So here is the next chapter. Just to warn you in advance, it isn't a very pleasant chapter so i apologise for that. Please leave a review to tell me what you think as i love reading them :D

Saffron's POV

I quickly let down my shields, allowing Uriel to enter my mind. I decided to start from the very beginning and work my way up. I unlock the first door.

5 years old today. My uncle and my Mama were at home getting everything ready for my party this afternoon. Uncle was blowing up balloons and I drew silly faces on them in black marker. Mama was getting the food ready and waiting for Papa to come home.

Papa was my uncle's brother and they were also best friends. Mama was from England when she met my papa, her soulfinder, on holiday in South Africa. My Papa was picking up Aunty Maggie at the moment. Auntie was my Uncle's soulfinder and they were coming round my house for my birthday party.

Papa came in a while later and he had tears in his eyes and blood on his head.

'Markus! Are you okay!' Mama gasps. Papa doesn't reply.

'Mark! Where is Lula?' My uncle asks. Papa sits down with his head in his hands.

'There was an accident in the car. Lula is dead.' He says.

'No no no no' My uncle mutters. His eyes look funny. Crazy.

'I'm so sorry. The doctors, they did all they could. She couldn't be saved.'

'NO!' My uncle roared suddenly. 'WHY DO YOU LIVE AND SHE DIES?!'

'I'm so sorry.'

'No! You are not sorry. You have a soulfinder. You took mine away from me!' My Uncle's anger increases.

Suddenly Mama's head twists to the side and she falls to the floor like a limp rag doll.

Papa shouts out and sinks to his knees in front of Mama. He is crying and saying 'come back.' I don't understand. Why must she come back when she's already here?

'You killed her! You broke her neck!' Papa yells at my Uncle.

'An eye for an eye.' My uncle replies coldly.

My father reaches for the kitchen knife that is used to cut the birthday cake and lunges at uncle but he moves out of the way. I try and wake mama up so she can stop them fighting but she is sleeping too deeply.

Papa's head suddenly twists to the side and he also falls limply to the floor, next to mama.

'Dead….all dead.' Uncle mumbles, staring at mama and papa.

'What? They are not dead. Just sleeping.' I say in a panic.

'dead dead dead.'

I scream out for my mama and papa but they don't reply, for they are dead.

Uncle looks at me. I think he is going to kill me.

'Mercy, mercy.' I beg and he stops. I think it worked. He grabs me by the arm and tells me to get in the car. We drive and drive into the night…..

Uncle is not very nice. He hurts me when I am bad or when he is sad. It's my 10th birthday today and he is always worse on my birthday because that is the day that his soulfinder died. I was cleaning the pavement outside the house and Uncle was pacing up and down the hallway. He does this most days. Always pacing.

A snake wriggles on to the pavement. It is red and yellow and black. It is poisonous. I step back a little to allow the snake to pass without hurting me.

'Why have you stopped working! You mustn't stop! Work and work and work!' Uncle yells from inside but I ignore him. I cannot shout back as I may scare the snake and it may attack me.

Uncle storms over to me and yanks my head to the side by my hair.

'Listen to me girl! You do as I say! You are mine!'

'Uncle, there is a snake.' I whimper and point at the creature on the ground. Uncles face goes funny and he looks like he is going to faint. I remember mama telling me that Uncle has a phobia of snakes. That means that they make him very very scared.

Uncle fumbles around in his pocket and gets his gun out. He points it at the snake's head but I pull on the gun to stop him from killing the harmless creature. I would use my gift and make him take pity on the snake but I knew that he would find out I have been poisoning his mind with my gift and hurt me later. Uncle hits me around the face and then pulls the trigger. The snake's blood is splattered on the pavement. Uncle yanks me by my arm and pulls me inside.

'You we're going to take the snake's side over your own family?!' He screams in my face.

'No, uncle.' I cry.

'You were...This was all your idea…you and the snake were plotting against me…plotting…trying to kill me!' My uncle's angry escalades and my right arm cracks and twists. Broken. Maybe my Uncle will fix it when he has calmed down a little.

I scream out in pain but my Uncle cannot hear me. He is talking to himself and working himself up in frenzy. His right hand connects with my left cheek, a punch to my stomach, kicking my fallen body. The bones in my fingers break and my leg snaps, making a horrible noise which echoes around the hallway. Blackness swallows me.

14 years old today. Uncle is getting worse. He is talking to himself day and night. I try and care for him but he gets angry and hurts me more. He sent me out to town to get food. He didn't say which food to get so I have to guess. If I get it wrong, it could be disastrous.

A father and daughter are walking down the market, hand in hand. The daughter is about my age and she is smiling at her father and her father is smiling back. As they walk past, I heard the father say 'I love you' to his daughter. I wondered what that would feel like- to be loved and cared for by someone. I have the ability to control emotions but I have never made anyone love me because it would seem artificial as, deep down, I would know their love is fake.

Maybe even fake love is better than no love. I am still considering this as I bring the food back to uncle. He is waiting in the kitchen for me. I show him the dinner that I brought for tonight and he yells that he doesn't like it, despite that fact that it was his favourite food last week.

He holds the frying pan above his head, about to bring it down above my head when I decide to use my gift on him.

'love me.' I say telepathically, thinking of the father and daughter in the market.

Uncle drops the saucepan and it lands with a clank to the floor. He pushes me against the wall in the kitchen and forces his lips against mine. I try and fight back but his hand is holding me tightly to stop me from escaping. I try and rescind my gift but it is too late, his shields are up strong.

'Uncle. No I don't want this.' I manage to say.

'But I want you Saffron.' He replies, grabbing my wrist and yanking me upstairs, to his bedroom.

Pregnant. Pregnant at 14. What will people think of me? What will my Uncle think? He would be angry. He would say that it is all my fault and then hurt me. Then the baby will get hurt too. This cannot happen. I must get out.

I tried to escape that night. Packed my suitcase and left while he was sleeping. I reached the electronic gates to the house, preparing to climb over.

'One more step and I will break your neck.' My uncle's voice fills my head. I freeze in panic, my feet glued to the spot I am standing in.

'Bad girls must be punished, Saffron.' My uncle whispers behind me, his breath making the hairs on my neck stick up.

He grabs my arm and pulls me to the garden. No one is around. We live away from everyone. No one can save me. He pushes me against a tree, tie my arms around the truck so I cannot escape. It also means that I cannot see what he is doing. I can hear him pottering around the garden, muttering crazy things to himself. Things that don't even make sense. He gets it all muddled.

Then he stops talking and goes quiet.

'Uncle?' I call out nervously.

'No good deed goes unpunished, Saffron.' My uncle says sadly and then pain splits across my back. I line of pain burns across the place where he whipped me with a rope. I scream out in anguish but there is no one there to help me. The noise of the rope whistles in the air as it fly's down and strikes my again in a slightly different place. I scream again, unable to keep quiet, despite clamping my lips together like a vice.

'One for sorrow, two for joy, three for a girl, four for a boy.' My uncle sings, bringing the rope down hard on my back, four times. I feel blood trickle down my back from the rope. I can't see what my back looks like but I imagine it to resemble a snowflake. A blood red snowflake.

My uncle's voice suddenly sounds a couple inches away from my head.

'Don't leave me Saffron. You are mine forever. You have to be.' He says sadly although it is hard to make out through my sobbing. Then he walks away, as if nothing had happened at all. Humming softly to himself.

'one for sorrow, two for joy, three for a girl, four for a boy.'

Once I'm sure he is in the house I pull at my wrist, tugging at them in desperation to be free. I try and block out the burning pain. It feels like somebody has covered my back in petrol and then set fire to it. I pull at the rope all night long until, at around 3 in the morning, I break free. My wrists are a bloody mess and charred by the ropes, my back feels like someone is stabbing me again and again but that doesn't matter anymore; I am free. What do I do with me new found freedom? I run. I ran fast and far, to a faraway land where he'll never find me.