Mara didn't like being told what to do. Back on the docks, "don't go there" was usually where the truth was hidden.
As the other girls went to the hall, Mara slipped out of her bed. Her heart hammered against her ribs, but it wasn't fear; it was an itch. She walked to the heavy wooden door of the room next door—the room the others called the "Cursed Chamber."
She placed her hand on the cold iron handle and pushed.
Creeaaaak.
The room was silent. Cold. It smelled of damp stone and something metallic—like old coins or dried blood. Mara stepped inside, her eyes squinting in the dim moonlight. The beds were stripped bare, except for one in the far corner.
The room felt like a tomb that had already been vacated.
Mara walked deeper into the shadows, her footsteps echoing. She reached the last bunk bed, the one tucked into the dampest corner of the room. She expected to find a doll or a toy, but instead, her gaze climbed the peeling gray wallpaper behind the pillow.
Mara's breath hitched. Her jaw dropped, and a cold shiver raced down her spine that had nothing to do with the drafty window.
There, etched into the wall with a piece of stolen charcoal, was a drawing. It was crude, the shaky lines of a child but the imagery was horrifying. It was a self-portrait of a small girl with "angel eyes," but protruding from her head were two jagged, dark horns. Around the girl, the charcoal lines bled out like a dark cloud, swallowing everything else in the picture.
"A monster," Mara whispered, her voice trembling.
Suddenly, the door behind her slammed open against the stone wall with a violent BANG.
Mara whirled around, her heart nearly leaping out of her throat.
Kiara stood in the doorway, but she wasn't the "Angel" Mara had seen earlier. She was drenched in sweat, her hair matted to her forehead, and her small chest was heaving as she panted for breath.
But it was the expression on Kiara's face that stopped Mara's blood cold.
Kiara wasn't looking at Mara with curiosity. She was looking past her, her eyes wide with a jagged, raw terror. Her tiny hands flew up to cover her head, her body hunching into a ball as she instinctively flinched away from the door.
SMASH!
A heavy glass bottle, thrown by an older boy lurking in the dark hallway behind Mara, sailed through the air. It missed Mara by an inch and shattered against the stone wall right next to Kiara's head.
Shards of glass rained down like jagged diamonds, cutting into Kiara's arm. She screamed. but She didn't fight back. She just dropped to her knees in the doorway, burying her face in her bruised knees, her small frame shaking with a silent, broken sob.
"I'm sorry!" Kiara choked out, her voice a ragged whisper. "I'll go back to the dark! Please! Don't throw anything else! I'll stay away!"
Mara looked at the terrified girl on the floor, then back at the "horned child" on the wall. The realization hit her like a physical blow.
Mara's flint-like eyes hardened. The fear in her chest turned into a burning, white-hot rage.
She stepped over the broken glass, ignored the bullies laughing in the hallway, and reached out a hand toward the girl on the floor.
"Get up," Mara said, her voice like a jagged blade.