Eden Forest (Part one of the Saskia Trilogy) Read Online Free

towards me, he picked me up and threw me on the white
    marble floor, breaking my arm. A scream rose in my throat.
    “Get up. You disgust me,” he said while moving towards me
    again. He tripped over an overturned table and fell. I got up and
    ran to my mother’s chambers. Tears poured down my face as I
    cradled my arm.
    When I entered, my mother was lounging on her four-poster
    bed. She took one look at me and asked, “What have you done
    now?” At that very moment the realisation hit me. If he came
    after me, he would finish what he started, and my mother would
    not stop him this time. I ran and locked my mother’s door. She
    got up off her bed.
    “Bellona, what do you think you are doing? Unlock that
    door at once.”
    Placing the key in my dress pocket, I glared at her. “You
    won’t hurt me anymore.” I could hear the venom in my own
    voice.
    Her face turned red with anger. “You spoilt little…”
    She never got to finish her sentence. Anything I put my hand
    on I flung at her. She screamed, startled. After emptying her
    dressing table, I moved around the room and started throwing
    books at her.
    “Stop this at once—” She was cut off midsentence by a book
    I aimed at her head, but I missed. I reached to get another book
    and that’s when the bookshelf opened. “Close it, and close it
    now, Bellona.” Her eyes darted to the door. “Your father will
    kill you if you go down there.” She actually looked frightened.
    She darted across the room, but before she could reach
    me, I opened the door and closed it behind me. She was still
    screaming her protests from her chambers. I raced blindly down
    the stone steps until I ended up in a large, circular room . The
    room I stand in now. My father never knew I found his secret
    room and my mother never told him.
    I place the book on the stone stand that is in the centre of the
    room. Opening the cover causes a breeze to flutter around the
    room, stirring the candle flames, making them dance wildly.
    I close my eyes and breathe in the musty smell of the book. A
    low sob pulls me back. Bethany, the servant girl, is curled up
    sobbing in her cage. I move towards her, making her move back
    into the cage. Her ratty, dirty hair covers her face.
    “Oh, Bethany. Shhh! It will be all over soon.” She looks at
    me and starts sobbing again. She has a poor existence. I am
    doing her a favour.
    I prepare the altar by lighting candles and purifying the area
    for my sacrifice. Just below the altar, I place a large piece of
    black cloth for Bethany to lie on. Once Bethany is removed
    from the cage, I wash her down and remove her soiled clothes.
    She stands still, staring at the ground. The smell is becoming
    less intense the more she is washed. I hum a tune my mother
    used to sing to me at night time. It was one of her rare moments
    of kindness towards me.
    “Lorem, my lady.”
    I hit Bethany across the face. “It is forbidden to use Latin.
    You know this.” I inhale a deep breath to calm myself. Latin
    stirs too many awful memories. It was the tongue of my parents.
    When I came into power, I banished the language and enforced
    English.
    Bethany holds her face. “Sorry, my lady.”
    I wrap her in a white silk robe and brush her wet hair from
    her face. Taking her bony hand, I place her on the ground in
    front of the altar. She keeps her eyes closed, but her body shakes
    with silent sobs. Taking my pendant off the altar, I place it
    around my neck. The purple stone starts to swirl.
    Holding the black knife above Bethany, I start my incantation.
    Almost instantly, the energy in the room starts to rise, causing
    my hair to snap with electricity. I continue the incantation, saying
    it louder and faster, until I can’t hear myself over the roars of
    the demons in the room. The demons circle Bethany and me in
    a large black fog. They move so fast a wind races through the
    room. The only thing you can see through the black fog is their
    red, greedy eyes. I thrash the knife