was back in that vile Hunter den, with heat stabbing my skin as the alpha bore down on me, those blue eyes bright with satisfaction and victory.
I howled and tore free of the memory, and spun, slamming my fist into the nearest thing: the wardrobe. It was too solidly built for me to damage anything except my hand, but at leastwhen pain blazed through my fist, I could catch a breath and escape those memories.
With my throbbing hand, I turned the easel to face the wall so I wouldn't have to see it again, but there was no undoing the damage it had already caused. Painting was my escape, the place I could disappear to when everything else became too overwhelming. But there was no comfort to be found here anymore.
There was no comfort to be found anywhere.
What I really needed was to drown out the memories, and if nothing else worked, at least there was always alcohol.
13
Priest
Iwasn't proud of it, but I followed the dark flow of my bond with Luna to the bar, and pretended to be there for my own reasons.
"You fleeced me last week," I told Wizard when he raised his eyebrows at my arrival. "You didn't think I'd forgotten, did you?"
"Here to pay up a second time, Priest?" he threw back, running a dark hand through his shaggy black hair and sitting back in his chair to give me a smirk. "By all means … hand over the rest of your savings."
I rolled my eyes, helping myself to a seat at the table he shared with Cobra and Sweetie.
"You're going down, Priest," Sweetie taunted, smirking behind his bushy beard.
My mouth curled in a grin. "I didn't realise we were betting sexual favours. If that's the case, count me out. I'm not interested in whatever you've got crawling around down there."
"Hey," Sweetie growled, his dark eyes narrowed but a smile flickering on his face. "You'd be lucky to get anywhere near me, I'll have you know."
I snorted, secretly angling myself to watch where Luna sat near the bar with ChaCha—secretly watching Sweetie—and Thora—downing vodka shots like it was her paid job. Luna was paler than usual, but that could have been the shitty bar lighting that Prodigy claimed gave the placeambiance.
"Subtle," Cobra remarked with a smile sharp enough to cut. "You pining over the new rescue, Priest? That's not usually your style."
I narrowed my eyes in a clear warning, checking the hand Wizard dealt me. I hid my reaction to the cards behind a steely stare at my younger, volatile brother. I was probably gonna lose this hand, too. Fuck.
"I don't poke my nose intoyourbusiness," I said pointedly to Cobra, watching a muscle flicker in his sharp jaw.
"I don'thaveany business," he shot back, sneering and defensive.
"Huh," Sweetie said before I could reply. Just that. Justhuh.
"You got something to say, Sweets?" Cobra demanded, leaning across the table, his cards tipped to give us an accidental glimpse. Maybe all hope for this hand wasn't lost, because Cobra hadshittyluck.
"It's just strange," Sweetie said nonchalantly, pretending to assess his cards. "I could'veswornI'd seen Lynn leaving your room a couple times this week."
I took another quick look across the bar. It wasn't massively busy tonight, but there was still a decent number of knights and rescues as Cobra called them. I double checked I knew every single person—we couldn't be too careful after a Hunter got in a month ago, and scared the shit out of Vienna.
Luna's clear brown eyes were glassy as she laughed at something Thora said, but it was a vacant sort of laugh, nothing like the way she'd laughed earlier. Before the episode in the supermarket threw her back into her trauma.