I could see the hunger in his eyes. He wanted to do it. I hoped he would. “I don’t think you would find that experience enjoyable,” he said.

“I don’t care!” I sobbed. “I don’t want to live… Just eat my soul, Great One. Eat my soul!”

“Pah! Your puny soul wouldn’t satisfy me. If I feasted on you, I would have to devour dozens more to even come close to feeling sated! Would you want all of those lives on your conscience?”

“I don’t care! I love you!”

Riley stepped back. “You are too insignificant a being on which to expend the effort. And if you value your planet, perhaps you might consider staying alive for the sake of your loved ones.”

Love? Love had betrayed me. I was unworthy of love. I could do nothing but sob.

Riley sighed deeply, expelling air into the night. “And consider that in order for the prophecy to remain fulfilled, this world may yet need you alive, unharmed.” He stood back up. “Do me the one favor I have asked, infinitesimal child. Simply keep yourself from harm. Consume not of the Tylenol in excess, nor look for trouble in bars frequented by bikers or gang members, nor leap from any bridges. You may yet be needed.” He stepped into the car, leaving me prostrate on the cement. He closed the door. “For… the prophecy.”

I heard the powerful engine turn. Watched as the car pulled smoothly out of the driveway. I waited, flat on the concrete, waited for him to stop the car. Waited for him to take it all back, to say it was all an elaborate lie. A test of my loyalty, perhaps.

But deep down, I knew it wasn’t true. There was only one truth.

I was not worthy of him.

I was now forever alone.

Chapter Twenty: Captured

I ran to the curb, dumbstruck as I stared after the BMW’s rapidly departing taillights. They shrank to barely discernible pinpricks in the night, then turned a corner and were gone.

Gone.

I collapsed once more to the pavement, head in hands, and I wept. I wept until there was nothing left in me but an iron ball of unrelenting emptiness. I wept until I thought I would die. But to my chagrin, I was still very much alive. Alive in a world without my great love. A life unworthy of the word.

After a while, I suppose I regained an outward semblance of composure, but I remained all turmoil inside; my empty chest wanted to scream, my body wanted to shake, my soul wanted to evaporate to nothingness. But I knew I couldn’t just lie on the curb in front of my house forever. My parents would find me eventually, and I couldn’t let them see. They would never understand.