Marked by Pain

by Cece Rose

  "Mary Crowe, what happened to the sweet woman I loved?" he asks, clearly shocked.

  "She died after her husband pretended to be dead, then he kidnapped her children, and tried to brainwash them into crazy beliefs. Now I’m not asking again, where is my son!" she shouts the end part, and he flinches a little.

  "They’re not crazy! You just never listened to me! We need to go back to Ariziadia, we are getting weaker all the time, and the planet will make us stronger. It will give us a chance to take back our place on earth, rather than hide on it like we aren’t the most powerful ones here!" he spits out and my mum laughs.

  "It's all crazy, completely crazy. The marked on Ariziadia must have the twelfth mark as they are all powerful like you say… then why haven’t they opened the portal? They clearly don’t want to help you, and you will lose," she says. Alaric wipes his face with his hands before pulling out a dagger from inside his cloak. He walks over to Kelly, pulls her head up by her hair, and holds the knife to her throat.

  "NO!" I scream, jumping forward from East.

  "Your mum and East stay here, and you come with me. Otherwise I kill her, and then them both, just like I did all your other guys," he says coldly, and I don’t doubt him for a second. My mum really pissed him off, and then I pause when I process what he just said, his words making my skin freeze.

  "What did you just say?" I ask, shaking my head, not believing him.

  "That Daniels, those twins, and the eleven are all dead as they fell for my distraction," he laughs. “Did they really think it would be that easy? That twenty years of planning would just be over if they found us?”

  "That’s not true," East says, stepping next to me, and Alaric holds the knife closer to Kelly’s neck, cutting her slightly, and I watch the blood drip down her front.

  “It is, believe it or not. Either way we need the Academy, and Mackenzie,” he tells East as I stand in complete shock, sickness filling me at the thought of the guys being in trouble. I refuse to think they are dead, I know they aren’t. I would feel it, right? Like they say people do when you lose someone you love.

  "Make your choice, we don’t have much time Mackenzie," my father warns me.

  "Where is Ryan?" I ask quietly, hearing Kelly whimper a little as her eyes open. She just stares at me, an empty look in her eyes. Like she has given up.

  "Enough, make your choice!" he demands and I step forward, away from East and my mum, who grabs East's arm when he tries to follow me.

  "I don’t have a choice, just get out of here with Kelly, and mum, you heal her when you get a chance or she isn’t going to make it," I tell them.

  "I love you, and just hold on, we will get out and I will heal her," my mum whispers as my eyes meet East's and he doesn’t have to say a word, he only nods in understanding as he looks close to breaking with fear. He doesn’t stop me, and that means everything to me. He knows I couldn’t live with myself if I let Kelly die and got caught anyway. I look at my father as I walk over and he lets go of Kelly, her body falling to the floor and I run to her, only to get grabbed by my arms by two of the rebels. They hold me tightly as the door opens once more and Stella walks in, a big smirk on her face as she looks around.

  "They sent me to say the academy is fully under control, and the water will be ready in ten minutes," she says, “The dress is being taken out the box now.”

  "Very good, daughter," one of the guards holding me says and I look up at the blonde woman, seeing the similarities straight away. They have the same bitch face, what a bad thing to inherit.

  "You bitch, your parents were never undercover, where they? You betrayed us all the whole time," I shout and she chuckles as she walks over, kicking Kelly out the way, and I glare at her as she steps right up to my face.

  "I can’t wait to see you in pain, the pain you deserve, and I hope my laugh is the last thing you hear, Mackenzie," she says, laughing still and then looks over at East and my mum, "I will keep East busy, don’t you worry.”

  "I will kill you, I fucking swear to god I will," I shout at her and she slaps me hard across the face, making me stumble and taste blood in my mouth.

  "Try it," she says before walking over to where East is, and my father steps in front of me so I can’t see her.

  "This is for your own good," he says before placing his hands on my head and pain shoots through my body, making me scream until everything goes black.

  Chapter 29

  Mackenzie

  “Wake up,” I hear someone whisper, something hitting my leg. I shuffle a little, feeling a tightness on my wrists like someone is grabbing me.

  “Mackenzie, come on,” I hear again and I blink my eyes open to the bright room, groaning at the pain spreading throughout nearly every inch of my body. I quickly remember Alaric using his pain mark on me. I look down to see handcuffs I’ve had on before, and I don’t even need to try and use my marks. I know the handcuffs are stopping me.

  “Son of a bitch,” I spit out, and then hear a laugh. I turn my head to see Miss Tinder and Enzo’s sister Stacy right next to me. There are two other teachers I don’t know also tied up with their own handcuffs on. It was Stacy who hit my leg, and she is still laughing a little.

  “If I die, at least I know my brother chose a girl with a little bit of fire,” she says, winking at me.

  “You won’t die,” I shake my head.

  “How is Enzo? I only saw him for a few minutes the morning before he left to go after the rebels to rescue your friends, and we didn’t have long to discuss everything. He only asked that I keep an eye on you, and make sure you didn’t manage to hurt yourself while he was gone. I knew straight away that my brother had fallen for someone, and I’m happy it’s someone like you,” she pauses, “Someone strong enough to see past his dark and aggressive wall he puts up.”

  “I’m not—”

  “You don’t need to agree with me. I knew from my conversation with my brother how much you mean to him, even if he never said it,” she says.

  “He was with you that morning? I wondered why he snuck out,” I say, thinking of Stella, the lying little bitch. He went to see his sister, of course he did. He wasn’t with her like she said, not that I believed her anyway; Enzo isn’t stupid enough to go to someone like her.

  “Yes, now have you heard anything?” she demands this time, the worry for her brother showing in her eyes.

  “Nothing, but I believe—I know—that he will be here to rescue us and give us a sarcastic comment about it,” I say firmly and she looks away, swallowing deeply and not replying.

  “Where are we?” I ask her, trying to get her attention back, and she looks over at me with watery eyes, but it’s Miss Tinder that answers.

  “Waiting to die, what else,” she snaps.

  “Why does it sound like you are blaming this on me? This isn’t my fault you know, I’m tied up too,” I say, and she glares at me.

  “Sarcasm isn’t going to help us with this situation, Miss Crowe,” she snaps and then looks away. We sit silently, not hearing anything as I worry about my guys, my dads, my brother, and Kelly. And my mum, as she is with my crazy father. How did everything go so wrong?

  “I’ve been wondering something, why do you and Enzo have different last names?” I ask Stacy, needing a distraction and it’s the only thing that pops into my mind.

  “How very random, but I’ll tell you,” she smiles, “Well you must know that it’s a marked tradition for the men to take their woman’s last name, and therefore the children the same,” she says and I nod. That’s why Ryan and I have the last name Crowe, and so do all my dads.

  “My mother hated her last name, and didn’t want to go down that route. So she had DNA tests done not long after each of us was born, and then we each had the name of our biological fathers.”

  “Didn’t that cause a lot of trouble between you all?” I ask. There’s a reason most marked decide to take the woman’s last name, it stops a lot of arguments.

  “I don’t know. Enzo and I ar
e close in age, and my biological father died a month after Enzo was born. My mother and two other dads, well, they lost themselves in grief and weren’t the best people or parents.”

  “I didn’t know, I’m sorry,” I say.

  “Don’t be, but we do need to escape,” she says, nodding her head towards the door of the classroom. I very much doubt we could, the room has no windows, no other doors. It’s empty of anything other than us, the teachers desk and a few tables and chairs. The door opens, and two rebels walk in and come straight over to me. He grabs my arm, lifting me up off the floor, and a wave of dizziness hits me.

  “Your father said to tell you to behave,” he says.

  “You can tell him I said fuck you,” I mutter slowly, and the guards don’t reply to me, but I hear Stacy’s chuckle as I’m dragged from the room. We walk outside to a corridor and then straight towards the hallway, and into another room with two guards outside.

  “Go in,” the guard shoves me forward, and the other one opens the door, waiting for me to walk past him and into the room.

  “Mackenzie, I’m glad you’re awake now,” Alaric says, sitting on a throne type seat in the middle of the small room. He has a book in his lap, which he closes and places on the side.

  “I would have been awake sooner if you hadn’t knocked me out,” I spit out, and he laughs.

  “We had things to do, and I couldn’t trust you to be awake. Now, this is for you,” he says, waving my comment off, and walking across the room to a small box. He opens it up, pulling out an awful white dress.

  “A wedding dress? Fuck no, I have no intentions of marrying anyone at eighteen and certainly not in that ugly dress,” I say and he snaps the box shut.

  “It’s not a wedding dress, it’s a ceremonial dress that our ancestors wore for the ritual many years ago,” he says, and walks over to me, offering me the dress.

  “I’m not wearing it so you can use my twelfth power and then kill me,”

  “I never wanted to kill you, there’s so much you don’t know, but if I have to drag your unconscious friend in here and keep hurting her until you get dressed, I will,” he warns me, keeping his cold eyes on mine, and I know he means it.

  “Fine,” I snap, taking the dress from him.

  “I will wait outside,” he goes to walk away and looks back at me, “Don’t do anything stupid or I will kill Kelly, and then Ryan, and then your mother. Do not test me, Mackenzie,” he says and then walks out, slamming the door shut as I try not to throw something at him. I hold the dress up, smelling how it stinks of old people and dust.

  “Could have at least washed it,” I comment as I put it on the floor and try to pull my top off. It’s a lot harder than it looks but I get it off, leaving a vest, my underwear, my boots and leggings on underneath as I pull the dress on. I get stuck half way into it, with the handcuffs catching on something, and I try to wriggle out of it, and slam into a wall.

  “Ouch,” I mutter, finally getting the dress on, and pulling the white lace around my ribs tighter to hold it up.

  “Ready,” I shout, wanting to get out this room already, and the door opens. I walk out to see Kelly being held up by two guards and I run to her, only to be caught by two rebels myself. They grip my upper arms tightly, shaking their heads at me, which I see in the corner of my eye as I keep looking at Kelly. No one has healed her, so something must have gone wrong.

  “It’s finally time,” my father claps with a large grin on his face before he walks away, and we’re dragged after him.

  Chapter 30

  Mackenzie

  As I'm dragged up to the clifftops beside the school, I can't help but think it's ironic that I thought I was safe here, when it’s where they needed me all along. The water from Ariziadia underneath the school having some importance to whatever they are doing here. My long white dress drags in the mud on the ground. I stumble and the rebel dragging me catches me, holding me upright.

  “Fucking watch where you're walking,” he growls.

  “Maybe if you weren't dragging me so quickly in the freaking dark, I wouldn't keep stumbling!” I snap. “Hell, if you didn't make me wear this ridiculous dress either, that would help,” I add, practically seething. I see Kelly and the rebel dragging her catching up to us. Maybe if I can keep him talking for a moment longer...

  “Fucking shut up, and come on already,” he grunts, pushing me forward, and up the cliff. I almost stumble again, but keep my footing this time.

  “Fine, no need to shove me,” I mutter, as we continue up the last part of the trek to the clifftops.

  When we reach the top, a group of rebels are already waiting there, my father included, and he’s standing in the centre of the semi-circle. They’re all standing around a marked-made pool of water. The edges of the pool are so flat and perfectly rounded, it has to be that someone has used their earth mark to create it and then they’ve filled it with water. I notice both Stella and her parents are also standing around the pool with the other marked rebels. They’re all wearing stupid ceremonial robes, too. Gods I hate those things.

  The rebel dragging me releases my arms as we reach them, going to stand next to the others. Looking behind me all I see is the edge of the cliff, and while cuffed and unable to use my marks, jumping off the edge would be extremely dumb. I feel a raindrop hit my face, and then another. As if things weren’t crappy enough, it just had to be raining too.

  “We all know why we are here,” Alaric voice calls out, and I cringe.

  Is he really going to give a speech? I look around hoping to see signs of the others returning here to help, to rescue me and Kelly before it’s too late, but there’s no sign of them. I bite my lip nervously.

  “Today my daughter, Mackenzie Crowe, will open the portal to Ariziadia. We will then use the power from that world, through the opened portal, to push more power into this body of water. Water that came from Ariziadia itself,” he says, pausing as if to add a dramatic flair to his speech. The winning smile on his face showing just how much he is enjoying all of this. “We will then step back into the water, as we did when we were first marked, and we will be blessed again, with enough power to rule this world the way we were meant to,” he finally finishes. I expect cheering, or at least something, but they’re all deadly calm and serious.

  I hear Kelly whimpering as the rebel dragging her up here finally reaches the top with her. I look across at her, frowning in confusion as they walk her over to my father. As my eyes follow her, I notice one of the robed rebels is handcuffed like I am. I frown at the figure, but their hood is up.

  “Ryan?” I shout, calling across. The figure steps forward, or tries to, but he’s held back by the rebels either side of him. Kelly seems to realise it’s him, and she starts trying to pull towards him, but as weak as she is, she isn’t able to put up much of a fight against the man pulling her towards my father. Two marked rebels move over to me. They remove the cuffs from me, but stay standing close to me so I know it would be dumb to try anything. I rub my sore wrists as I watch Alaric. He’s standing way too close to Kelly for me to try and attack now that I can use my powers again, I can’t risk Kelly getting hurt.

  “We will now cause Mackenzie’s twelfth mark to activate. We previously thought this was only achievable by physical pain, but we now know the most effective method to trigger the mark is high levels of emotion,” Alaric says. High levels of emotion, what does he—

  “No!” I scream, all thoughts cut off as his hands rest on Kelly, and her body twitches while she screams in agony.

  “Let her go!” I shout, as I try to rush forward and get to her, a hand grips my shoulders tightly, holding me back and away from Kelly. I scream with her, for her, as he continues to use the pain mark on her. She collapses down in a heap on the floor in front of him. Tears are running down my face, but I don’t feel my twelfth mark activating.

  “Nothing, Mackenzie?” he asks, and I shake my head. If it isn’t working, maybe he’ll stop? “Do you not care for your friend at a
ll?” he drawls, crouching down, and pulling out a knife.

  “Get the fuck away from her, you monster!” I screech. I try to call on my air mark to throw the rebels holding me back off from me, but I’m so panicked I can’t concentrate enough to call it properly.

  Ryan manages to wriggle free from the other rebels, his hood falling down, and showing that it’s him. His mouth is covered with duct tape, and his face is covered in bruises, meaning he still hasn’t seen a healer. Alaric stands and turns towards Ryan.

  “What do you want?” he asks, as he rips the duct tape off from Ry’s mouth.

  “Use me,” Ryan blurts out desperately.

  “No way!” I shout.

  “What do you mean?” Alaric asks, looking at Ryan, paying no attention to me whatsoever as I scream.

  “Use me instead of Kelly. Clearly Kenzie’s powers aren’t activating for Kelly being hurt. Use me instead,” he pleads, his eyes looking down at Kelly sadly. “She can’t take anymore. If you use the pain mark on her again or cut her with that knife, she’ll die. I can take this, but not watching her die,” he says. My whole body shakes with quiet sobs as I realise Ryan is trying to protect Kelly, even if it means him being tortured instead of her.

  “That could work,” he says, and then a loud bang comes from down below in the school. “But unfortunately, we are out of time. We’re switching to plan b.”

  “Plan b?” Ryan echoes in a confused tone.

  “There isn’t enough time for torture,” he answers plainly, and then he shoves the knife into Ryan’s stomach. He rips it back out and then plunges it straight back in, and I scream as Ryan falls to the floor next to Kelly. I feel something in me snap, something uncontrollable taking over me. The ground beneath me shakes, and my neck burns so much that I can’t help but scream. Bright, blue light shines from behind me, and I turn to face it. I gape at the plane of light shimmering into existence. All the marks on my body burn hot as I stare, watching as the light becomes deeper and more corporal. It’s just off the edge of the cliff, and it stretches out, getting bigger and bigger, both across and up and down. Pieces of rock fall off the cliff, floating into the air and then the cliff shakes, making us all sway as we stare. I fall to the floor, landing on my hands and knees, as I feel the power flow not just from me, but through me. It’s like I’m not the creator of the power, I’m not in control, I’m just the conductor for the current. And it’s painful, so much pain.