No, I need to be strong. I’ve survived worse, I can survive this. As long as they don’t kill me, I can survive it. I repeat it again and again, forcing my mind to toughen up and push all thoughts of my mate away. She makes me feel weak, and I can’t afford that now, not if I’m to get through this and back to her side where I belong.
They don’t remove the bag, so I can’t even see them, instead I close my eyes and focus on my other senses. I can smell them, the scent of wings and the metal they are carrying. I can feel their anger and hatred brushing along my back with the force of it. I hear them shifting, their boots crushing twigs even as they try to stay silent, but they can’t stop their breathing or the pounding of their hearts.
“Well, isn’t this fun,” I deadpan. “Do trees make you hard or something?”
“You fucking abomination,” one of them spits, his voice low.
“I’ve heard that before, you guys need new insults, it just sounds like a pet name now,” I taunt. I don’t know why, maybe it’s a habit. I won’t show them my fear, I’ll force their hand, mess with their plans. They don’t get to see my weaknesses, only Dawn does.
“Do you remember us?” the other one questions, his voice breaking like he can’t speak, and that’s when it hits me. I know why they are familiar.
I go quiet and the one with the deeper voice laughs. “Oh, I think he does, so he knows why we are here...revenge.”
“I was a kid, I had anger issues and you guys were assholes,” I snap.
I remember them, and he’s right, they want revenge. They had been saying shit about my mum for days, spreading rumours, calling her a whore, weak, a sheep. They made the mistake of saying it to my face the day I had a fight with my dad over slapping my mum. It was their blunder.
As much as I like to believe the darkness, the madness hiding inside me was created the day they took my wings, I know differently deep down. I was born with it. I’ve always had it. Yes, they brought it out that day, but it appeared one other day before. That day with these two. I had waited for them, attacked them. The one with the ruined voice? I ripped out his throat with my bare hands and put it around my neck like a trophy. Later, I handed it to my mum as a way of telling her they couldn’t hurt her anymore with their words. The other? Let’s just say it’s a good job we can’t have kids, because there’s no way he ever could now.
Afterwards, my mother had been horrified, and that’s when I realised I had done something bad. Something really messed up, something only a monster would do. She looked at me differently after that, as if she finally understood I wasn’t human but something else, something capable of killing and hurting in ways she couldn’t imagine. Oh, she still loved me, but it was tinged with fear. I hated them for making our last moments filled with that. I blame these assholes for it. Maybe I would have been triggered some other way, maybe I wouldn’t have. All I know is they are the reason I became scared of myself, of what hides within. I buried it deeply after that, never letting it show, becoming perfectly in control, cold even. It was easier if I didn’t feel, because then I couldn’t react. I saw the sadness in my mother’s eyes as I became more and more like my father, but I did it for her. To protect her from me.
“I didn’t know any better,” I growl. “I was a kid, we were all kids. Plus you totally had it coming. Tell me, how’s the cockless life going?”
One of them growls, and I hear the other nephilim holding him back. “You are nothing but a feral animal,” the one with the ruined throat tells me. “Do you know how they break feral animals?”
“If they can’t tame them, they kill them,” the other one continues, “but before that comes a whole lot of pain. We are going to tame you, Griffin, but I really hope we can’t. I have been dreaming about killing you since I was thirteen.”
“All I’m hearing is that you have dirty wet dreams about me. Kind of weird,” I tease.
“I hope that humour helps you survive this,” he growls.
Something thick, barbed, and sharp slices across my back. It tears through my shirt and skin as pain flashes through me in white-hot heat. A groan slips out from the suddenness of the attack, but then I bite down to stop any more sounds from escaping.
Weakness is strength.
Pain is living.
I can do this.
The lash comes again and again, and they leave different stints between the hits so I can’t predict them. I only hear the slither as it slices through the air, heading for my unprotected back which is already on fire. My body stiffens at the sound, making the pain worse. I feel the skin trying to stitch back together again, but there are too many wounds, so it’s slow going. I feel blood coating me, dripping down my back to my trousers and to the ground below. Like a sacrifice to the earth.
They laugh as I writhe in agony, a scream trapped in my throat. Unwillingly, my mind reaches for Dawn, needing to feel her loving touch for just a moment. It was the wrong thing to do as she fills my mind instantly, gasping in pain. She feels the next lash and the lash after that, I try to push her out to block her off, but she won’t leave.
Her anger and hatred fills my head, her utter helplessness at not being here to kill them. I feel it, the need to bathe in their blood, to stop the pain they are inflicting on something she has claimed...something she loves.
It gives me strength, her love guides me, and I try to make my mental voice as strong as possible.
Calm down, Vasculo, this is just a bit of foreplay. See you soon.
Then I push her from my mind and block it off so she can’t come back, so that she doesn’t have to witness this humiliation, to see the weakness of her mate and let the pain rip through her. No, this is mine to deal with.
And she reminded me of one thing—we are not victims.
Not anymore.
I’m stronger now, because of her. Fuck this and fuck them.
I let her anger twine with mine, and it fills me up, blocking out the pain with icy tendrils of utter madness. It reaches for me, telling me I can make it stop, that it can help me.
Fuck this. The madness takes over and I let it. I hide in it like a child huddling in the dark, crying for his mum. Pain flows through me and I realise I’ve ripped my wrists open on the wire, but I am free. Blood flows quickly from my body and I instantly feel lightheaded, but I ignore it as I tear away the bag and turn with a snarl to see the two fallen.
My wrists blaze in agony as they stitch together, but I don’t give them the time I need, no, I move, uncaring about the pain or the damage. All that fills me is the hate I feel for these men.
They unlocked this madness when we were kids, and now they will feel the full wrath of it. I will kill them like I should have back then, without mercy or tenderness. They are dead men walking.
The one with the messed-up throat and a vicious-looking scar marring it tries to turn and run, no doubt remembering what I did last time and seeing his death in my eyes now.
He dies first.
Grabbing him mid-leap, I break his neck and then rip his head from his body. Using it like a weapon, I throw it at the other nephilim who is also now trying to run. It hits him in the back and sends him to the ground.
I stroll towards him, picking up the whip laced with barbed wire as I go. My shirt is falling from me in tatters, so I pull it off and let it fall to the grass, the night air stinging the healing cuts on my back, but it only makes me stronger.