CHAPTER 33

D-Day-5

Suzanne stood in the shower, allowing the scalding hot water to blast her skin. As the steam rose from the bathroom floor, lacing around her body and over her head, Suzanne scrubbed furiously at her palm trying to rid herself of the mark. In a matter of hours, the black mark had spread like cancer all the way up to her elbow and her once pale pinkish arm now looked as if it had been dipped in black ink, with black looking roots snaking all the way up her arm.

Refuse us and you will surely die, the figure had whispered deep into her mind the other day. It was the same voice that had called out to her at the airport.

Fuck you, she had said to the faceless dark figure. She would rather perish a child of the light than be a servant of the dark. But for all her bravado, Suzanne Summers was afraid.

No, she was not afraid. She was terrified. She did not want to die.

She had seldom thought of dying, death had always struck her as