"This piece of junk gives me a headache just looking at it. Take it back."
Beverly let out a cold laugh and hurled the cup to the floor like a piece of garbage.
"Who are you trying to curse with this thing?"
Then she raised her foot and brought it down hard, grinding her heel into the cup with all her weight.
The wood groaned under the pressure, cracking and splintering.
"No!" I scrambled across the floor on my hands and knees, throwing myself over the cup, shielding it with both hands.
"Still protecting this piece of trash?"
Dean strode over, building momentum, and drove his foot straight down onto the back of my hand.
A sharp, brittle snap.
The hard sole of his shoe crushed down, mashing skin and flesh out of shape, the force driving straight through to bone.
Searing agony ripped through my entire body in an instant.
A strangled groan escaped my throat. Blood seeped from the wound and dripped, drop by drop, onto the cracked surface of the cup beneath my hand.
When the pain reached its peak, I stopped struggling.
I lowered my head and watched my blood stain the Half Oracle Cup a deep, thorough red.
In that instant, I heard something shatter in the void, a sound beyond sound.