The Fiend and His Fools // UGG vs. FFG vs. Mutt, Day 5

Down in the deep
Where the sirens sing
And hide in the muddy water
Blood on my hands
And the moonlit sand

Have you ever wished for a rewind?

She had a dream, she wanted to pick up the pieces of the last memory she had from when life had made sense. Those memories were so far away, buried beneath the scars that littered her skin like a raging sea. She’d been tossed against the rocks at the base of the cliff for her entire life, drowning over and over again. Anabelle had been the lifeboat that had propped her up for three years. For three years of her life she had been able to taste the fresh air on her tongue instead of water in her lungs.

Was it fair for her to feel so exhausted by the age of fifteen? The world dragged on her shoulders, like a demon looming over her, claws dug deep into her flesh. An endless darkness surrounded her heart, I’m living on nothing but borrowed time, she watched as the knife had sliced open Daemon’s throat, but he didn’t die.

This time Anabelle sat herself on the dirt and grass beside Meredith, pulling the skirt over her knees as she rested Meredith’s heart in her lap. She glanced down at it, deep gashes piercing the flesh, each thump of her heart growing weaker as the blood pooled on Anabelle’s dress. Darkness danced at the edges of her vision, the pain a constant and overwhelming feeling as she swayed against the breeze that brushed her skin.

“That was a good throw,” Anabelle looked to where the knife had landed, an amused grin on her lips. Meredith stared at her, unable to take her eyes away, she was glued to the spot. Her body didn’t want to make or react, but she had to, there was still more to do.

“How’d you do it? Smile all the time?”

It hurt too much, trying to pretend nothing was wrong, burying the pain beneath a grin. Anabelle had done it every single day of her life, smiling right until the end. She finally looked away from the knife, turning her brown eyes to Meredith with a thoughtful frown. Her face was still round, fourteen years old and barely at the beginning of her life, before it was stolen in an instance.

“Someone had to,” she picked at the grass, pulling a blade free as she hummed gently, the tune following the beat of Meredith’s struggling heart. “One smile leads to another, and even if I could only ease everyone’s pain just a fraction by making them a little happier, that was enough for me.”

Meredith sat in silence, ignoring the clash of the others' weapons, the sound of Bella and Lysander fighting was background noise to the tune that Anabelle hummed.

“I think I’m going to need that back for now, Anabelle,” she pointed to the heart on her friend's lap, her one good hand moving to the knives at her belt, aching fingers tugging another one free.

I walk a lonely road

The only one that I have ever known

Don't know where it goes

But it's only me, and I walk alone

"Bella."

Her blade slices through the mutt's head.

"I need you."

The beasts ear is severed from its body in a mighty scream of pain. Regret wells in the pit of her stomach, like a stone that's weight never seemed to cease. Constantly growing, weighing her down. She wonders if it would ever pass, or it it would be there forever... A constant reminder of what she had done. What she had been forced to become. The pain from the monsters cry clashes through her ear drums, her mind as she struggles to tare her gaze from the wound in its head that dripped with blood. It runs down its face, like tears. Not only its body was crying in pain, but its soul too-

I need you.

Lysander.

"Rip off a piece of my cloak and tie it around my arm." She instructs, Arabella's hands quickly finding the edge of her own cloak, tearing through the fabric she rushes to her side. There- there was so much blood. Biting her lower lip she forces herself to hold back the bile that had begun to rise deep within her throat, the acidic burn starting to feel familiar. She could not vomit again. "If you don't I'm going to bleed out in a matter of minutes. But for the love of Ripred," Swallowing hard she meets Lysander's gaze. "Please don't throw up on me." A small shaky laugh bubbles past her lips, her shoulders relaxing ever so slightly.

Fingers working quickly as she wraps the wad of material around the tender stump. She tries to ignore the tears of pain that begin to swell her the girls eyes. Arabella couldn't even imagine the pain that she and Meredith must be going through. It had been one of her worst nightmares coming into the arena. To have her body butchered so violently that her body parts would be scattered and that she would die, alone, burning with an agony that only the call of death would cure.

Lysander throws some words in Meredith direction. Arabella gaze follows her gaze to her fractured career. “How’d you do it? Smile all the time...?" Huh? Wait, what? Who was she talking too? She thinks a frown knitting her brow together her fingers clasping the hilt of her blade tighter as she watches the girl post to something that she couldn't see. “I think I’m going to need that back for now, Anabelle." Confusion swirled through her, her foot taking a hesitant step towards the Career.

"Meredith... Who- what are you talking... about? Lysander, who is she talking too?" Maybe Lys could see what Arabella could not. But before she can say- or even think- much more Meredith pulls back her arm sending a knife flying towards Daemon. She looses her breath, her eyes watching as the boys body crumples to the ground. Then suddenly it's not his body, its Helle's, her gaze burning into Arabella as she hits the earth, cursing her to burn in Hell for eternity. Panic veins to climb through her limbs, creeping up her arms and legs. Shaking like a leaf she takes a deep breath, in and out. In and out her chest which had been heaving in shallow rapid breaths starts to slow.

Blinking rapidly its Daemons body lifeless on the ground. Eyes dart to Kahinta, a lump forming in her throat. I'm tired of feeling so small. She had said to her that night, she had looked so tired, and now, she simmered with anger. An apology danced on Arabella's lip she she stops it before it can escape. What was the use in apologising? Daemon was already dead, his body soon to be carted away to wherever it is that they take them. Soon he would be brought back to life, only to fight to death once again- so Arabella assumed.

Instead she turns back to the mutt, it couldn't give a damn that one of them had fell, it only sought chaos. Its lips salivating with the thought of sinking is claws into flesh. She couldn't let it get to Meredith, Lysander- even Kahinta- so she darts towards it, slashes her blade towards it dying body.