The Darkness in You (The Darkness Series Book 2)

by Diane Ashley Nortje

  Contents

  The Darkness in You

  Dedication

  Warning

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  The Darkness in You

  The Darkness Series Book Two

  Written by Diane Ashley Nortje

  The book is a work of fiction. The use of names, characters, locations, events and businesses are the products of the author imagination. Any resemblance to actual people, locations or events are entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. This work or any portion of this work may not be reproduced, resold, or used in any manner without the written consent from the author, except for the use of brief examples used in book reviews.

  This work both in its entirety and in portions is the sole property of Diane Ashley Nortje.

  Copyright © 15 February 2020.

  ASIN: B083ZZSLTV

  Dedication

  To all the girls who thought they needed a knight in shining armor…

  ~ ~ ~

  Warning

  ~ ~ ~

  The e-book contains scenes that are of adult nature. This may be offensive to sensitive readers. There are also trigger scenes which readers may find offensive. This e-book is intended for sale to adults only and is not intended to be read by anyone under the age of 18.

  Continue at your own risk….

  ~ ~ ~

  Chapter One

  “Your soul is woven into my mine.” - Natalie

  ~Natalie~

  I watch the city come alive as the lights start to flicker on in the buildings that surround my apartment. The constant noise of the traffic, police, ambulances used to sooth me, the constant knowledge I wasn’t alone. Now it annoys me. I feel broken, out of place here, where I once felt whole.

  I hear my neighbours rising to the sound of their alarms, the running water coming from their taps, their foot falls on their carpets. How? I don’t know. I take in a deep breath, inhaling the aroma of the cup of coffee in my hands, and continue to watch life happen before me. I feel like I’m standing off to the side, everyone continuing their lives and me, I’m not living, I’m spectating.

  I move from the window; I’ve seen enough sun rises to know them by now. It’s a beautiful sight, for those who can appreciate it. Me, I know something is wrong. I can’t place it. I make my way to my kitchen; I need another cup of coffee before I can start my day. I’m not tired, it’s not the caffeine my body craves, it’s the normality of drinking coffee it craves. Again, why?

  I take a look around my apartment, its small, cosy how I like it. It’s wrong. I feel like I woke up in a parallel universe. I move to my couch, with my new cup of coffee in hand. And I know I will sit the day away again, like I have for the past few days. It’s been all a blur. One moment I’m here, the next I’m elsewhere with beautiful green eyes haunting my body and soul. Once I return from my mind wondering, the day has gone, and I will do it all over again tomorrow.

  I can’t allow myself to do it again today. I can’t allow myself to live in a dream world, where my days are passing me, not living. Why am I not living? I make myself stand once again and I move back to the window. I watch the slowly rising sun once again. Why am I questioning everything, it’s not like me to be lost? I feel like I’ve gone crazy. I’m making myself go insane from this. But I can’t shake this feeling.

  I turn back around; I need to live. Clearly living in this blur is not healthy, I know that. I’m pining for something, but I have no clue what I’m pining for. No. I make my way to my bathroom, throwing my second cup of coffee down the drain. I don’t need it. I’m going to figure out what is wrong with me.

  After showering, brushing my hair, putting on clothes other than pyjamas, I feel semi human once more. I look into the mirror; I can see the dark circles starting to form beneath my eyes. Have I not been sleeping? How can I not know if I’ve been sleeping or not? I don’t feel tired, but my face is a clear indication I haven’t been sleeping. Why don’t I know these things!

  No, I’m going to figure this out. I haven’t left my apartment in days, before that, events are unclear. I haven’t left, I know, I would have remembered if I had left. My thoughts consume me as I leave my bathroom, until I bump into one of my side tables, and jab my toe on the leg.

  Pain comes through my foot; it feels like I broke my toe. I know it’s not broken, but by the gods it feels like it and I hop on my foot just to add in the dramatics. While I’m hopping and holding my toe, I notice my plant that sits on the side table.

  My one and only responsibility other than myself. My silly little house plant, that I bought at a farmers market on a whim. My apartment needed some life when I moved in, and it was perfect. It’s low maintenance and adds a bit of nature and easy to look after. On the instructions it came with, I only needed to water it once a day to maintain a healthy plant.

  I’ve been out of it for four days, so my mind can’t process, why in the ever-loving hell it is dead! Brown flaky leaves have fallen to the table, some are on the floor and others are still clinging to the stem of the plant. I bend down to pick up a leaf that is currently laying on the floor, the brown dried out leaf crumbles in my hand, not an ounce of water in it left.

  I stand straight up, and I start to look around my apartment. I try take in anything that seems out of place. Nothing. Everything seems normal. I run to my fridge and take out the first thing I see. Milk, expired weeks ago. The cheese I supposedly bought a few days ago has mould growing on it. My lettuce has turned to brown mush, and I don’t even want to know what the hell that is.

  How did I not notice anything? The last four days have been a blur. Have I even eaten anything in the last four days or has my body been sustained by black coffee? I’m starting to go crazy. I slam my fridge closed and drop to the floor. I start rocking back and forth, running my fingers through my hair. I don’t know what’s going on. Should I check myself into a hospital, but I don’t think insane people do that, do they?

  I jump up again, and rush to find my diary, that should at least tell me what I’ve been doing. If I have had appointments, then I can retrace my steps and figure everything out. I dart to my desk in the corner by the window. Thankfully it’s there, that’s one thing that is normal. I start to page back through the diary, page after page I go back, its blank, no entries. How can there be nothing, not even a hair appointment, doctors appointment, not anything. Five and a half weeks of nothing, but it’s only been four days.

  I start to panic again, and before I know it, I’ve dropped to the floor again, rocking back and forth. I don’t know how long I sit like that for, but when I come around again, the midday
sun is beating down on my face through the window. I stand up and move to sit on my couch, and I don’t move again until the moon is shining bright in the night sky. I get up and get into bed, where I’m haunted once again by beautiful green eyes.

  ~ ~ ~

  When I wake again, I will myself not to repeat the process again. Something is missing, I know that, my brain wont function. It won’t remember what has happened. Did something traumatic happen and my brain is blocking it out. Something I can’t process, that will send me to insanity.

  I get up once again, the sun is starting to rise, the same time every morning. I feel like I’m a computer programme, set to function but not live. Set to do manual tasks but not feel. And I do feel nothing, but complete and utter emptiness.

  I make my way through the house, put my coffee machine on, and attend to my daily bathroom needs. At least I’m doing something different this morning. Once I’m done, I open my laptop, and I start to online shop. I need food, that is clear. I order a few items, and some pizza. I need to eat something, and pizza will have to do for breakfast, until I’m functioning properly that is or until I have figured out what the hell has happened to me.

  Every time I start to figure it out, something hits a recycle button and I start all over again. I can’t let whatever is happening to me win. I just can’t. I will figure this shit out. Once my food ordering is done, I have my coffee and move to stare out of the window, the sun is fully risen now, the day is beautiful. And I feel nothing. Numb to my core.

  I shake my head at my thoughts. My reflection is coming off the window and I don’t even recognise the woman staring back at me. An empty shell. My doorbell rings, which jars me from my thoughts. Damit! It happened again. I lost time. At least this time it is only forty-five minutes, not forty-five hours.

  I make my way to my door, placing my now cold cup of coffee on the counter. I open the door to my pizza box and small packet of food I ordered. But it is held by one of the most gorgeous men possible. If my jaw unhinged it would not have surprised me. Cropped blonde hair, eyes the colour of the sky and double the size of me crowds my doorway.

  When I look into the man’s eyes, I feel nothing. Not a buzz on my skin, not a whisper of a thought. Nothing. Normally women would have at least stuttered. The only thing he did was catch me off guard and then nothing.

  “Hello.” I nod to him while going for my box of pizza and small packet of groceries.

  “Hey.” The delivery man says back to me, and my eyes snap to his. I’ve heard that voice before. Where I don’t know, I can’t place anything. But I know I’ve heard it before.

  I eye him suspiciously, which he doesn’t seem to notice while handing me my food.

  “Do I know you?” I ask him without thinking. I clearly don’t know him.

  “That’s a funny way to come onto someone, if you wanted my number, you should just ask for it.” The man says back to me, smiling from ear to ear.

  I don’t want anything.

  I say nothing back to the man and take a step back and out of the way, shutting the door, and locking it just in case. Something isn’t right. I feel myself starting to panic. I feel like I’m going to throw myself into a ball and not come back from it.

  Before I can allow the panic to take hold of me, the whispers start. At first caressing my skin, then blowing the air around me. They have never made their presence known like this before. Always discreet, always quiet. And only me that knows.

  “You’re back, you have been gone a couple of days.” I say out to the shadows.

  “Weeee weren’t allowed to come visit mistress.”

  “Why?” I ask them.

  “No, no, weeee weren’t allowed. Weren’t allowed. Very bad to disobey. Very, very bad. But we must. We must come back. Must protect darkness. Always.”

  “Okay then. What darkness are you off to protect now?” I ask the shadows while making my way over to my table to eat my pizza. At least their presence distracted me from another melt down. Their constant rambling is somewhat of a comfort. Even though they make no sense, I’m pretty sure they are on some drug, but they are comforting non the less.

  “Always protect mistress, always protect. The five can’t always. We must.” They whisper out to me, their voices caressing my skin.

  “I see.” I say to them before taking a large chunk out of my pizza. I never knew I was that hungry. I pull my mouth away from the pizza and a large gooey cheese clump comes off and whacks me on my chin. I slurp it into my mouth while I continue to chew.

  I feel the air start to displace, starting to turn, brushing passed my hair, running over my body. I turn to look at what the shadows are doing, maybe they have left to protect this darkness they are on about. Instead of finding an empty spot of nothing. I find an intruder.

  The dark shadow had formed into some sort of a human figure, which is hunched over like it can’t seem to hold its own weight up. Its hooded head is bent over, covering its face, while dark wisps of air float around it, making the body of the shadow appear to be floating too.

  I’m not sure what to make of this and my now forgotten slice of pizza in my hand has hit it floor with an echoing splat with pieces of cheese hitting my foot. I’m not sure what to do, should I run screaming, shouting out that there is a shadow in my apartment. I’m sure that will get me at least a ticket to see a doctor or even an overnight observation visit, or do I play it cool and blast it with a ball of my magic.

  Ideas are running wild in my head; I can’t decide what’s best to do in the situation. They have never appeared in this kind of form before, always just wisps of black air or the slight movement of darkness in an unlit corner. No, never like this.

  “Can- Can I help you?” I stutter out at the shadowy form.

  “Misssstressss, you must return. You must return now.” The shadow demands of me.

  “Return to what?” I ask the shadows.

  “Misssstressss you must return, always return. Always, always, always.” The shadowy figure hisses out at me. I don’t understand what it is going on about. I haven’t left to return anywhere.

  “I don’t understand you; I haven’t left.”

  “You left mistressss, remember, remember, try. He needs you, always needs you. Deny, deny, deny, but needs. Always needs you.”

  “I don’t know who you are talking about, return to what, to who?” I ask the figure.

  “Return to him, his beast calls for you. Only you. They are stirring, they will take.”

  The shadows don’t make much sense, and I’m starting to get frustrated at them because they can never just tell me what is going on. Just give it to me straight.

  “I don’t know what you are talking about, I remember nothing, I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

  “Nothing Misssstressss, return to him, return.”

  “Return to who?” I ask the figure, frustration lacing my words.

  “Return to him, return to home, return Misssstressss, you must, you must fight the spell. You must fight for darkness.” The figure whispers out.

  I sit there starring at the figure, which is starting to fade from my view. It came to tell me what it needed to and now it’s fading from once it came. I stare at the now vacant spot for a few more moments before momentum kicks me in the butt.

  I jump up from the stool I was sitting on while eating my pizza, which I forgot was now laying on the floor and slipped on the cheesy piece and landed square on my butt with a loud thud. I feel myself wanting to curl once more into a ball and start rocking back and forth. The universe giving me a sign, just stay the fuck down.

  I try to remember; I try to will myself to remember just something other than a blank past. I never returned home; I haven’t been back in years. Why would they tell me to go back? They have never led me wrong before, but now they are talking such nonsense. I must return home for what? So, the devil that has been haunting me can finally find me.

  I still at my thoughts, what if I had returned home, and he did find
me and that’s why I’m sitting on a piece of cheesy pizza wanting to pour my eyes out. What if he did find me and I’m back here, hiding from something. I don’t know, I can’t process my thoughts properly.

  I know one thing for sure, they have never led me wrong before. So, on that thought, I peel my sore bum from the cheesy pizza, and rush to my room, change my pants, throw some clothes into an overnight bag. I’m going to do it, I’m going to return home, and figure this mess out. Get my life back and hopefully all will be normal once again.

  I close my bag and rush to my apartment door and grab my car keys. Once I’m halfway out the door, I stop and go back inside. I make my way to my bathroom and stop next to the dead plant that is sitting on the side table.

  “You are coming with me. You are the only piece of the puzzle I have.” I say to the dead plant.

  Great now I’m talking to dead plants. The hospital idea is still an option.

  I turn on my heels and leave my apartment. I’m going back. I’m going to figure this out. I just pray for whoever messed with me, is strong enough to handle what I’m about to bring them.

  ~Jacin~

  “What is it.” I bark out into my phone, the ringing noise making me on edge. I fucking hate technology, and yet these humans thrive on it, need it, can’t seem to live without it.

  “Sire, something is not right.” Tray says to me from the other side.

  “Well fucking fix it.”

  “Sire, there is something wrong with Natalie.” Tray says to me. Just the mention of her name has the hairs on my body sticking up. How the hell does a name have that kind of effect on people.

  “What is it?” I grind out to him. He is lucky he isn’t standing in front of me right now.

  “Sire, she left, with a bag of clothes and a dead plant.”

  “Well where did she go?” I question Tray.

  “Home sire, she is on her way home.”

  I crush the phone in my hand before I can give Tray a reply. That’s the third one this week and the tenth one since she has been gone. Four fucking long weeks without her and I’m still not closer in finding these fuckers that want to end my reign.