58 Contradictory Feelings

"I'm going to make you lose everything you love, so you start to learn how you've ruined someone's life, and what it's like to be ignored when you're begging helplessly."

  Lyra tried to hug herself with her arms, wanting to cover her whole body with warmth and serenity.  But that still didn't work, neither her arms being able to do what she hoped for, nor the calm she had been waiting for.  Pain tore through her heart, spreading to all parts of her body, tearing apart the smallest cells and crushing them to shreds.

  She knew this time Duke Kleo seriously wanted to punish her and even tortured her in a sadistic and slow way.

  Ella and Gena immediately helped her up after he left her.  Like a lump of shabby and unwanted cloth, her body staggered to find a place to take shelter.  It was not the heat of the sun that stings her, but the injustice of the world and the various misfortunes that keep coming.