Hey guys! New chapter already!! (I'm very proud of myself here.) It still doesn't resolve much, but please R&R, but the next chapter will start to, I swear. Thanx!
He grabbed her by the hair and pulled her to her feet. She winced in pain and followed him. It hurt too much to struggle.
He led her out the back door, into his cornfield, into the corner where it abutted the house. He picked up a shovel as he passed it, sticking out of the ground.
Her heart caught in her throat. He wasn't like the others, he didn't want power, he didn't want her to submit. He wanted blood. He wanted revenge for whatever he had suffered in the past. He had killed his wife. He would kill her.
She didn't want to die. Not like this, not like this, not like this… her mind screamed. He threw her down again, onto the ground. She felt the hard-packed dirt, little blades of grass pushing up here and there between her fingers, making a hard and weary existence. Living. Beautiful life.
"Mort—" she looked up suddenly. "I love you." And it wasn't a lie, it wasn't a desperate ploy to make him stop. It was truth, and she simply had to let him know it before she was dead. She said it again, fiercely. "I love you."
He gave a sharp, bitter laugh. He knelt and spoke into her face, his dark eyes boring into his. She shuddered at their darkness but met his gaze steadily. "Shoulda thought of that, huh? 'Fore you fucked him?"
She didn't try to deny it; he wouldn't have listened. She bit back tears and closed her eyes hopelessly. She didn't want to die with this unknown, dark presence dominating her entire world, suffocating her with his hate. Maybe if she couldn't see him, she could sense the world beyond him.
"Look at me!" he commanded, grabbing the front of her shirt and hauling her up to his face. Her eyes flew open and looked fearfully into his, only inches away from her own. His calm veneer was gone now; his face was contorted with rage, and he spoke in shallow, gasping breaths. He kept one hand on her chest, holding her down; with the other he reached behind him for the shovel.
She whispered, her voice trembling from tears, still meeting his gaze. "One of us will die inside these arms."
A tremor seemed to run through him. He narrowed his eyes suspiciously. "What?"
It was a song that she had loved, that she had sang for him one night. It was a song about two lovers, promising each other that they would die still loving each other, so that their separation would be as sweet as their life.
After she had finished, he had looked at her a long time without speaking, and she had let the silence stretch on, the words of the song hanging in the air like stars in the night. Then he had reached out and touched her face, gently tracing the curve of her cheek.
"They're not afraid," he whispered.
She picked up his train of thought easily. "Not even of death. Their love is that strong."
"Marah?"
"Mmm?"
"I love you." He had said the words before, but not with this same intensity. There were echoes of eternity in his words.
"I love you too," she whispered back. They smiled at each other.
He pulled her to him and cradled her in his arms. "Teach me the song," he murmured.
"Okay."
So she had taught him the song, line by line, and felt a warm glow of joy begin within her. And the song became a promise between them, their promise of love and truth and sweetness forever. Almost every night, he whispered a line into her ear. And in that moment, she felt safe and warm, and she wasn't afraid of anything.
"What'd you say?" he asked again, abandoning the shovel and grabbing her with both hands again. There was a note of panic in his voice.
"You promised me that. Don't you remember?" Her voice cracked, so that she could barely force out the words.
His hold on her tightened, his face terrible and unreadable, but he did not move. There was a nagging feeling inside his head, shielded behind layers on layers of thick muffling dust, that something was terribly wrong. He'd felt a flash of compassion for the helpless girl. A desire to save her. But that made no sense—he was the one killing her, and he wanted to be killing her, because she was a traitor and a liar and had stolen his love when it was all he had ever had or wanted or needed. She had stolen it and ripped it apart and then thrown it away like trash. He wanted to make her suffer. Simple. But now he felt…
Whatever it was, if it were ever allowed to surface, it had the power to destroy his world, to unmake him as a human being. It terrified him, and he felt a desperate urge to repress it. Kill her quickly. Don't listen to her lies. Abruptly, he cast her away from him, and because he'd been yanking her up she hit the ground with some force. He raised his hand to strike her.
She began speaking the words, almost chanting them to herself, but her trembling and urgent voice gained melody as she went. The melody was as sweet and soft as a lover's whisper.
Eyes wide open…
Naked as we came…
One will spread our
Ashes round the yard…
At the last words she broke his gaze, and her eyes filled with tears, remembering the sweet parting they had promised each other.
"I want to die in your arms, Mort," she whispered. "Not by your hands." And she closed her eyes, letting the tears run silently past her eyelashes and down her cheeks.