A Gift from the Goddess novel Chapter 89

Chapter Eighty–Nine 

No, no, no, no... 

No, this couldn‘t be happening. 

I‘d been so guarded against everyone else that I hadn‘t seen the real issue sinking its teeth within me the entire time. 

“Aria?” Aleric asked again, grabbing onto my shoulders to steady me. 

But I recoiled quickly away, taking a few shaky steps away. 

“No, don‘t… don‘t touch me. I‘m... I‘m not...,” I said disjointedly, unable to even finish my sentence in my current state. 

“Are you okay?” 

‘What if he‘s just trying to gain your trust,‘I heard her say inside. 

‘What if he‘s lying to you.‘ 

‘What if he‘s going to betray you again?‘ 

Over and over, her voice started to fill my head. All the things she‘d told me once before now beginning to overlap until it was the only thing I could hear. As if I were in the middle of a crowded room filled with people shouting. 

‘You could pull the knife out. No one would even know it was you. They‘d say it was the rogues.‘ 

“You did the right thing. Either way, this is the best thing for us.‘ 

‘We made a vow. Myra‘s death was a result of making that same mistake once more.‘ 

‘Kill her. Kill her now. Strangle her until the light dies from her eyes.’ 

“Stop!” I shouted, covering my hands over my ears. “Stop, please! Get out of my head! Get out!” 

‘He trapped us, degraded us, tried to force us into a union... and then had our parents kil–.‘ 

– They don‘t respect you enough. You should make them kneel. All of them. It would force them to acknowledge yo-‘ 

–Don‘t need them. Aleric was, and always will be, our undoing. He was our beginning and our end. Time does not change t 

‘-Offer us nothing but lies, all stemming from a new personal vendetta. Look at how he continues to deny everything even though we heard the evide 

‘–And is in league with her? What if Cai just wants you to think he isn‘t on her side so you‘ll open up and let him steer you in the wrong direc–?‘ 

“STOP! STOP! STOP!” I yelled as I fell to my knees, the onslaught of imagery and voices filling my head too overwhelming to cope with. 

I couldn‘t hear anything else, couldn‘t see anything else. There was now only one thing. 

There was just Thea. 

Only Thea. 

‘–What if that piece is the only thing sustaining us? We were meant to be dead. We don‘t even belong in 

this timel–, 

––Going to die either way. You need to act now! Selene is the enem 

‘–know it‘s the right thing to do. You need to end this now. Kill Lucy 

–Should kill them before they kill you. No more liabilities. Just try it-‘ 

–––Do it. Kill him 

–FINISH IT 

And I began screaming. 

Somehow louder than even the voices in my head, I screamed a piercing shriek into the air, wishing more than anything that all of this would just end. 

My brain now felt as though it was completely on fire, burning me up from the inside as it struggled to compensate for the sheer amount of chaos happening internally. 

“Aria! Aria! Talk to me!” | vaguely heard Aleric yell once my scream had subsided. 

But I couldn‘t reply, couldn‘t find my voice as she continued to swarm my mind. Showing me every step I‘d made in my journey of becoming her pawn. 

“Cai, get in here! I need help! She‘s convulsing. We need to get her to the hospital.” 

And I wasn‘t sure exactly what happened next but I had never been so grateful for everything to cease. 

...And, finally, everything went black. 

When I eventually awoke, I felt cold everywhere. 

The feeling of crisp bed sheets welcomed me along with the smell of strong chemicals filling my nose. A scent I was instantly familiar with. 

I was in the hospital. 

“Alpha?” a voice asked and I finally opened my eyes slowly to see Elder Luke. 

It felt as though I were waking up without enough rest, my body still incredibly sore and exhausted everywhere. But inside I felt worse than I did outside. As if my mind had been put through a shredder. 

However, putting aside her mental assault on me, the new discovery also left so many unanswered questions in its wake. So many conflictions about myself that I wasn‘t sure how to get the answers to. 

Like… just how much of ‘me‘ was still here… and how much was the version that Thea had moulded me into? 

“Alpha, if I may...,” he started, his eyes full of a keen curiosity. “I can‘t help but wonder that, for a being who has so much power at her disposa.. why did she not just kill you when you were younger, if that is her goal? Seems strange to go about this in such an indirect way.” 

“And did she explain to you how the curse can be broken?” he asked, catching me off guard.