MERCY
Prompt: Twilight Tricks and Treats and More Contest
Date: October 2022
2002
Hope, New Mexico
They came for her in the middle of the night.
We were on the threadbare sofa, a bowl of popcorn between us. It went mostly untouched. I was too little to eat much, and I didn't have a memory of Mom eating a lot, even when we had food to spare.
I didn't know what show we were watching, I never knew, but it was loud and I was up late and that was all that I cared about. I hated sleeping at night when I could hear my mom watching TV. My fear of missing out on something … anything … kept me up well past my bedtime, much to my mom's constant irritation.
I remembered the scent of Mom's shampoo: coconut and vanilla. She always said it felt like taking a tropical vacation to smell like that. I remembered the feel of the popcorn grease against my small hands. I even remembered looking up at Mom, her big brown eyes looking back down at me with a smile, and I knew that I was safe and loved.
Mom and I didn't have much, but we had each other, and that was all we needed.
I remembered the moment everything changed. I remembered Mom sitting up so abruptly on the sofa, the popcorn tipping onto the floor. I remembered her reaching out, placing a hand over my mouth as I began to cry in surprise. I remembered her words, whispered in my ear as she started to stand.
Hide, Bella.
Mom got up off the sofa, sliding me under the coffee table as she moved. She handed me my blanket, a tattered, worn thing. She crouched down, kissed my head once then stood back upright.
I waited until I heard her open and shut the front door before I crawled out and ran to the window.
It was dirty, and too high for me to see out anyway, but there was a chair nearby and I pushed it over so I could climb up and peer outside.
Mom was in the front yard, and she was backlight by the brightest lights I'd ever seen. She stood there, too small and thin in the blinding wall of white, and held a hand up to her eyes.
That was when they appeared. Angels in white, more than I could count, descending from the sky, from the darkness of the desert, from everywhere.
They were all reaching for Mom and she didn't fight them. She turned once, her face dark against the bright light, but I could see her eyes, see her stare right at me, and I saw her lips form the last words she'd ever say to me.
Hide, Bella. I love you.
Fear took over me, and I climbed down from the chair and ran to the one bedroom in our trailer. Mom and I slept in the same small bed, and I crawled under the covers to hide.
A few minutes later, the front door opened, and I shrank smaller, trying not to make a sound as I felt myself starting to cry.
He found me quickly. I screamed when the blanket was yanked off me, and I let out a terrified sob. I could hear voices as the giant man loomed above me. He was dressed in white, a flaming halo over his head.
"Leave that one, Mercy. She's not who we're here for."
The man stared down at me, and I continued to cry. He shook his head, and then he turned and left me alone.
Within minutes, the angels had gone, taking my mother with them, and I was left utterly and completely alone.
2022
Hope, New Mexico
The cigarette smoke curled in front of me as the stick burned, untouched, in the stone ashtray. Across from me where I sat on an old, tan leather sofa, Angela watched me, her sharp brown eyes framed by black glasses.
Neither of us spoke for a long time, and the only sound was the gentle ticking of the clock on her wall.
I knew what she was waiting for, and she knew I wouldn't do it.
I had thought I wanted to smoke, but the moment I'd lit a cigarette, it had made my stomach churn, so instead I watched it burn to nothing.
It felt metaphoric for my life. Wasted use, wasted potential, left alone to burn to ash.
"Bella." Angela sighed after a solid fifteen minutes had gone by. My eyes flickered up to her, and I watched her tuck her short hair behind one ear. "We can sit here in silence as long as you want, but it won't do anyone any good," she said gently. "How are the new meds working out?"
The cigarette burned out in the tray, and immediately, I fished out a second one. This time I lit it and took a long drag, despite the way my stomach curdled.
"Haven't been taking them," I muttered around the cigarette.
I could feel Angela's frustration and disappointment even though I wasn't looking at her.
"Bella, you have to take your meds," she said, her voice tense. "I don't want to have to send you back."
I flinched at the threat. I'd been in and out of psych wards since my mother was abducted. No one had believed my account of that night, no matter how consistently I'd told it. Without any living family members, and since no one could hunt down my mom, I'd been turned over to the state. But each foster family I went to had hosted me for less and less time until I'd been put into a juvenile psychiatric care facility. They all thought I'd lost my mind, that I'd made up stories about angels coming for my mom. It had been tolerable when I was four, but it had been twenty years now, and I knew everyone around me wanted me to stop pedaling this story.
The fact that Angela was threatening me with an institution again wasn't surprising. She'd been with me for years, perhaps the only constant in my life, but even she had her fucking limits. She'd throw my ass in a ward if I didn't take the meds she wanted and do the exercises she laid out for me.
Obey or be sent away.
I brought the cigarette to the ashtray, tapping it twice before leaning back and taking a drag again. It annoyed Angela to have me smoke during our sessions, which was usually why I did it.
"Did you hear me, Bella?"
I glanced at her as I sucked in another drag. I wanted to argue and fight with her, but what would it bring me? It had been a while since I'd done a stint in a ward. I was sure Angela was itching to send me back to one and let me be someone else's problem for a while.
"Yeah." I grunted, blowing out the smoke in a single breath. "I heard you."
She adjusted her glasses.
"This is for your own good," she encouraged.
I brought the cigarette to my lips again, gazing at her. Angela still said shit like that, pretending I believed her, and I didn't contradict her, letting her think it was actually true.
Angela's office was one of four functioning businesses in downtown Hope. The other three were the post office, the fire station, and a gas station that hadn't actually sold gas in at least three years. They kept the convenience store open, despite the malfunctioning pumps, and it had become the only place to purchase food in the town limits.. I'd often asked Angela why she operated out of Hope, since there were barely one hundred people in town, but her answers were so annoyingly noble each time I asked, I'd finally dropped it. Angela said she liked working where she grew up, liked helping the people there. She believed everyone deserved access to mental health care, even if the help could only do so much.
I wasn't sure that she had any patients other than me, though she could be serving the whole population and I would never know it. I spent as little time as I could actually in town.
When I'd turned eighteen, and was finally able to have some of my own rights back, I'd moved back to the trailer Mom and I had lived in before her abduction. It was strongly advised against by every single one of my doctors, but I didn't care. The place was a dump, but it had been there that I had the last ties to my mom, and I wanted to hold onto them.
Our trailer had been north of town, about a mile out into the desert. There wasn't an official road out there, but I knew the way even in the middle of the night.
When I left Angela's, I set out on foot, past the dilapidated buildings, toward home. Hope was a fucking dump, but it brought me peace to be back there.
I turned up E 1st Street, approaching some of the only functional homes in town. One family was outside, three young kids setting out carved pumpkins in the yard. I realized with a start that it must be October. I hadn't noticed until now.
I walked north until the gravel road ended, then I headed out into the desert dirt path. I wanted a cigarette, but even I wasn't a dumbass enough to light one out here in the brush. Instead, I shoved my hands into my coat pockets and continued on my path.
I got home a little over half an hour later. There was a light breeze that was rattling the windchimes I'd put up when I moved back. I could remember Mom hanging them when I was little, and I'd been pretty upset upon my return to see them tangled, torn down, and destroyed.
Restoring them had been my first project, and it had taken me an entire weekend to complete. The soft music had been a source of comfort to me, like somehow Mom was still trying to talk to me through the breeze.
I'd found a few more since, and many featured the object of my biggest obsession—angels.
All my doctors had tried to break me of my interest, but I couldn't let it go. I was haunted and I collected anything and everything with an angel that I came across.
My house was an inescapable shrine.
Part of me knew it was fucking insane, but I just couldn't help it. The angels had come to me that night, and even though they'd ruined my life by taking my mother, they'd given me something else in return. I knew even if no one else around me believed me, that somewhere out there, beings greater than humans existed. That knowledge brought me peace in my own twisted way, and gave me something to hold on to.
One day, the angels would come back for me and finally take me home where I belonged.
The moment I pushed past the screen door, I lit a cigarette, balancing it between my lips as I kicked off my shoes and pulled off my coat. I tossed my shit by the front door and plopped on the sofa, leaning forward for the beer I'd been nursing before I left. It was flat and warm, but I chugged it anyway. On the table, the angels I'd collected over the years all gazed at me, like they too were waiting to be taken home.
It was a full week until my next appointment with Angela, and I had planned on avoiding town as much as possible during that time, but an oversight had me running out of both frozen pizzas and whiskey. The food, I felt like I could live without, but the whiskey was the only way I ever got any sleep.
I held off on going into town as long as I could, but I'd been semi drunk since I was nineteen. Sobering up now was not something I was willing to face.
It was cold out the morning I finally headed back toward town. The sky was an endless, crisp blue that honestly made me a little nauseated to look at. I hadn't done laundry in a while, so I walked into town without socks, and in my sneakers, my toes started to rub raw against the worn plastic soles.
The houses still had pumpkins out on the porches as I passed them, though this time I didn't see any kids out. Maybe it was too early, or too late, or maybe it was a school day.
I didn't fucking know.
I made my way toward Angela's office, wishing there was another way to get to the liquor store. But Hope wasn't big enough for side streets, and I was forced to follow the road, past the church, past the post office, and past Angela's office. I didn't look up at her windows—I didn't want to know if she was watching me or not.
I made it to the liquor store, and when I realized I only had enough cash for whiskey or pizza, I bought the bottle and a cheap bag of chips that would have to be enough food for me to live off of until I got new money coming in.
On my way back home, I breathed a sigh of relief when I passed Angela's office and I didn't hear anyone calling my name. I took a few swigs of the whiskey, appreciating the warmth it brought me against the crisp cold desert fall day.
All my relief was short-lived though, for as soon as I neared the church, the doors opened, and the entire population of Hope spilled out of the old double doors.
Hope was too small not to know everybody, and yet I'd managed in all the years living in my mom's trailer to not bond with anyone. I knew Angela out of an obligation, but everyone else was a stranger to me.
That was what made the smiling minister dressed in black, approaching me, so weird.
"Bella! It's good to see you!" he said, a warm smile spread over his face. He was lightly tanned, with short blond hair and soft blue eyes. Everything from his carefully combed hair to his well-manicured hands told me that he was not someone who had grown up in Hope. No one here had any sort of money to spend indulging in professional haircuts and manicures.
I wanted to ignore him, turn and run the other way even, but I felt a body slide next to me.
Angela, of course.
Immediately, I fished out a cigarette and lit it. I felt her take half a step back, and I let out a relieved breath.
"Who are you?" I asked around the cigarette.
The minister cocked his head to the side. "Don't you remember me? I'm Pastor Mike." He flashed me a too-bright smile. "Your mama and I used to be friends. It's a shame what happened to her."
My body went rigid, feelings of both being too hot and too cold flooding through me.
"What?" I choked.
"Pastor Mike," Angela started, one of her hands fluttering in front of her. "I really don't think—"
"What happened to my mother?" I demanded, cutting Angela off. His eyes widened, and he looked between Angela and me.
"Oh, I mean… well…" He reached up, rubbing a hand on the back of his neck. He knew. He knew what happened to my mom all those years ago.
And what was more, so did Angela.
I turned on her, my blood boiling at this revelation.
"You've known?" I hissed, spit flying out of my mouth as I tried to bite back most of my anger. The cigarette was in my hand, but I was shaking so much, I was sure I'd drop it or end up burning someone. I let it fall to the dirt and twisted my toe over it to extinguish fully.
Angela reached for me, but I pushed her hands away.
"Bella, come with me. We'll talk about it in my office," she said, shaking her head. We were starting to attract a crowd, but I didn't fucking care.
They knew what happened to my mom, and they were keeping it from me.
"Tell me what happened to my mom!" My words came out as a scream, and Angela's hands wrapped around my upper arms.
"Not here," she hissed, her eyes tight with her panic. "Come to my office."
I didn't understand. What could she possibly be keeping from me? What could be so bad that would justify lying to me for years.
"Tell me what's going on!" I shouted, my heart beating so aggressively in my chest, I felt like I couldn't breathe around it. Angela pulled me from the gathering crowd, and I was too weak to really fight her.
"You're drunk," she accused, the moment she'd yanked me inside the lobby of her office. I turned on her, staggering a little on my feet.
"Tell me what happened to my mom!" I yelled, transferring the whiskey to my other hand when I realized my grip was slipping.
Angela shook her head. "You know you're not supposed to be drinking," she said quietly.
"Angela, I swear to fucking god," I hissed, my voice cracking over my anger. "Tell me."
She bit her lip, her eyes flashing toward the window facing the street before she looked back at me.
"Fine, come and sit down."
She turned and headed for her office. For once, I didn't fight her. I followed her in, plopping down on the sofa and took another swig of whiskey. She glared at me but settled in her normal chair.
"What I'm about to tell you is extremely confidential," she said softly. "You need to understand. Knowing this information could put your life at risk."
I sneered at her. I was a drunk lunatic living alone in the desert. There wasn't anything that could make that worse.
She took a breath and leaned forward, her elbows braced against her knees, hands clasped together. "How much of your mother do you remember?"
I sat back, frowning.
"Not much," I said slowly. "She… She liked windchimes."
It was embarrassing to admit how little I'd known the woman I'd spent my life pining after.
Angela nodded.
"Your mother had a lot of faults, but she was a good person in her core," Angela said slowly. "She just had a tendency to get involved with the wrong people."
I stared at her, willing her to get on with her story.
"That night … I know you've spoken about the…" She paused, her dark eyes flashing to me.
"The angels," I supplied.
Angela swallowed hard and nodded. "Right." She cleared her throat. "They weren't angels who came for your mom. Your mom was tied to dangerous, powerful people, and she'd been hiding from them and the FBI since you were born. That night, the FBI finally found her."
I frowned, trying to wrap my head around anything she was saying. "The FBI?"
Angela nodded. "It's still an ongoing case. No one is supposed to know about it…" She trailed off, looking guilty.
"So how do you? Or that guy?"
Angela took a breath. "I was working for CPS back then. I was the one called out to bring you in."
What? I had no memory of that.
"And that guy?" I asked, my palms starting to sweat. I rubbed them on my pants, my fingers itching to reach for a bottle. She let out a breath.
"You were distraught when we first brought you in. Pastor Mike was asked to come in and… evaluate you."
It took me a minute to understand what she was saying. "You thought I was possessed?"
She let out a breath. "Some people wondered about your adamant insistence that angels came for your mom. Mike Newton has a background in social work, so I felt comfortable having him talk to you."
"So, what? Did he miss the memo about it being a secret operation?" I couldn't help the bitterness in my voice.
Angela sighed.
"Pastor Mike is many things, but good at keeping secrets he is not. It's not the best quality to have in a pastor, but we've all found ways to deal with his talk."
I stared at her, trying to process everything coming at me.
"Is…" My voice cracked, and I cleared my throat once, swallowing hard. "Is my mom still alive?"
I hated how broken and hopeful my voice sounded. I hated the vulnerability in it.
Angela let out a long breath, bringing one hand up to rub her forehead.
"I don't know," she said softly. "I've tried looking into her. I've reached out to everyone I can. There is no trace of her. If she is alive, she's still being kept hidden."
Tears burned my eyes, and I didn't want to cry in front of Angela, so I looked up at her old ceiling, my head resting on the back of the worn sofa.
What could be so bad that my mom would be snatched away from me, without a single trace of her left even twenty years later? What kind of secret carried that sort of scar?
The possible answers weighed me down until I felt like I couldn't breathe.
So instead, I reached for the whiskey.
There was a stain on my ceiling that looked like an angel.
It was probably water damage, and if I were to get up off my ass and peel back the thin wallpaper that mysteriously covered the ceiling, I was sure I'd find mold.
But none of that mattered because the stain looked like an angel, watching over me.
I lifted the whiskey bottle from where I was sprawled out, tipping it back. Some of it dribbled over my lips and down my throat as I sucked the last drops. The bottle had lasted less than a day.
I wanted another bottle, but I didn't have any money.
Somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew that no matter how much I drank, I couldn't drown out the swirling thoughts of my mom. Who had she really been? What had she done in life?
Instinctively, I reached for the bottle again, but it was empty. Still, I tilted it up over my mouth, lapping at the glass in hopes of a few more drops.
When it was licked clean, I threw the bottle across the room. I heard it thud against the carpet, and I shut my eyes, wishing I could chase away the thoughts.
What I wouldn't give for something—anything—to knock me out right now.
I blamed Angela, even though I wasn't sure she was in fact the right person to blame for the shit show that was my life.
Still, it was easier to pin blame on her than dive deeper into who might actually be at fault. After all, Angela had lied to me practically my whole goddamn life. She'd sat there across from me for years, smiling and offering absolutely nothing to me when I was broken and screaming for answers, for help… for anything.
She'd stayed immovable, completely indifferent to the pain I was constantly living in.
If only she'd opened her fucking mouth once in a while, or even left a file out for me so I could find answers…
My eyes flew open.
Angela was an annoyingly meticulous notetaker. If she'd been there that night, and she really knew what was going on, she'd have a record of it… somewhere.
I was up off my sofa before I'd even finished the thought. I staggered a few steps, realizing too late that I was a little more drunk than I'd thought.
It didn't fucking matter. I had to go to her office. I needed answers.
I stuffed my shoes on and left the house, too warm from the alcohol to even remember to grab my coat.
It was the middle of the night, and it was fucking freezing, but I was burning with anger and injustice.
I stumbled my way through the desert, tripping a few times on rocks and tumbleweeds. A particularly deep divot in the sand had me sprawling face-first into the dirt and sand, my palm scraping against a rock.
I dragged myself back on my feet and kept going.
It probably took longer than normal to get to town because I never made the trip in the dark and I couldn't actually be sure I was walking in the right direction for a while. I had no sense of time; the only thought in my head was about getting answers, by any means necessary.
Eventually, the dim streetlights appeared on the horizon, and I headed toward them, a new determination blooming in me now that I was getting closer.
It was late, but I wasn't sure what time. Every house was dark, the jack-o-lanterns on the stoops extinguished for the night.
I passed the church and the post office until finally, I saw Angela's office.
It was dark, just like every other building in town.
In my drunken state, I tried the front door first. It was, of course, locked, and I moved around the building, looking for an unlocked window.
They were all secured, but the back door had a small pane of glass in it. Picking up a rock, I hurled it at the door. I missed the window at least seven times before finally, the rock made contact with the glass, fracturing it.
I moved toward the door, punching at the weakened pane. It gave out under my fist, and I reached through to unlock the door.
It was dark in Angela's office when I finally made it inside. I'd never been in the back, and for a second, I groped around for a light.
After a few minutes of not being able to find it, I grunted and stumbled into the room. My shins hit every piece of furniture in the space, and I stumbled forward, swearing.
I needed to find a light.
I was about to turn and go back to the wall when murmurs made me freeze. It was still dark wherever I was, but I could hear voices getting louder.
Then, a light flickered on in the room ahead of me. It illuminated the space I was in enough that I saw I was in a small kitchenette. I ducked down behind the counter, out of view from the other room.
"You had one fucking job," a smooth, female voice snarled. "Only one. Keep a fucking lid on this mess."
"I've had it under control for twenty years." Angela's voice rang out, tight with her anger. "You assured me no one would remember!"
"Do we have to fucking hold your hand through this?" the other voice hissed. "Do your fucking job."
"What does it even matter?" Angela demanded. "She doesn't remember. She's an alcoholic disaster who still thinks angels came for her mother. Nothing has changed."
"Something has changed," the other woman insisted. "She…"
The voice cut off, and my spine went numb with my fear. My ears strained to hear what was going on, hear anything of what was happening, but I couldn't focus on anything past the thundering of my heart in my ears.
After a few seconds of silence, I took the quietest breath I could and leaned forward, peering around the counter. It was still dark in the room I was in, but the glow from the next room outlined the silhouette of a man, standing beside me.
I screamed, right before a hand came around my throat, silencing me.
My feet flailed, kicking at the air as I tried to make contact with the man. I was dragged up into the air, and the hand at my throat clamped tight enough to make it hard to breathe, but not so hard as to crush anything. He wound an arm around my body, tucking me flat against his chest so that my back was to him. His hand moved from my throat to cover my mouth, and I bit at the flesh. He hissed in my ear, and the sound was so inhuman, I relinquished my hold.
The tang of rust in my mouth told me I'd either bit him hard enough to draw blood, or somehow had gotten my own lip in the process. Since I was pretty numb from the whiskey and fear, either was likely at this point.
"What's going on?"
A light flickered on overhead, and I was spun in time to see Angela and a blonde woman I'd never met. The woman was tall, taller than even Angela, with flawless pale skin and bright, lavender eyes.
The moment she saw me, she turned on Angela.
"You call this under control?" She snarled. Her angelic face contorted with her rage, and though she was still beautiful, she was terrifying.
Angela looked helplessly between the woman and me.
I couldn't breathe. The man holding me was grasping too tight and my vision was starting to go splotchy.
I whimpered once against his hand, and he must have understood what I meant because his grip loosened.
I slid down his body until my feet hit the floor, and he let me go. I staggered away, spinning toward him and backing up until I felt a wall behind me.
He was tall, and easily the most muscled person I'd ever seen. His eyes were an almost glowing green, and his hair was such a bright copper color, it looked like fire.
A halo of fire.
"Mercy," I wheezed, my eyes filling with tears. The angels had come back for me. They had come back, just like I knew they would.
His eyes flickered over me, looking confused.
I couldn't stop myself. Relief, pain, desperation, hope… it all collided in me, and I rushed forward, wrapping my arms around him and sobbing into his chest. I felt him stiffen under me. I longed for him to wrap me in his wings, to hold me and tell me that all would be well.
Instead, he pushed me back.
"You're bleeding," he said, his voice deep and carefully neutral. I reached up to brush tears from my face.
"You came back for me," I cried.
He looked confused.
"Fuck," I heard the woman swear. "This is all your fault."
I didn't turn to look at her, but I suspected she was talking to Angela. My eyes were focused on Mercy, who gently reached for my hand. There was glass in my knuckles and gravel in my scraped palm. I was a mess, but I didn't care.
My angel had come back to me.
"Bella, you need to listen to me."
Angela was trying to get my attention, but I couldn't tear my eyes from the closed bathroom door. She'd dragged me in there to clean me up, and to my dismay, had shut the door. I hated it. I couldn't risk my angel leaving again. I needed to see him.
"Bella!"
She pressed against a cut on my hand and I winced, looking at her.
"Huh?"
She huffed and let go of my hand. She turned to the sink and ran a cloth under the faucet.
"You are in great danger," Angela whispered to me over the running water. I stared at her. "Don't trust those…" She glanced at the door. "Don't trust anyone. Don't accept anything from anyone. Don't go anywhere but home. Do you understand me?"
I didn't.
"Who are they?" I asked. She shut the water off and turned to my hand, wiping it with the cloth. She didn't answer me, which wasn't that surprising.
Angela cleaned up my cuts, bandaging what she needed to. Most of the wounds were surface scrapes that had stopped bleeding already.
When she was done, she let out a soft breath and met my eyes.
"Now," she whispered, turning the faucet back on. "When I open the door, I want you to crawl out of this window and run home. Do you understand me? Run away from here, and don't stop no matter what you hear."
I frowned. "Why would I run away from my angel?"
Angela leaned toward me. "Goddamnit, Bella. He's no angel. He will kill you. Run home and hide and don't look back. Got it? Hide, Bella."
Hide, Bella.
My throat constricted at the remembered words echoing in my mind. Hide, Bella. I love you.
The words rattled sense into me, and when Angela met my eyes again, I nodded that I understood. She motioned me toward the bathroom window. It was high up, but if I stepped on the sink, I could scoot through it. She kept the faucet running as I opened the window and climbed up. When I was halfway through the window, I looked back at her.
Angela appeared like she'd aged twenty years in the last hour. She looked tired and frightened, and when she stared at me, the resigned look in her eyes scared me.
"Hide, Bella."
I slipped through the bathroom window, tumbling to the concrete outside with a graceless thump. I picked myself up off the ground, shivering now that I was aware of just how cold it was. I glanced back once at the window before I took off, stumbling down the street.
Twenty seconds later, a bloodcurdling scream wrenched the night apart. I stumbled, tripping to my knees when I looked back.
I knew it was Angela, and even though I knew there was no way for me to save her from whatever had come, part of me wanted to.
I wasn't sure I liked Angela, but she was the closest thing I'd ever had to family.
Hide, Bella.
Her parting words pushed me back into motion, and I turned, running into the desert.
It was too dark, and I was still drunk as I slipped out of the town limits and into the edgeless void. It was stupid to be racing into the desert, I knew that, and even sober and in the middle of the day, this would be dumb, but I was running on fear and confusion, and so I kept stumbling farther and farther into the unknown.
I lost all sense of direction, and any sort of lingering sense of time I had also vanished as I continued tripping through the wild landscape. I didn't know where I was going, or if I was even remotely headed home.
I just kept going.
After some time, I couldn't take it anymore. I collapsed against a boulder, my back leaning against the cool stone as I curled my knees to my chest and sobbed. It was so cold out, and I was utterly and completely alone.
I would always be alone.
"Now, now, there is no need for tears," a smooth voice said through the dark. My body froze, and panic flooded through me. I knew the voice: it was the beautiful blonde angel. And if she'd found me, then…
An iron grip clasped my shoulders and hauled me up. I screamed, but the sound was lost to the night.
I spun in his grasp and he turned me to look at him. Even in the pitch of night, he was beautiful.
"Mercy," I sobbed, equal parts relieved and terrified to see him. "Mercy, please. Save me, Mercy."
His eyes moved over my face, brilliant and glowing in the dark. That was a gaze that could see through anything.
"I am no angel," he said, his voice low like the warning rumbling of thunder before a storm. "And I have no mercy."
The woman's cold, cruel laugh cut through the air, and when I looked at her, sharp white fangs were stretching down from her mouth, like a serpent ready to strike.
I looked up at Mercy and saw fangs glinting under the half-moon in his mouth too. I had exactly two seconds to panic before the world went black.
It is my intention to extend this into a full-length fic, though when it will be coming to you in full length, I'm not sure. Join my group on Facebook, and be sure to follow me as an author to get the updates when it finally goes live!