Extraits

The pain is all I can think about, the burning consumes every cell in my body, and I writhe in a tangle of sheets as I scream into the pillow that’s underneath my head. Death breathes expectantly down the back of my neck, and I almost welcome it.

I can’t do this. I can’t survive this pain, but as much as every fiber of my being believes that it doesn’t release me from this torture. All at once the burning stops, my breaths hitching as relieved sobs tumble out of my mouth.

I’ve been clenching my jaw so hard that I’m surprised my teeth haven’t shattered. I slowly and cautiously unlock the stiff muscles of my body, taking stock of myself. I’m a sweaty, tangled mess. What the hell just happened? I exhale a shuddering sigh and scrub my hands over my face to try and release more of the coiled tension trapped all over me.

What the fuck?

Small, intricate symbols run up one side and down the other of both my middle fingers.

I turn my trembling hand over and find an eight-pointed star mark, sitting under the nail of my ring finger. I scramble to turn on the bedside lamp. Symbols line the outside of my arm, and when I look down more trace the top of my shoulders.

Panicked, I untangle myself from the bedding and dash into the bathroom. I flick on the light and find my reflection in the full-length mirror hanging from the back of the door. I rip my tank top over my head, and I frantically search to see what other parts of my body the intricate symbols have claimed.

Two rows of symbols now run down the back of my neck to my lower back, and my torso is marked on the sides. The symbols start at the bottom of my armpit and stop at my hip bones. I’m marked from my heel, all the way up the back of my leg, until my thigh meets my butt.

The markings on the back of my legs remind me of the black seam that ran up the back of the old-school stockings that women used to wear. On the underside of each of my butt cheeks, symbols follow the natural curve of the bottom of my glutes and stop just shy of the side of my ass.

I spot three symbols on the helix of each of my ears, a line of markings on the outside of each of my feet, and a crescent moon on each of my middle toes. Everywhere I look, from head to foot, I now bear lines of these symbols, one side of my body a mirror image of the other.