@handworn asked : “misery made me a fiend.” – for Catherine! - FRANKENSTEIN STARTERS (ACCEPTING)
"Yes," She says directly, voice sharper than she intends with passion that ignites suddenly from the embers of the exhaustion she has been wearing for weeks, something between old anger and emphasis which she cannot presently name, the words catching immediately like flame on dry wood, "As it has made him, as it has made all of us."
Death, she had said, that night with trembling hands and eyes as dark and silent as a still lake. The devil asked her how she felt and she had seen and lived so much death she felt only death - now, it seems, she has seen and lived so much hate she could scarcely feel without it, and that is worse. Her papa would not recognize her now, Catherine thinks. The girl who walked through the threshold and said, chin lifted and defiant, that she shall at least love and no one can take it from her - has burned down altogether.
A moment later she amends, softer, pensive, "...Misery only made us miserable. The fiend is what emerged. Only -"Her gaze, dark-eyed, red-rimmed and careful - glistening in low firelight - suddenly flickers to his countenance. " I don't wish to be a fiend, not like him - and neither do you." She pauses, wary, uncertain - and presses, a moment later, "...Do you?"
