The Darkness in You (The Darkness Series Book 2)

by Diane Ashley Nortje

  The five haven’t left her side, always watching, always protecting. I sense them. And I make my way over to them. I need some answers. I round the corner of the house, the sun is setting. And I call the shadows to me. They have been quiet. They clearly have been meddling where they weren’t supposed too. But they come when I call and cloak my presence from any prying eyes. I make my way up to Tray, who is looking through a window while the others are patrolling the grounds. No one will dare enter if they saw them, but then, they have tried their luck before. The fucker who thought to take her then, it didn’t end well for him.

  “What is going on?” I ask Tray. My patience is wearing thin and I can’t keep back his growl any more than I can keep mine in.

  “I can’t hear anything, but I see she is crying, her parents are there, looks like bad news whatever they are telling her.” He answers me, never taking his eyes off the scene before him.

  I look through the window. It’s a clear view of the kitchen. It’s a clear view of her. But she will never see me. Unless the shadows lift, and with the shit they have been pulling lately it really wouldn’t surprise me.

  I stand outside, like some peeping tom, because this is what I have been reduced to. She is making me insane. I watch her but she can’t see me even if she was to look for me, her eyes are constantly filled with unshed tears. I know I did this too her, I’m the one that is putting her through this. My actions, my choices.

  Whatever news is being shared, its news I need to hear. I make my way to the wall of the house and place my palm over the bricks. Magic laces the house together, making it a stronghold. I remove my hand and step back to take a good look at it. Why the fuck is a clearly normal white witches house laced with dark magic. Magic that protects, magic that keeps the unwanted out and away. Who the fuck were they expecting?

  “You sense anything about this house that is off?” I ask Tray. Normally I would have Weyland here for this, but he seems too fucking busy lately.

  “I hear the pulse of magic, I just assumed it was normal since it’s a witches house.”

  And therein lies the problem and why I have Weyland. These pups are too untrained for shit like this. They are here to protect, because under Trays cool façade, he is deadly. I know, I fucking trained them. I trained them to kill everything and anything that would stand in her way.

  “It’s not normal. Its dark magic. Magic they shouldn’t be able to possess.” I answer him. It’s time he started learning. “When this is over, you need to go spend time with Bishop.”

  “Sire? Who will guard Natalie? I can’t leave her unprotected.”

  “You will, once this is over, I will be here to protect her. You have a lot to learn in order to protect her fully.”

  “Yes, Sire.” Is all the reply I get from him. He knows better that to argue with me.

  I place my hand once more on the bricks, and pull the binding away from the house, allowing me entry into it. At first the voices are muffled, the sounds coming from the kitchen are distorted but I push my magic in some more and I hear a faint popping sound, I have pierced whatever magic that was protecting them.

  “- we were beyond happy. You were so beautiful, so small, but you looked so perfect. But once I took my eyes from you, I saw how broken your birth parents were. I had to know why they were doing this.” Natalie’s mother’s voice comes through the walls, they must be talking about her adoption, which I always suspected since she is far from a witch as I am.

  “What- why did they say they did it?” I hear her voice, for the first time in weeks, it’s like a broken song. I broke her. I broke her when I broke the bond between us. It was for the best, hopefully one day she realizes it was for her own good.

  “Your biological father said they are hunted, after your biological mother gave birth to you, a prophecy of over a thousand years old was somehow linked to you. That you were destined for great, great things and that they needed to hide you, because once it got out who you were destined for, they would come for you, you weren’t safe. So, they hid you.”

  “The Prophecy of Danté.” Natalie whispers out

  “Yes, how did you know?”

  “I didn’t know, but I’ve heard of it before somewhere, I think. What is the prophecy about? What does it say?” Natalie says to her mother as her father looks on at the two of them.

  “It’s the same prophecy that has been haunting this coven, but I wish I could tell you more baby, the library burnt down on some freak-.”

  I pull away from the wall, I’ve heard enough. Her birth parents knew what she was destined for. And if they told Natalie’s parents the entire truth, they know she is destined for me. Yet they never told her. They were vague about it. Maybe they realized if they told her who and what she was destined for, she would run. And she should. So fucking far that I couldn’t even find her. But the itch on my arm reminds me, she can never escape me. Bond or not.

  I replace the binding on the house, whatever they need protection from will come once they figure out that it is Natalie they have been searching for. I watch through the window as Natalie walks with her father back through the house.

  I look towards the stairs; which I know her bedroom is the second door on the right. I have only ever been in there once, I was curious to know what she was like as a child, but most of her belongings were taken to my place already, so I was left with an empty room, but some trinkets remained, dotted around her room, same with old pictures.

  I never told anyone I was there, but I absorbed it all in. Because she is mine.

  “Was it bad?” Tray asks me. He cares about her; I don’t know if I should be pissed or somewhat happy that they do care even after a spell has been put on them.

  “They knew.” Is all I say to him and fade back to the home I call hell.

  Chapter Three

  “My tortured soul craves her.” – Jacin

  ~Jacin~

  I walk through the doors of my mansion, which I used to call home, and I’ve come to realise this is no longer home. It’s a fucking prison for myself and for my soul. What used to bring me pride and joy, makes me want to burn the fucking place to the ground, and everyone in it.

  People busy themselves doing whatever the hell they do. I don’t know half of the people I pass. But they all bow when they see me, and I simply just nod my head towards them, and they scamper off to carry on whatever the hell it is that they were doing.

  Its fucking draining.

  I want to return to my house, but there are way too many memories of Natalie there, that I can’t. I won’t. Her smell perfumes the air I breath and her stuff still lay dotted around the house and in my room. I never thought that such a small woman would have such an impact on me. She did in every way.

  So, I hide in my own slice of hell instead. I make my way through the long passages to the other side of the grounds where the men will be training, and that’s where I should find Weyland. He trains and keeps the men fit when he is not with me.

  I push my way out to the gardens and the echoing sound of bones crushing and teeth snapping assaults me. There is no guns or knives used in this realm. Strength wins, not fucking machinery. Even though I do envy the simplicity of the use of guns. Aim pull the fucking trigger. Dead.

  Here it’s about brute strength and cunningness. Who is quicker to rip who apart? Whose magic holds out against each other. That answer is quite simple. Mine. They are born into this world as my hounds, but they still need to train. But me, that’s a completely different matter.

  For the first couple of weeks after I sent Natalie away. This is where I worked out my frustration, until I realised, I was doing more damage than training. I was doing more damage than they were able to heal. Then I moved onto Weyland.

  He took what he could, but even then, my anger was too much. And he looked like shit in the end. I had to stop. I had to control myself.

  My footsteps alert the men to my approach, and they all stop what they are doing. I nod my head in acknowledgement of
them. None of them kneel. They haven’t since the day I took the crown. I couldn’t fucking stand it. I was one of them. Fought beside them in the never-ending wars my father waged on realms. Some of the hounds are my friends, some are my family, but none more than Weyland, who has been beside me before the crown and hasn’t turned on me since the crown.

  I see Ethan approach me from the one corner. I know each and every one of my men’s names. I made a fucking point to learn them. So, when I am fucking chopping a head off for disobedience, I know whose head it is.

  “Ethan.” I say to him and nod my head.

  “Sire. Can we help you with anything?” Ethan asks me, as he looks back to the hundreds of hounds who have stopped what they were doing to look to me.

  “Yes, where is he?” I ask him. He would know who I’m looking for.

  “We haven’t seen him today, sire.” He answers me and my eyes start to scan the crowds of men and they too shake their heads at me.

  The answer takes me aback. Where the fuck is he? He hasn’t been at my side either. Which is strange and unsettling. You get used to someone with you day in and day out, even if they are just a friend.

  “You will let me know if he turns up then.” I say to Ethan.

  “Yes sire, the moment he appears we will inform him you are looking for him.” Ethan replies and steps back into the line of hounds.

  I nod at Ethan and then fade. I will find the fucker; I’m not waiting on him until he turns up.

  ~Natalie~

  After I got my bags from the car, I made my way to my old room. Nothing had changed. Colours, smells, even some clothes I don’t remember owning as a teenager still hang in the cupboards. Once I put my small bag of belongings away, I make my way downstairs again. I’ve decided I’m going to stick around, and figure all this out. I can’t run from this anymore. I hear a voice downstairs, which is definitely not my parents, so I make my way downstairs.

  I run and hop onto the stairways banister that I always used to ride down when I was younger. But my ass gets stuck halfway and I do a body jerk and then lose my balance. I hop off before I face plant onto the stairs. This was way more fun as a kid, clearly.

  I follow the sounds of the voices. My brain telling me I know this voice. The voices lead me into the kitchen where the chatter is coming from. I see my parents holding coffee mugs in their hands, listening to a woman talk about some shop.

  My parents notice me standing there quietly when the woman stops to sip her own coffee.

  “Natalie, baby. We were just coming to find you.” My mother says to me, but my eyes have locked with the woman in the room.

  Faith.

  “Hey short stack. It’s good to have you home.” Faith says to me, while coming over to give me a hug.

  I know I haven’t felt her hug in years, but my body tells me otherwise and I give her a squeeze back. I pull back from the hug and give her a small smile.

  “I wish I could say the same, but under these circumstances, I wish things were different.” I murmur out to her.

  “Your mom has caught me up to speed with everything she knows. But don’t worry, we will figure this out and have you back to normal in no time!” Faith says to me.

  “Thank you though, for coming so fast to help me, when I haven’t been around in years.” I say to her weakly.

  “That’s the strange thing, I feel like I saw you the other day.” Faith says to me and my eyes shoot up and lock onto hers. Maybe I’m not the only one that was affected.

  “So, hopefully, if you figure this all out for yourself, you can figure it out for everyone else?” She says to me hopefully.

  “Anything I can do to help, I will. I feel like this is happening to everyone because of me and who is after me.” I say to her.

  “But don’t worry, we are here to help you through everything.” Faith assures me and I smile at her weakly. Hopefully whatever she has planned will help me.

  “Thanks Faith, I really do appreciate all of this.” I say to her.

  “I’m here for you, short stack. And we are going to get those memories flowing in no time.” She says to me and looks back at my parents to give them a nod.

  “Honey, Faith says she can do this spell by herself, so she doesn’t need our help. So, we are going to leave the house for a bit, until it’s all over okay? Just in case it messes with our own memories.” My mother says to me.

  “We are only a phone call away.” My father chips in.

  “Thank you. I’m so sorry for putting everyone through all of this.” I say to them and give my mother a hug.

  “You don’t need to be sorry; we just need to figure out what is going on.” My mother replies to me. and gives my arms a tight squeeze for reassurance.

  “A phone call away.” My father says to me again and then they both turn to leave the house, leaving Faith and myself to deal with the mess that is my head.

  Once the car is out the garage and on its merry way down the road, Faith finally starts barking out orders on what I have to do.

  “Here take this.” She says to me, and hands me a bar of homemade soap. “It’s mixed with bay leaves, lemon grass and a hearty helping of juniper berries. It will help cleanse your body for the spell. So, go, scrub, scrub, scrub.” Faith says to me as she basically pushes me up the stairs towards my room.

  “I’ll be down here setting up for the spell.” She continues to say to me.

  “And you know all of this how?” I ask her.

  “Well, I might have taken a few books out the library for some light reading, and since it burned down, I really didn’t see the need to return it.” Faith says to me as she whips a book out of her handbag and shakes it in the air at me. “When your mom told me what happened, I scanned over some memory spells, and this seems the best option to help you recover your memories.”

  “Okay then, I will just be upstairs, with this.” I say to her and wave the bar of soap in my hands.

  ~ ~ ~

  Once Faith left me alone. I hop into the steaming shower. And start to scrub. I need to be cleansed for this spell. But I wonder if she knew, that no amount of soap will ever cleanse my soul. But I do as I’m instructed, I can’t have it messed up just because I didn’t scrub.

  Once that is all done, I stand beneath the warm shower spray and I let the soap run from my body. The warm water feels good against my body. I start to wonder if it told Faith, that it’s not only my memories that are fractured. I feel as if my soul is halved. That its calling for its other half. It doesn’t want to rest, its forever searching. And when I close my eyes and allow myself to float into a blissful state. I see my other half of my soul.

  It glows green, a deep forest green that calms my body, until it is swallowed by a burning red, which my soul aches for. Faith would definitely think I’m insane if I ever said anything of a sort like that too her.

  Too know what my other part of my soul looks like, it must mean I had given it away. I must have met the man who took it from me, but I don’t want it back, I just want to be near it, so it can soothe my own souls cravings.

  I dare not say a word.

  I run the bar of soap once more over my body, and the warm water rinses it from me as I watch it get swallowed by the drain. I hop out, and quickly towel off. Hopefully now, Faith is ready for me. Because I am ready to figure out my life and my memories.

  I slowly make my way down the stairs after I did what I was told to do. Which was scrub, scrub, scrub. My skin is basically raw in some spots, so I might have taken her words to heart. I just don’t want anything to go wrong. I need to find my memories. They are there, somewhere, locked away from me. And so is she.

  I haven’t heard a peep from her, not one utter, not one murmur. It’s like she up and left me to figure all this nonsense out by myself. Unless something happened to her, I just don’t know what and I can’t imagine what could have possibly happened to make her go away.

  Hopefully I find out.

  Once I make it to the bottom of the stair
s, I see Faith has been busy. Like really busy. The dining room table has been flipped over and pushed to the side. The chairs are neatly lining the wall next to the table. The curtains have been drawn back to reveal the setting sun and the rising moon.

  On the floor there is a massive five-pointed black salt star and in between the points of the star, sits large white candles which are lit, which casts eerily shadows around the room as the sun has finally started to set, bringing the darkness with it.

  “Wow, you have been busy.” I say to Faith as she comes from the kitchen with dried herbs in her hands.

  “I’m almost done. I wanted to get this perfect. No mistakes.” She says to me and starts laying the bunches of herbs next to the candles in each point of the star.

  “Can I help with anything?” I ask her and she shakes her head at me as she lays the last bunch of herbs in the star.

  “All done, we just have to wait for the moon to rise and then we can start. At least the moon is in our favour, so this spell should go off without a hitch.” Faith says to me as she admires her handy work.

  “Thanks again Faith, I heard you talking to my mom about a shop you run?” I ask her, I miss her. I want to know more about her life and how it turned out.

  “Yeah, it’s great. I love it. I love being my own boss, the pressure is great, and I love creating things. Just like we did when we were younger. I still to this day make the shampoo you invented for my frizzy hair.” She says to me.

  “That’s great, I remember we wanted to do that together before I ran off.” I say to her.

  “Yes, we did. It would have been great. You really should come by and check it out. I’d really love your opinion on the new soaps I created.” Faith says to me, I can hear the hope in her voice that we could hopefully be friends once again.

  “I would really love that, I can come by this week maybe, if you are not too busy?”