Big Bad Wolfie

64) Marco Polo

  I followed the trail of our scents back. I can tell they tried to cover it, but they didn't do a very good job. Any hybrid would have been able to find us with ease if any had wanted to, so I guess that's a good sign that none did.

  Unless they're all dead.

  Which would probably mean Rose and Brandon didn't survive either.

  But I can't afford to think like that.

  I refuse to lose four family members in one sh*t show.

  I sighed.

  My aunt and uncle. . .

  I shook my head. No. Enough of that.

  I focused on the pain in my abdomen and watching myself put one foot in front of the other to distract myself from my thoughts.

My skin starts prickling, and I know I've reached my destination before I even look up.

Once I do, I see the once tall, strong and terrifying building reduced to a different kind of terrifying rubble.

My eyes watered at the sight of it.

I don't have time for this.

I swallowed thickly and stumbled onto the rubble.

The tears fell as I lethargically looked through the dark for my brother and sister.

This place. . . The monsters laying crushed under the debris with my friends. They caused me so much pain. They took my parents from me.

  Please, don't let them have taken Rose and Brandon too. . .

  Hm. . . My parents. I think about them a lot. In the day I think about all the awesome sauce things they did, what they stood for.

  In my dreams though, I watch them die. Over and over and over. When I wake up panting and crying, I always have to remind myself I'm not there, I'm home, safe. . . Ish.

  But now, if I turn my head a few degrees to my left, I'm actually here. I'll actually see where my parents were ripped apart right in front of me, all those years ago. Where he took them from me.

  The hybrid king. I want to hate him. I want to hate him with all my being. But I can't.

  Because I'm absolutely terrified of him instead.

  I made the mistake of looking over to the clearing where he killed my parents. . . I couldn't help but fall down the hole.

  Fear out-ways any other emotion I have, when it comes to him. Well, that and helplessness.

  It has from the first time I saw him when I was nine.

  I don't fear many, and when I do, it's rather easy to look past, to overcome.

  But with him. . .

  He got to me before I was strong. Before I was brave. Before I even had a clue.

  Now, when I think of him, every horrible feeling I had when I was a kid comes rushing back, and even now, strong and brave, there's nothing I can do to stop it from consuming me.

  . . . I wasn't as afraid of his little helpers. They were evil, evil and scary, but I knew they were just that. Little helpers.

  He'd tell them what to do, how many "shots" to give me, and they would.

  When I would "misbehave" and make their jobs more difficult, the aftermath was always worse when he was around.

  They would give me a dose of the poison to slow my healing and use a whip to shred the skin on my back. Sometimes even leave me out in the sun to burn after. There was that, among other things. . .