Page 1 of Vicious Impulses (The Capo and Ballerina)

Prologue - Caelian

The pain remains.

Constant and unending.

’Til soon, everythingbecomespain.

It torments my body day and night. Hot summers and the coldest winters.

A profound kind of pain that knows no relief and offers no escape.

Only in my dreams.

The sharp, unbearable pain subsides. No longer does it feel like a thousand razors stab my chest. My desperate gasps for air turn into a dozing silence.

The world is in color again.

For the first time in my tortuous life, it’s like the heavens have opened up. I’m a monster being welcomed through the golden gates.

Soft clouds and twinkling music. I’m able to breathe, able to feel alive.

Even if it’s only in my dreams.

It’s whensheappears—the clouds part ways and she twirls into view, her arms in a perfect arc above her head. Her body floats and her feet glide with grace. Her every move mesmerizes me.

A sign from the heavens themselves. An angel appearing to me.

Dark skin and darker hair. The sweetest eyes and lips that are destined for mine.

I reach out with hope beating in my cursed heart only to wake to clutching air.

It was just a dream. Dreams aren’t real. But the pain is.

The razors stab away with utmost cruelty ’til I’m bracing against the bed and tearing at my skin. Blood drips from my lips and dries under my fingernails. I heave for breath as if learning to work my lungs for the first time.

The days are numbered, but that grim reality serves as motivation. If it’s all coming to an end, then I decide the terms. I choose what will be my final moments.

Because anything is better than a life like this.

ONE

Nevaeh

Pain shootsup the arch of my right foot.

Immediate, almost debilitating pain that any doctor would probably be concerned about. That should probably concernme.

But I can’t stop now. All eyes are on me.

I wince through it and push myself to keep going. I swing my left leg to the side in sync with my arm as I spin in fast circles and maintain my momentum.

The dance studio zips by as if I’m not the one moving. The room orbits around me at a dizzying blur.

Round and round and round again.

Panic clenches inside my chest. So does a sense of breathlessness in my lungs. The pain’s gone nowhere—it intensifies ’til I’m gritting my teeth with each push off my right heel.

Soon it’s not just the room looking like a dizzy blur because I’m executing fouettés. It’s a rush of dizziness crashing over me as the pain becomes too much and I can’t hold on another second.