Shaking her head, as if to shake off the memory, Amara continued. “Mr. Maroni had sworn his men to silence about Tristan’s truth – not out of the goodness of his heart, if he even has any, and not because he wanted to protect the boy. Oh no, it was so that the man Tristan would become one day would owe him.”
The disgust in Amara’s voice seeped into Morana, her heart shuddering. The depth of cruelty in her world astounded her. Even though she’d known how brutal their world was, this still managed to catch her off guard. There was no place for innocence here. None. What a little boy had done out of instinct had cost him everything. Not because someone wanted to get revenge against him, or because someone wanted to kill him for themselves. No, but because someone wanted to simply exploit him. He should have been loved and protected. More importantly, he should have been forgiven. Instead, his crucible had only begun at the hands of the people who’d taken him under.
“Fuck,” she whispered, not knowing what else to say, the one word encompassing the entire situation perfectly.
“Yeah. As if that wasn’t enough, he was kept away from all the other children in the family, in a separate wing,” Amara reminisced, another tear trailing down her cheek, her raspy voice trembling. “During the day when other kids went to school outside the walls or played until their time came to be trained, he was locked in the compound with private tutors. Maroni’s best men trained him, tortured him, and he never said a word. Mama said she heard his screams sometimes in passing when she went to the wing. All of us did at some point. But never heard his words. And after a point, the screams just stopped.”
Morana closed her eyes, rage infusing her blood, the urge to kill all those people, the need to kill all those people, to destroy them as they destroyed a child, so acute it became an ache in her heart. She remembered the deep, mottled scars she had seen all over on his body, the burn marks on his back. How many of those had been inflicted by these people? How many when he’d been just a boy? How many had taken him to the brink of death? To the brink of insanity?
A tear made its way down her cheek – a tear of pain, of anger, of compassion – before she could stop it. She let it roll down, taking a deep breath to calm her racing heart.
She opened her eyes. “Go on.”
Amara sighed softly, her face etched in remorse. “I’ll never forgive myself for ignoring him back then. I know I was just a child, but even back then, I knew it shouldn’t have been happening like that. I knew it wasn’t right. And yet, I did absolutely nothing to help him, not in any way. And I wonder sometimes if maybe a kind word, a selfless gesture, a hand of friendship would have made things a little better for him…”
Morana didn’t say anything to that. She couldn’t. Not with the rage she was feeling.
Amara swallowed, evidently struggling with something before she sucked in a breath and continued. “I saw him around the compound for years. I’d be wandering around the quarters, playing with the other children not under training, or helping my mama, and I’d catch glimpses of him over the years.”
Rubbing a hand over her drained face, she went on. “He was always bruised. He walked with a limp sometimes. Sometimes, he could barely walk. And even then, nobody dared pity him, or talk to him. It became clear within years that he was lethal. His silence fed that even more. People within the family shunned him for being an outsider and people outside shunned him for being on the inside. He belonged nowhere. And while nobody messed with him, nobody talked to him either.”
“Wh-what happened then?” Morana stuttered, barely able to get the words out, her heart clenching for the boy he’d been, wishing she could’ve known him back then. She’d been so alone growing up too, surrounded by people but nobody to talk to. Maybe, she could’ve extended that hand of companionship, surreal as it would’ve been. Maybe, they could’ve helped each other feel less lonely.
Maybe…
Amara smiled slightly, breaking Morana’s thoughts, her entire face softening. “Dante happened.”
Morana frowned, not understanding.
Amara shook her head, grinning softly, her beautiful eyes glistening. “A few years later, Mr. Maroni started Dante’s training with the same men who’d trained Tristan for years. They both trained in the same place sometimes. There had already been talk about Tristan taking over the family when he grew up, and Dante was the obvious heir, being the oldest son and all. It didn’t help that Tristan barely acknowledged anyone, much less spoke to anyone. Dante would try to talk to him and Tristan would shut him down so fast… he was that way with everyone. Only spoke when spoken to, and most of the time, not even then. Dante wasn’t used to not getting his way. It created a lot of tension between them.”
She could imagine.
“Then one night after training, Dante lost it. Got in Tristan’s face. Tristan tried to walk away, and Dante punched him. Tristan broke his jaw.”
Amara paused. “He broke the jaw of the oldest son of Lorenzo Maroni, the Boss of the Tenebrae Outfit.”
Morana felt her eyes widen, the implications making her breath hitch, a shiver running down her spine.
The wind swirled around them, bringing stray, fallen leaves on their laps.
“Was he punished?” she asked in a whisper, afraid of the answer.
Amara’s responsive chuckle surprised her as she shook her head again. “Mr. Maroni called everyone to the mansion. All the staff was there too, watching quietly. Anyways, he created a big scene, demanding the culprit, demanding who had broken his son’s jaw. He took it as a hit to his honor or something.”
Morana leaned forward, her breaths picking up. “Then?”
That little smile on Amara’s face remained. “Dante never spoke up or even looked in Tristan’s direction – he already hated his father. But Tristan did. I remember how stunned I’d been when Tristan stepped forward without hesitation. There was no fear in that boy. None at all. I mean, I’d seen grown men cower before Lorenzo Maroni and him… anyways, Maroni tried to threaten him subtly…”
The wind picked up. Morana shuddered. This just kept getting better and better.
“… and that was the first time I heard Tristan’s voice.”
Morana raised her eyebrows, heart pounding. “What did he say?”
The look of awe on Amara’s face, even at the old memory, matched the wonder in her voice. “God, I still remember it like it was yesterday. Mr. Maroni threatened Tristan, thinking he’d feel obliged, maybe scared, maybe respectful – God knows what he was thinking – and Tristan… he got nose to nose with Mr. Maroni and told him – ‘You ever put a leash on me, I’ll fucking strangle you with it.’ ”
Morana blinked, stunned. “He said what?!”
Amara nodded. “You ever put a leash on me, I’ll fucking strangle you with it. Word for word.”
She tried to wrap her mind around it as astonishment flowed through her. “How old was he?”
“Fourteen.”
Morana sat back, feeling the wind knocked out of her.
Amara nodded, as though she understood completely. “He was fearless, Morana. That was the first time any of us had seen a boy shut the Boss up. That was also the moment Dante decided he was completely Team Tristan. And when his father told him the truth about Tristan to make him stay away, it only made Dante more adamant to befriend that boy.”