Pain
A shudder rippled through Lucas' body, and his mouth opened as he leaned towards me. I didn't even have time to react before Isaac's cold hand gripped my wrist and dragged me away from Lucas with enormous speed. My back hit the wall with enough force to blow the wind out of me, but Isaac didn't seem to notice. He stood protectively in front of me while Lucas glared at me with hungry eyes. His gaze sent shivers of fear down my spine and made my knees tremble slightly.
"Lucas, calm down", Isaac barked.
The only response he got was a growl.
"Calm down", Isaac repeated.
A low whimper escaped my lips as I saw how Lucas took a step closer, and the sound brought Isaac's attention to me. He turned around slightly to look at me.
"Just sta…"
His sentence was cut off as Lucas suddenly bounced at him and thereby knocked him to the ground. I gasped out loud, but neither of the two brothers paid me any attention this time.
I knelt down to the floor beside them, desperate to stop their fight.
"Go back…to my room…and stay there", Isaac ordered gruffly while he struggled to keep Lucas down.
I was too shocked to be able to get up on my feet again, so I crept towards the opening of Isaac's room. My eyes had adjusted enough for me to see where I was going, so it didn't take long for me to get inside the bedroom and close the door behind me. The sounds of the fight outside the door disappeared, but I was still so frightened that I couldn't stop the tremors of fear from shaking my whole torso. I crawled to the corner of the huge room and curled up there, trying to melt into the wall.
The blazing anger I'd felt inside was now completely gone and replaced by both sheer fear and the grief of loosing my mother – especially now that I knew for sure what horrible death she'd experienced. Just the small image of my mum's face made my eyes fill up with tears.
I don't know how long I sat there, my body shaking with both fear and tears, but eventually the door to the room slid open and someone peeked inside. It was too dark for me to see anything but the profile of the person.
"Isaac?", I whispered. I couldn't make my voice louder.
The person walked over to where I sat, and hovered over me. Although it was dark, I could clearly see the features of the person who stood in front of me. The hair was long and the eyes – which had a strange green colour – were filled with a fierce thirst.
My breath got stuck in my throat.
"Where…where's Isaac?", I whispered.
Lucas didn't answer my question. He leaned closer to me, but I cringed into the wall and covered my face with my hands.
His hand gripped my wrist tightly, and I couldn't stop a gasp from escaping my lips as I felt how cold his skin was. He dragged me up from the floor in a swift move – ignoring my shocked intake of breath – and pressed me against his stone chest. His arm wound around my back, stopping me from escaping, while his other hand pushed away the hair from my neck. I wiggled and wormed, desperately trying to get away from him as I saw how his head bowed forwards.
My worthless struggling stopped as I felt how a set of unbelievably sharp teeth sank through the thin skin that covered my neck. My whole body went limp and if it weren't for that his arms held me up, I would have slumped back to the floor. It stung deeply were his teeth were set, and the pain radiated through my whole body. It was almost a relief to me when a dark mist began to cover my eyes and the unconsciousness started making my mind blurry.
Just then, a familiar voice screamed my name.
The arm around my back disappeared and was replaced by a gentler one. Instead of being mashed against Lucas' body, I was now cradled in someone's arms. The air around me swirled uncomfortably, but I knew the feeling from before. Besides, I was more concerned about the horrible pain that ached in every cell of my body.
"Jessica?", Isaac's voice murmured anxiously. "Jessica, can you hear me?"
I groaned in response.
"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. I…"
"It hurts", I interrupted him. I couldn't really focus on his apologizes.
Something touched the spot on my neck where the pain was centered, but it didn't hurt more than before. Isaac muttered something, but it was too low for me to hear what it really was. It sounded almost like a curse.
"It hurts", I repeated, lower this time.
"I know", he said soothingly. "But it'll be alright"
He started saying something else, too, but that was the exact moment when the unconsciousness sank down on me and made everything else disappear.
Even in complete darkness, the pain was as excruciating as before. Every other sense had disappeared; all I could feel was the unbelievably sharp pain that ached through my body. Strangely, it kind of reminded me of the time when I'd tried to kill myself.
Still, this time was so different.
I didn't dread for the reality, like I'd done the other time – I longed for it now. I knew it wouldn't be the same as before, though. After learning as much as I had of what Isaac had said, I knew for sure that I wouldn't wake up as a…human.
That wasn't the only thing that was different; the pain I'd felt after jumping from the skyscraper was nothing compared to what I felt now. This pain trembled through my whole body slowly and tremendously painfully.
What frightened me the most was not the pain. It was that I had no grip on what was happening in reality while I was unconscious. Had Lucas calmed down enough or was he following Isaac and me? Would he attack if he caught up with us? There was no way for me to know the answers to those questions.
The sound of a voice suddenly cut through the endless silence, which surprised me enough to forget about the pain for a second.
"Stay away from her", Isaac shouted to someone.
At first I thought that I was dreaming; it felt strange that my hearing would come back to me before my sight could. And the pain hadn't even disappeared yet.
But as I listened more closely, I could hear more sounds; the quiet set of footsteps, the wind blowing over my head and rustling the leaves in a tree. Was I outside?
"I won't hurt her again", another voice replied more calmly. Lucas.
Just the sound of his voice made me cringe mentally. But I couldn't really focus on the fear – I was very surprised that I could hear so much.
"I don't care. You will not get near her", Isaac growled.
A quiet sigh was heard. "Isaac, I've calmed down…"
"I said I don't care. And if you take another step, I promise you that I'll kill you"
No other words were spoken, but the air suddenly swept over my face, almost as if someone had rushed by me much too fast…
"No!"
I was frozen in shock as I realized that I had been the one who'd screamed. But that was not only the reason why I was stunned; the pain had abruptly vanished and everything around me was bright and clear.
It took me a little while to realize that my eyes were open again.
Sorry to say, but this story is kind of coming to its end… :/ So PLEASE review a little more now – give me some inspiration for the last chapters of this story :O
And I know, I know, that this chapter wasn't one of the longest, but anyway…