Heart Thief

by Ker Dukey

  “Why come for me? Am I not to follow Judith’s fate? I broke your precious laws.”

  A backhanded slap catches me off guard, causing a trail of fire over my cheekbone. My teeth cut into the gum, copper liquid popping over my tongue. Bastard.

  Colt’s word for his father is perfect for mine too. They’re both bastards.

  “We have rules for a reason, Mona. To keep our people pure from the unclean, the toxic poison of the outside world. They are not to be mocked or broken. You are my daughter and naïve. You will face punishment, then you will marry and atone.”

  “And if I don’t want to marry? What then, Father?”

  “Eli is a good man, willing to overlook your lapse in judgment. You should think yourself lucky, and you’ll do as you’re told.”

  “Eli?” I call, anger lacing my voice. “Eli? Are you going to say anything?”

  He turns to me, an emptiness in his eyes. “You were always supposed to be my wife, Mona. You’ll see.”

  “No, I won’t.” I cry, looking to the water. Could I survive it if I threw myself over?

  “Don’t even think about it,” my father scolds, once again covering my mouth. I try to fight it, but it’s too strong. The toxins fill my lungs and steal the light from my eyes.

  I wake in my room, my head feeling like my skull cracked open and all the insides tipped out. My vision doubles, blurring everything in sight. I notice the matchbox still on my bed and shove it in my pocket. Checking my neck, I sigh in relief. Clara’s necklace is still there.

  I stand, gathering my equilibrium.

  I try the door, but it’s locked.

  “Mother?” I try calling, but empty silence stretches out before me.

  I check the window. Nails still penetrate the wood, sealing it shut.

  “Father?” I cry.

  Will Colt just accept I left and not even look for me?

  I look around for something I can use to break the glass. Pulling a drawer free from the dresser, I throw it at the pane of glass, the bounce nearly hitting me in the face. Crap. I try again, angling the corner and giving it more strength. The drawer breaks through, the glass falling like sharp confetti.

  Wasting no time, I climb through. A sting pierces my thigh as glass cuts my skin.

  I make it ten feet before Eli crashes into me, knocking me to the ground and the air from my lungs.

  “I can’t let you leave again.”

  I rub at my chest, trying to gain control of my breathing. “Eli, I can’t marry you.”

  “I know. Your father knows. He’s preparing a cleansing.”

  “What?”

  “Do you even care what the consequences of your actions are?”

  “I deserve to have free will. God created us to have free will.”

  “You have responsibilities here. Your mother is imprisoned because of your selfishness. You’re just like Clara.”

  “Life shouldn’t be lived half full, Eli.”

  He reaches forward, grabbing the chain from my neck and snapping it. Gasping, I reach for it, but miss his hand.

  “I thought giving you this would sate this need for closure.”

  “What?”

  “She was so full of darkness, Mona, so unruly, and she would have come back for you.”

  “Eli? No…”

  “Now I see she already tainted you too much for me to salvage.”

  He reaches into his jacket. The blade glistens under the moonlight. “No,” I choke out.

  No way. Please, no.

  A burst of energy powers my legs, and I take off running. I hit the tree line and disappear under its canopy. Branches whip at my face, twigs breaking beneath my feet, giving away my direction. I pump my arms, my brain raging with this new information, trying to think of a safe place I can hide. I change direction, moving away from the places we would frequent together. The forest becomes dense, darker. I push on.

  Shadows in the moonlight chase me. Everything could be him. I’m running out of time. I notice a formation of rocks I’ve never seen before and head toward them. There’s an opening big enough for a person to fit through. Slipping inside, I trip over a branch, hitting the muddy floor. It’s so dark. The space is tight, maybe eight feet long by four feet wide. Dense twigs cut into me, breaking my skin. I dig into my pocket, bring out the matches, and attempt to light one. My hands tremble, prompting several attempts before one sparks. I lower it to my leg to see a thick white branch stuck into my shin, blood blooming around it. What the hell? Wait, that’s not a branch… The breath in my lungs flees in a horrifying scream as I drop the match, lighting the bones beneath me.

  Vomit races up my throat, spilling free like acid, burning a path over my tongue. Moving back through the sliver of space away from the ghastly sight before me, my foot snags on a tree branch, sending me falling. I hear his approach, his voice calling out to me. If he finds me, sees what I’ve found, I’ll be buried here too, left to rot.

  I get to my feet. My own breathing roars in my ears. I take off when I hear twigs breaking behind me, a flight of birds soaring into the night sky.

  “Mona, you can’t outrun your fate,” he roars.

  I push through the thicket of brush and tip out onto the sand on the other side of the island, rolling down the incline. Pain fires all over my body, sand stinging open wounds. I get to my feet and begin walking, pressure on my cut leg too much to bear.

  “You should be careful what you wish for, Mona. It may be the last thing you ask for,” Eli says from behind me.

  Tears gush from my eyes, my heart dying.

  There’s a crack in his exterior, the façade dropping and his true self coming through the fragments.

  “You want a life away from this island, and I’ll grant you that—you’ll have no life at all.”

  He lunges for me as I turn.

  “Wait,” I plead, falling backward into the sand.

  He hesitates, stopping in his tracks.

  “Just tell me…why her heart? Where is it?”

  “It’s here, where it belongs.”

  It’s been here all along?

  “Whose bones are in that cave?”

  “The first traitor who broke my damn heart.”

  “I don’t understand…”

  “My mother. She ran away back to her false family and thought we would just accept her return. She was always coming and going, tainted by the outside world. And then, Clara. I found her sneaking away. I followed her there, watched her be with those heathens, corrupted by money. They thought they ruled the world and could have what they wanted from ours.”

  “Is that why you left her body there? To frame them?”

  “You sound like one of them, Mona. They’ve filled your head with delusion. I left them her empty shell. Her heart will forever be here, as will yours.”

  “Did you follow me there?”

  “I had to. I had to see for myself, your betrayal. It broke my heart.”

  “Did you kill Annemarie?”

  “She was a sinner, Mona. She was a warning, but you didn’t take it as one. You didn’t return home, and that’s when I knew.”

  “Knew what?”

  “That you couldn’t be saved.”

  I grasp a handful of sand and throw it in his face. He yells out in pain as the particles fly into his eyes. I pick myself up and run into the water, the waves lapping at my feet, my shins and then thighs as I push myself deeper.

  “Mona!” Eli roars. Gaining his composure, he enters the water, but I know he can’t swim—learning was forbidden. I power my arms like I remember Cash doing and kick my legs like Colt taught me, moving farther out, the ocean floor too deep for me to stand now. I sputter the water trying to enter my mouth and swim around the edge of the island, I’m too far from anything else and would tire and drown if I attempt to swim away from here. Eli doesn’t go any deeper than his knees. I move sideways, and he stalks my actions, tracking up the beach with me. A large gathering of rocks cuts off the beach, forcing him to wat
ch as I swim away from him beyond the rocks. His arms flay as he loses all his composure. Turning, he disappears back into the trees. I power my arms and legs, ignoring the biting cold of the water and pain screaming in my limbs as I follow the border of the island. I keep moving until I physically can’t stay in the water any longer and drag myself to shore. I have to squint and rub at my eyes when I see a boat a few yards up. A cry of relief chokes out of me when I see Cash’s face coming toward me.

  Twenty-Five

  Colt

  It took too long to realize Mona was gone. And not just walked out and went for a fucking stroll—she was nowhere. Panic spiked in my veins when Cash said she must have gone back to Cult Island.

  I couldn’t believe she’d willingly go back there. Someone came for her. Probably the same cunt who killed Annemarie. “Fuck!” I roar into the dead of the sea. “If anything’s happened to her…” I mutter to Cash, who’s driving the fucking boat to that shithole.

  We’re getting our girl back.

  “Go around the back. We don’t want to alert them to our presence,” I tell him pointing farther down from their dock.

  The horizon has swallowed the sun, casting us in darkness, making navigating an issue. Cash cuts the engine and jumps out of the boat, looking for something to tie it to. “What’s that?” I ask, pointing to something down the beach. Someone dragging their leg and waving their arms.

  “Fuck! It’s Mona,” Cash barks, taking off running toward her.

  I leap from the boat and give chase after him. Why the hell is she limping?

  Cash gets to her first, engulfing her in his arms. It’s then I see someone coming out of the trees behind him.

  The boy steps forward. The moonlight hits his face, and recognition sparks inside me. He’s Mother’s son, Eli.

  “She belongs to me!” he roars, raising his arm, catching Cash off guard.

  I charge forward, wrapping my arms around his waist, knocking us to the sand. I pin him beneath me, landing blow after blow to his face. “How about you let her decide where and who she belongs with,” I growl, my knuckles splitting as I demolish his face.

  “Colt!” Mona cries, and I turn to see her cradling Cash’s head in her lap.

  Eli splutters, choking on his own teeth as I scurry over to Cash, checking his body for injury.

  “Eli stabbed him in the back,” she sobs. I turn my head back to see the bastard still dribbling blood, then return my attention to Cash.

  “I’m fine.” Cash winces.

  “Then why the fuck are you laying here like you’re dying? You scared the shit out of us,” I snarl.

  “I just like the view.” He half laughs, half grimaces, looking up at Mona’s worried features. “Oh my God,” she bawls, leaning down and sealing her lips over his. Reaching out, she pulls me into her. “I can’t believe you came for me.”

  “We will always come for you.” I take her face in my hands and kiss her lips, her nose, cheeks, eyelids. “Come on,” I tell her, helping Cash up and guiding her to her feet.

  “My leg,” she flinches, looking down at the blood coming from an open wound.

  “What happened?” Cash asks her.

  “Oh God, Cash, Eli killed your mother,” she weeps.

  It takes a couple seconds for what she’s saying to register. A wave of sorrow cloaks me, thinking of my mother and her love for this place—for Eli, her son. That bastard.

  “I’m sorry,” Mona implores.

  “It’s not your fault,” I assure her.

  “Cash…” she murmurs, reaching for him. He embraces her, squeezing her to him like she’s a lifeline and he’s drowning.

  Eli squirms in the sand like a crushed worm.

  “Fucker,” I growl. I lurch forward to go back to him, but Mona stops me, grabbing my arm.

  “No.” She shakes her head, then hobbles over toward large rocks scattered on the sand. Picking up one almost the size of her head, she shuffles over to Eli. His breathing is labored as he coughs blood. “Your heart belongs with me,” he sputters.

  “You belong in hell. You never had a heart, that’s why you stole hers,” she sneers, and with all her might, she smashes the rock down, an angry, broken roar tearing from her lips as she lifts it, again and again, hammering it down until her arms give out. Crimson splatters up her face and into her hair as the impact split his skull open with a gruesome crunch, his face now resembling mulch.

  His body convulses, nerves twitching before he stills. Blood seeps into the sand beneath him, the moon our only witness, the tide drawing in to wash away the evidence

  We were right. The killer was from this place—and our mother’s son, of all fucking people.

  “What now?” I ask, wanting to throw her over my shoulder and run home with her keeping her there forever but she’s not my prisoner she’s no one’s prisoner, now or ever again.

  “Now we free everyone else. It’s time to end my father’s reign.” She tells me, strong and confident despite the fact she looks like she’s been hit with a truck.

  Twenty-Six

  Mona

  Closure leaked from within me as I drove the rock into Eli’s skull, his warm blood sticking to my skin almost in reward for finally getting justice for Clara.

  All those nights I lay with him, those hands that stole my sister’s life touching me…I’ll never forgive him for what he stole from me. Ending his life was a mercy. I should have locked him in Father’s prison and let him rot.

  “That cut looks nasty. We’re going to need to wrap it.” Colt frowns down at my leg, blood still trickling from the open wound.

  “My mother is imprisoned in my father’s dungeon. We need to free her and find Claudia.”

  “Who’s Claudia?” Colt asks, ripping off his shirt and bending to tie it around my leg.

  “She was Clara’s friend.” Cash nods. “She was the one who helped Clara get to and from the island. Lead the way.”

  “My father won’t take too kindly to you being here.”

  “That’s his problem, not ours.” Colt swoops me up, bridal style. “Let me hold you for a while. You look like you’re about to collapse.”

  “Thank you.”

  “For what?”

  “For loving me,” I whisper. His face clouds with an array of emotions. “This is what love is, right? The kiss of your scent, the strength in your grip, the taste on your lips.” I palm his cheek. “Through the darkness, light is visible here…” I lower my hand to cover my heart. “I feel you living here.”

  “I feel you everywhere,” he says, closing his eyes briefly. “I never want to not feel you.”

  “You don’t have to. I’m yours,” I breathe. Turning my head, I reach out to clasp Cash’s hand. “I’m both of yours. We belong together.”

  As predictable as ever, we find my father in his church planning my cleansing.

  His eyes widen in shock when I walk in, my hair hanging in scraggly, wet strands down my shoulders, bruises and cuts painting my face a kaleidoscope of colors. My clothes tattered and torn, a piece of shirt wrapped around my shin, the blood soaking through it.

  He rounds his pew, halting when my two soulmates follow me inside, large, bloody, and menacing, like attack wolves ready to tear him into pieces.

  “You won’t get away with this.” He clenches his fists. I jerk my head in command, and my wolves attack, tackling my father to the ground with little effort. “Not as easy as beating little girls, is it, Father?” I mock.

  As he’s frog marched outside with his hands tied behind his back, like the criminal he is. I’m grateful for the cloak of the night keeping us camouflaged.

  When we get back to their boat, they drag him on board and then lift me inside, taking us far enough out for privacy.

  “I’m not the enemy, Mona.” My father struggles against the makeshift bindings of robe rope from the church.

  “Yes you are.” I snort.

  “Why do you treat this as a war?” he growls.

  “Because it is o
ne,” I snap. “I’m fighting for my freedom. Your faith is not mine.”

  “When the light fades, who will save you, if you don’t have faith?”

  He truly believes the spill coming out of his mouth.

  “I don’t fear the darkness.” I shake my head.

  “You should.”

  “I don’t fear it because I am the darkness. You forced me to be.”

  “Mona?” He says my name with panic now, fear sparking in his eyes.

  “I’m sorry you have to die so I can live.”

  “Mona,” he urges.

  “It’s okay, Father. If your God truly exists, you shouldn’t fear death.”

  Colt looks to me for direction. I nod my head for him to get my father to his feet.

  I close my eyes, gathering my courage. “Bye, Father,” I say, my eyes opening, full and clear. I shove his chest and his eyes widen in shock as his body hits the water, sending a splash up and over the boat. He sinks fast, struggling with the bindings. I watch as he fades from the surface, falling beneath, air pockets popping on the water’s surface. There’s no sense of sorrow in my heart, only relief.

  “What now?” Colt asks.

  “Now, we go free my mother.”

  Epilogue

  Epilogue One

  Mona

  The dungeon beneath the very stage my father used to preach God’s words and light was the thing of horrors and hell. My father was the devil. He needed to die in order for our people to live. “You look lovely,” I tell my mother as she fiddles with the strings of her dress. “I don’t think I can do this,” she murmurs.

  I found both her and Claudia in a small cell not fit enough for an animal, let alone a human being. Poor Megan was huddled in her cell, waiting to learn if any of the men who defiled her left a baby inside her womb. My mother wept when I told her about my father, a mix of grief and elation.

  “You’re going to be a wonderful leader for the settlers who want to stay here. They need someone kind and loving.”