Chapter 9 - This is Hell.

"My...my apologies, Dantina. I..I was just picking up the..the laundry." Remi stammered.

"And eaves dropping?" Semira shot back.

"You do this a lot, don't you? I've heard about it from all of the maids in this house, Remi. You hide in the corners and lurk in the shadows like a sick psychopath and listen like a creep into people's conversations. Is that what you do for fun?" Dantina began moving to her, and Remi continuously staggered back.

"She is a creep anyway." Janet mumbled.

"A scary one."

"If you must know, since you're so eager, I'm leaving to be wedded to the Moonsalem Prince in two days, fulfilling my duties to House Lupercus, and having to successfully never see your abomination face or self again-and without killing you!" Dantina ended with a mocking cackle, and she turned to her friends who joined in the laughter.

"How does it feel, really? To be so useless and hated and... disgusting?" Dantina asked. Remi continued to shudder and look away.

"Nobody wants you. Mother hates you. Father...oh, he loathes you so much. Thane would sooner kill you than share a corridor with you. And Boris...well, he has always been pathetic. But then even he is so ashamed of you he can't look you in the face. And me...well, you know me. I hate you so much that I would pray to the Moon goddess every True Moon night that the night carries you away with it, and I never have to set eyes on you again. " Dantina spat. Her words were so mean even Janet and Semira shuddered and fell into silence.

Her hatred was real. Why? Remi wondered, as she always did. What did she actually do?

"What...what did I ever do to you, Sister?" Remi asked, tears helplessly falling from her eyes, and she shook her head and began to turn away slowly. Just then, in the blink of an eye, Dantina held out her hand, and as the did, sharp wolf claws sprung out, and she slashed them on Remi's back, tearing through her clothes.

Remi's screams echoed through the hallway, and she fell to the ground. The clothes she had just picked up sprawled under her.

"Let's go." Dantina said.

"Dantina, she's bleeding.." Janet said slowly.

"Let's hope she bleeds to death. Let's go, Janet." Dantina said and walked away. Semira and Janet followed, with Janet constantly looking back and the sprawled defective figure on the floor, crying with so much voice and pain.

"What did I ever do to her?" Remi continued to say as she wept bitterly.

This was her life. And she was tired of it. She couldn't keep on living here. No. Not if she didn't want to die.

But was dying such a bad idea?

Shadowglade. Moonsalem. Anywhere. I just have to leave here. This is hell.

No. She didn't even want to leave anymore. If her goddess was real, where was she? Why wouldn't she take her out of this life? This hell?

"Mene!" She screamed through her tears. "Take me, Mene!" Take me. I don't want to live anymore. I dont want to be strong anymore. Weeping and using her hands to hold herself to the ground, Remi let her tears continue to drop as other maids passed. She could feel the blood trickle down her skin and unto her lower back and eventually, her booty crack.

"Oh, heavenly moon!" Aileen's voice echoed through the hallway as she rushed to Remi's aid, the two maids by her side gasping and mumbling. She quickly picked a cloth from the ones scattered across the floor, and wrapped it across Remi's back, causing her to scream even more.

"Stand up, Remi."

"No!" Remi barked.

"Stand up. Don't let them see you like this." Aileen whispered, her voice was breaking against Remi's ears. But Remi didn't budge. Aileen pulled her up will the little force in her muscles, and Remi stood.

"I'm so sorry. Let's go to your room." Aileen said, with her hand across Remi's shoulder as she limped away.

Dantina's malevolence knew no bounds. The natural curve of her Remi's back wasn't a sufficient reminder, so she inflicted another brutal scar, to ensure a lifelong memory of the torment she endured at Dantina's hands, forever branding her as a monster.

Her sister's cruelty has always been as calculated as it was intentional, and as she etched another scar into the canvas of her deformed sister's skin, a permanent reminder of the monster that lurked within her soul, Remi swore to herself, that her day would come.

One day, her heart sang. One day.