ere his fingers had dug in. She forced her hea

ave, but it was enough. She stared hard at his

rfolk existed in this Beast World. S

a tail - a Merfolk tail. But it

s significant as a Wolf-kin's claws or an Eagle-man's wings. Now, it was a mass of festering wounds. Where the s

grated against those open, scale-less wounds. He left a smearing

tincts momentarily overridden by sheer human

nly, the sensory input - the metallic scent of blood, the damp chill of the cave - c

la didn't arrive as a story; they hit her

hed, replaced by a kaleidoscopic nightmare of the original Jayla's perspective. She wa

d a crude bone knife, its edge stained with his blood. She was laug

dripping with possessive madness. She placed a foot on

she pried one of hi

nd of pure, unadulterated despair, loud enough to make her ear

supernatural strength - had been brutally gouged from his chest, leaving a gaping, weeping hole where his sternum should have been. She saw an Eagle-man whose magnificent wings had been snapped and bound, his primary feathers violently plucked. She saw

la gasping for air. Cold sweat plastered her dirt

a psychopath. And in a Beast World governed by the sacred law of Marking, what the original Jayla had done wasn't merely cruelty. It was a desecration of the highe

effort. She looked toward the corner where Jordi had retreated. He was a d

y. She wasn't

submissive carried an implicit threat - the original Jayla had likely used her gaze as a weapon. She didn't approach him. Instead, she slid backward a few inches to give him mor

e as she could manage, slowly resting her hands open on the g

-stiff. He snapped his head around, his blue eyes wide

is hand shot out, grabbing a jagged rock from the ground. He held it in front of hi

eked. His voice cracked, brea

in the air, showing him she was unarmed. "Listen, I'm not going to hu

wrong thi

cal trigger. They were the exact same lie the original Jayla ha

sure. The fear transformed into a wild, uncontrolled rage, a desperate

de. The rock whizzed past her ear, missing her skull by an inch. It sma

. A thin line of fire bloomed on her ski

etaliation. That was the rule he had lived by for however long she had held him - pain was answered with worse pain. He scuttled backward unti

er fingertips coming away wet and red. She took a deep b

ma, the very sound of her voice - the voice of his tormentor - was a weapon.

oking at him. In the quiet of her mind,

We need t