Curse of the Loveless

The candles did little to brighten the room, but she didn’t need any light to know what was about to happen. He threw his robe casually over his shoulders and whispered in her ear, “I’m just going to get us some drinks.” The fire on the left side of the room roared on evenly, and heated the room thoroughly, adding to the sweat collecting on her forehead from the nerves she felt. She stopped him just before he left her side.
“Wait,” she whispered. She stroked his warm cheek and looked at his innocent face. “Please, wait. I need to tell you something.”
“Anything.”
“I’m not going to be here much longer.” He looked at her confused, not understanding the curse that had held her down for centuries. “But I want you to know… that I love you.” The last few words came to her lips as easy as she could breathe, but she had to force them out, force them to be heard. And they were heard by the boy leaning on her bed. He understood them and ate them up like they were as common as a greeting.
“I love you too.” he told her, but she didn’t know if she could really believe him. But it didn’t matter what he believed. It was only the fact that she had finally felt love, and she knew she had, and that she had said the words before she was taken away. She could feel it coming.
By falling in love she had broken the one rule of the contract, and now she would have to pay for it in the depths of Hell.
A pain began to swell in the centre of her back. She reached back as far as she could to feel what was happening to her. Her back was bare and the skin was warm and smooth, but there was something wrong. Where the pain was accumulating she could feel a bone protruding out and pressing against the skin. She heard a snap and felt the new pain radiate through her body as another bone shattered out of place. And another and another. She didn’t cry or scream; she knew this was her fate now and she didn’t want to bring her love rushing in just to see her taken away in her worst.
She let a breath and a squeak escape from her mouth as she felt the skin break. She realized then that he bones were not the cause of the tear; they were simply making room for the something coming through.
She could feel something moving up her back and over her shoulder, a creeping sensation and yet oddly familiar. She didn’t want to see it; she wanted her execution to move as fast as possible. Though she knew she didn’t have that luxury. Her breath became more rapid as she forgot the pain and waited for what was about to happen next. She took a cautious glance at the hanging mirror in front of her, instantly regretting her decision, because crawling over her shoulder was a bloody arm, its fingers stretched out as if to grab her. It stood out strong against the bright flame behind her as it reached down and cover her mouth tight to stop her from screaming the breath she just inhaled. It clamped down hard on her face, too strong for her to release. She pried at it with all her strength, but fighting back was useless. Another arm reached over her shoulder and began pulling her shoulder down, back where it came from. Same was done to her other shoulder, and arms and legs. Bones were broken as easily as twigs and blood was left dripping on the floor.
The tears ran down her face in an endless stream of desperation and she was yet to let out a single noise. The boy down stairs in the kitchen would be left alone, wondering where she had gotten to. He would miss her, search for her. But then he would get over her and move on. She was forgettable to him, like most things in his short life. But he would stay burned into her mind for the rest of eternity as the one who sent her to Hell, all because she loved him.
Her limbs had been completely sucked into the black hole that had formed in her back as a gateway to Hell. All was left was her head really, and like with the rest of her, an arm reached out and pulled her back. At some point, after having her head dragged back to the point of her neck snapping completely, she lost her vision and all she could see was the blackness, but she wasn’t dead yet, and she didn’t expect to die.
Her love entered the room only a few moments before she was gone altogether to find only a puddle of blood where he expected to see a beautiful girl…