The Three Who Chose Me

Thorne

I should’ve stopped it before it started.

But I didn’t.

I stood there, watching Marcy and Michelle circle each other like feral cats, their words turning sharper, uglier, feeding off the tension that never left the damn air anymore. I didn’t step in soon enough, didn’t grab hold of that thin thread of control before it snapped.

And when it did—

"Enough!" I growled and shoved between them, but my hand caught Marcy a second too late and far too hard. She stumbled back with a cry, her foot slipping out from under her. The wet stone around the pool gave no grace. Her body hit the edge with a crack, and she collapsed near the water, groaning.

"Shit," I muttered, instinctively reaching toward her, but before I could do anything more—

Josie’s voice pierced through the air like a scream from another world.

"I saw her! I saw her—she was drowning in her own blood—my mother—she was laughing—"

Her cries tore out of her throat like claws against stone.

I froze.

My chest tightened, and I felt it again—that helplessness. That cold, useless fear that I couldn’t protect her from the monsters in her head.