Slowly, as the night ticked away, the raven-haired Savage regained control over herself and her Beast. Onyx eyes looked around as she sought understanding for what happened.

Corpses and piles of ash laid scattered across the field, the sound of the ocean licking the shore in the distance. All she remembered was the pain and anger after they had made her watch as his heart was ripped from his chest, the wind taking pieces of him up and away into the night sky, things went black. She felt her Beast roil within, a primal scream of rage emerging from her lips as the night around her faded from red to black and finally into nothingness. Her Beast was in control, her anger and pain fueling it.

Were these corpses by her hands? Inked hands were held up, dark with smeared ash, dirt and even some blood spray. She didn’t know, she didn’t remember, and that was terrifying.

Numbly, she walked to the shore, the evening breeze making her hair dance around her face, a face streaked with blood, ash and dirt. Ash from the Kindred she had ripped apart in a murderous rage. Mentally, she remembered that the ocean was supposed to be cold, that the sand was supposed to tickle between her toes, but all she felt was the water and sand wrapping around her feet, pulling them in as tiny grains swirled over her skin. Dropping to her knees, she feels the water, but not really.

I’m standing at the ledge
My foot’s about to slide
What if it takes the fall for me to learn to fly

How easy it would be to walk out into the sea, let the tide take her and pray for the sun to finish what the piles of ashes couldn’t. What did she have left? The territory she fought so hard for would be lost, the local Prince would make sure of that. He had already taken her Sire, her hard work and Danse would be next. She wasn’t even supposed to be standing here.

But what should have been a feeling of vindication was numbness, an emptiness in her chest that would never be filled. Her anger and rage already forming a protective bearer over her. Never again would she feel anything, it was a weakness she could not afford.

I try to run from what I’ve done
And it cost me everyone, all it left me was feeling numb

As she knelt there, she didn’t know, or remember for that matter, what drove her to leave Italy. To leave the only home she had ever known, to refuse to let that bastard end her Danse. No, she would survive and she would be successful. But it meant leaving, walking away from her own name and assets she had holed away.

One thing was certain for her, she had no regrets about her actions. They had stolen the only one who had ever cared about and understood her. He had shown her how to break with what everyone around her expected, to be who she wanted to be, to lead the life she wanted. In what should have been moments of vindication and pride, she instead found an empty and numbness that radiated to her cold heart.

Russian roulette, I swear I don’t have many chances left
No I should change, but man I swear I’d rather dance with death

Even as her heart hardened, a little voice was still there, a younger and more innocent voice, telling her to take this experience and learn from it. Rebuild herself into something better…but she knew she would rather meet Final Death then listen to that voice. That voice was a weakness, it invited her to be hurt and to bleed again for another.

I’m just a desperate soul
Another broken human
I know some stars are falling
I know some stars are shooting
I get so high
I’m froze in time


Dead Man Walking-Jelly Roll