{Well fuck, if Tory and I had to be homeless, there were worse places to be down and out than at Brotherhood mansion, true, stretched out on the overstuffed chesterfield in front of a roaring fire, shitkickers dangling over the arm, a crystal tumbler of Goose balanced on washboard abs, gloved fingers toying with the silken strands of Tory's black hair while the doggen mill about, the Mansion a hive of activity in preparation for the Solstice, but there is a noise rising up above the humdrum activity of the servants, head pivoting in the direction of the sound, the pounding of little feet down the staircase like a mini earthquake, gaining in intensity, a streak of movement across the polished floor as Khaos plants himself down hard on my abs, forcing the air from my lungs on a grunt and splashing Goose all over my shirt...and the glass isn't the only thing spilling. The kid has tears streaming down his little round cheeks, breaths caught in sobbing hitches, barely able to articulate the words <<Nalla..wouldn't..let me..play...called..me a..freak>> warrior hands resting on the young's hitching shoulders, diamond eyes meeting the trauma in his little face} Kid, you can't let the females push you around, true...least not until you're bonded to one {the last part directed to Tory with a wink, but the kid is shaking his head} <<Xsy got really angry, daddy... she hit Nalla>> {I'm just about ready to go off to the boy about how he can't hide behind his sister when the significance of what he's telling me hits home, Tory and I locking gazes that are all about the 'Oh Holy Shit' as a scream, like a banshee on crack reverberates down into the echoey foyer of the mansion, a muttered curse escaping my lips} Fuck...
*It's all slightly amusing until someone screams...And Fuck is right, the high pitched anger sounding down from an upper floor drawing me up from my lounge over V's body, my hand stilling it's soothing strokes down Khaos' sob shaken back as my eyes hit diamond...Khaos' words didnt bring the best of feelings, our daughter hot tempered and very protective of her brother..if he said she'd hit Nalla probability was that she had...my lips brush a kiss to the top of his thick black hair, random flicks tickling my nose as my feet find the floor, an inhale readying myself for whatever the fuck was still yelling up there* stay with daddy, baby...I'll be back in a little while...*left in V's arms, his sobs settle to rough breaths, the weight of innocent emerald eyes tracking my progress out of the room, and with every step the volume increases, the words become clearer, and my eyes are dangerous narrowed slits as I follow the verbal attack ringing through the halls, leading me through a labyrinth, a golden thread of anger guiding me to....oh fuck...Bella, looking like a wraith of maternal rage stood over a wide eyed, tear streaked Xsykhe as she tries to fit her tiny body into the corner of the playroom, diamond eyes, so like V's, peeled in terror as Zsadist's female shouts the words her daughter had shouted. Fuck. No.* What. The. Fuck. Is. Going. On? *tight bitten, the words are dagger edged, sharp enough to slice through all that prim and proper skin, an icy blast darkening the flush of anger on her cheeks as my rage touches her flesh, Xsy shot like a bullet from the corner to band small arms around my thigh...one hand rests on her head, a little comfort for my traumatised little girl...voice softening, only a fool would mistake it for peaceful...it is a pool that hides razor rocks beneath it's surface, the sheath that conceals a blade* Freak? You dare call my daughter a freak? She's four, for fucks sake...Do you yell at your 'princess' like that? Do you scream at her until she cries? *Bella's head is shaking, but it is not an apology...far from it, the female just psyching up for another go around* <<Your daughter razed Nalla's Barbie Dreamhouse to the ground...the Barbies are nothing but spots of melted plastic and hair. She is a destructive little animal that should never be allowed out in public....she's dangerous..>>*I took steps that brought me nose to nose with the other female* Not as dangerous as I am, Bella. Call her a freak again and we'll see how long it takes your hellren to break us up...*Her sharp inhale flared her nostrils in a haughty scoff*<<She's a freak, she's not normal, and I dont want either of your young around my Nalla>>*the hard crack came as had been warned, slicing a brutal slap to the side of her face...Female wouldnt survive a punch....and ringing out a satisfying smack that snapped her head to the side and curled a sneer onto my lips* My children are warriors. Yours is a spoilt little brat who doesnt know how to share....*emerald eyes danced with the fierce protective instincts of a mother, hands curled into a fist as I rake the room with a laugh...Xsy had really done a number on the house...pink and purple bled down the previously beige walls, a warzone of melted plastic and scorched pastel colours, the fence annihilated in a slush of lava dreamhouse as Barbies milled about, molten casualties of burning hair and dripping eyes, fancy dresses ash in puddles of bimbo...With the female cradling her cheek like I'd ripped it off her face and Nalla staring with wide citrine eyes, a horror, a guilt in sunshine orbs, I hauled Xsy up my body to cuddle her crying form in the comfort of my arms* Lets go see daddy and Khaos, ok? Before your Uncle Z come and tries to kill mommy...*Not an unfounded concern, as I head back the way I came, calm a surface for the anger simmering in my veins, if Z came after me, V would be pissed....after all, no one likes to see their brother in arms get beat up...dropping playful kisses to Xsy's cheeks, coaxing a smile from her wet face, the view that greets me is as it was. Khaos perched comfortably on V's Goose soaked chest* V...We have to go...now...
{God damn Tory...the bags are all but thrown into the trunk of the Escalade, while Fritz hovers, throwing watchful glances over his shoulder like he's afraid a Psycho Bella will appear any moment in a homicidal frenzy with a kitchen knife, the doggen is fretting about the weather and where we are going to go...the only place there's still likely to be room at the Inn for us...Tory's mahmen's house, but it's a long damn drive and we need to get there before dawn..unless she and I want to get melted just like Nalla's Barbie dolls.. fuck.. impossible females..suppressing a laugh as Tory bundles the young up in warm clothes and they pile into the Escalade, and before Fritz has a chance to wave us off, we're heading north down route 22, deeper into the countryside, black ice shimmering on the road like slicks of oily black lesser blood...fuck...casting a quick glance back at Xsy in the back seat...sooo not the image I need right now...fixing my eyes back on the road, avoiding Tory's...the snow starts in small flurries, but soon it's falling heavy, the windshield wipers struggling to keep pace, swiping away mini-avalanches of the powdery white shit with every thunking beat of the blades, gloved fist tight on the wheel...thinking I should have put chains on the tires before we left..but damn, we couldn't get out of there quick enough..it may be cold out here..but the atmosphere at the mansion was positively fucking glacial...and no telling what that deranged SOB Zsadist would do when he found out...and what I'd do to him if he laid a hand on Tory, brows pulled low in a frown as I cut my eyes from the road to look at Tory} think you could find us a weather report on the radio baby?
Sure....*I wont ask what V is thinking of, the frown on his brow a neon sign of 'It's Nothing Good' and I have had all the bad thoughts I can handle, my fingers playing with the buttons and dials, skipping through the static of dead radio stations, passing the snow blurred reception of a sketchy rock beat...a buzzing Billy Idol if I'm not mistaken...fucking weather fucked up all sounds, nothing coming through...oh...wait....A synchronised cry of delight lit up from the silence of the backseat, the young bouncing, little voices raising the twinkling sounds of a Christmas song as snow filters down a white blanket over the world, swiped away only to cover us in the purity of glistening flakes, casting an emerald bright smile over at V* No weather reports, but at least they arent crying...*No, no crying, singing, imploring I join in with soft laughter* <<Sing, mommy, sing!! It's Rudolph!>> I dont know the words, babies...*and that set off louder singing, trying to imprint the words in my brain, even as the song changed, Rudolph and his shiny red nose continued in the voices of our young, filling the car with innocence, so bright my words danced along with theirs, eyes caught on the passing landscape, so damn white, the moonlight bouncing off the millions of ice crystals to flicker tiny incandescence over every blade of grass. Pretty, I dont even care that we had to leave the mansion, the snow filtered out every bad thing and lit the world up in icy fire, tears dried by merry human holiday songs, we had happy young, cruel words forgotten...I flicked through the stations again, seeking something to take the frown off V's face. But an uproar from the backseat has the station changed back to cheer, my body curved on it's side, watching our twins seat dance and coasting lazy appreciation over V's hard, snow back lit profile*
{The airwaves may be clogged with nothing but back to back fucking Christmas songs, but the one bene was that it thawed the frosty silence of the young in the rear seats, the twins singing along to Rudolph, disturbingly familiar with the words to the human music, eyes drifting from the road just a moment too long, transfixed by Tory's easy laughter when the thing comes bolting out of the forest in a streaking blur of motion across the beams of the headlamps, impacting hard with the grille of the Escalade. FUCK! Shitkicker slamming the brakes to the floor, yanking down on the steering, a frantic effort to pull the car out of the skid that threatens to careen us into the solid black wall of tree trunks lining route 22, a thousand outcomes running through my brain...all negative as the tires lose traction and the back of the Escalade fishtails back and forth on the ice, control wrested back by sheer brute force until the car comes to a sliding halt, skewed across the road, the lights trained on the hulking mass of whatever the fuck we hit, the shape obscured by the heavy snowfall. Whatever is was, it was big and it was down...and it wasn't running away.. dropping my forehead to the wheel on a growled curse, heart thumping a hammer beat against my ribcage} Fuck!! Tory, is everybody ok? Jesus... Did you see what we hit?
*My body was all but flung into the back seat, held to the front only by the belt, my hands on our young, doing what I can to steady them as the world spins and the squeak of tires cuts off all singing to screams of fright....careening, screeching, barreling the fuck knows where into the fuck knows what and tilting my world into an axis of fear as V grapples with the steering, fighting to get the bulk of the Escalade back on all its tires, trying to escape the demons of black ice that slick our wheels and force us into spirals of tree lined highway and snow covered everything....shitshitshit....I can only hold onto the young in a half brace that will really do absolutely nothing to save them as the Escalade stills in a slight glide over the highway, dragging in ragged, adrenaline infused breaths, emerald eyes shocked wide and locking to V's* we're fine, they're fine....*I hope they're fine, white as snow and crying again but unharmed...eyes drifting over the glittering road to the hulk of immobile something in the middle, squinting through the sheets of snow slanting across the windshield* umm....Maybe we hit Bigfoot...is it dead? I didnt get a clear look...
{exhaling a heavy breath of relief that Tory and the young are unharmed, my attention focused on the dark heaped mass in the middle of the road} Let me go take a look...stay in the car with the young, true {stepping out of the Escalade, the cold hits like an icy slap in the face, the headlight beams falling on the slumped bundle of fur? and.. antlers on the ground, bubbly breathing gurgling up from lungs drowning in blood, pluming into the frozen air. I've killed enough in my time to recognise it for the death rattle it is. A hot pool of crimson bleeding out into the perfectly white, fresh-fallen snow, shattered limbs twitching convulsively, one glazed doe-eye rolled up in its skull, staring up at me...pleading...Ahh fuck...burying the heels of my hands into my eye sockets...we have to hit fucking Bambi? Turning the breadth of my shoulders to shield the gruesome sight from the young in the Escalade. Fuck I hadn't killed a deer since my days in the camp. Couldn't stomach the taste of venison, even when Fritz cooked it in that chocolate sauce...the taste made me retch with memories of throwing up a stomach load of salty deer flesh at the feet of the Bloodletter, meat stolen by a boy on the verge of starvation, a crime that earned me a savage beating... well...fuck it...I'd hit the thing...least I could do was end its suffering true?...give it a humane death...palm closing around the butt of a Glock, a smooth slide and click engaging the magazine, snow beating against the frozen stubble of my hard-set jaw, jerking back the slide release, finger curled on the trigger with grim resignation, the muzzle pressed hard into the base of the deer's skull.....}
*Deer...it was a deer...V moved slightly to flash the tip of a proud antler around his calf, just a glimpse but the bulk of the animal wasnt concealed by V's body in the way, I am unbelted and craning to see, the young pressed against the window...fuck...I shouldnt have unstrapped them, but I didnt want them frightened and trapped in the back seat* Guys, sit down, daddy hasnt gone far....*no, he was just working out a way to kill the poor thing we'd hit, a miserable sight hunched in the road, a pitiful way to die...Khaos is crying again, his sadness acid in the air, hurting my heart as he peers through the snow hazed window, Xsy huffed back in her seat, curiosity over...she'd just wanted to see where V had gone...but my little boy, was fixated, fascinated, crying as though his world was ending and he was the one dying, hands flattened in a window blocked reach towards the fallen creature...he is deaf to my commands, knelt in his seat, glued to the glass....pulling at the child locked handle....fuck....* Sit. Down. You arent getting out Khaos...it's freezing...*something in the mechanism, maybe sheer force of will, has that door springing wide, releasing a crying, NO! shouting child to the elements and sending him running in an icy skid into the backs of V's legs* V...incoming!!!!
Shit {Khaos' arms are clamped around the legs of my leathers like a vine, tugging, pleading...} Please don't shoot Rudolph daddy...please!! {Fuck.. squatting down to get myself at eye level with the boy, Glock hand resting on my thigh, free hand raking through snow-heavy hair, palm dragged across my forehead...just...fuck.. killing the deer was the only humane thing to do...tough fucking love but the kid had to learn the hard lessons of this cruel world Tory and I had brought him into. War, death, suffering...they were the facts of our vampire existence...no lesser would ever show the kid mercy...no quarter given and none asked...Xsy could take care of herself..but Khaos? The boy was kind...empathic...sort of things that got you killed...my mind flashes back to my own childhood in the Bloodletter's camp...my father would have beaten me severely for tears shed over a dumb animal.. made me wield the blade myself and laughed at the weakness...it was a vicious regimen, but it kept us alive, taught us to fight back...clearing my throat to speak, a hand wrapped around Khaos' upper arm} He's hurt really bad, kid...he's in a lot of pain...this will be better... quicker...kinder, true {shit, the strain evident in troubled diamond eyes lifted to Tory, looking for something...understanding....help...forgiveness?...I don't fucking know what...}
*My brow furrowed, words carried to me on the wind and sending a shiver down my spine....all parents want their children to be safe, to be innocent, to be protected and cared for, but pure innocence will only get you so far until it gets you killed, deep kindness leaves you vulnerable to people who would use and abuse you...our world is no place for either, it's hard, and brutal, we hunt and are hunted, and as emerald eyes are caught by torn diamond ones, our son clinging, begging for a life that would only be leaving the thing in pain, a short nod, gives permission, gives forgiveness, gives understanding to a warrior unused to second guessing himself...Khaos will learn...maybe it's a hard way to teach but it will be better than both mine or V's inductions into the cruelty of this world. Soft words...a final plea as the muzzle is placed back into position, small hands flattening not on glass this time, but an unbloodied flank...Damn, Khaos, dont touch the dead, dying, thing....*<<Please daddy...let me help Rudolph. Santa needs him. Dont shoot Rudolph>>*A child's hope in his voice, the complete conviction that we have actually hit a flying reindeer in his tears...V's gaze is stuck to mine, torn between watching our son cry over an animal and seeking refuge in my eyes. For a moment, silence reigns, the wind stops it's howling, the snow falls slowly, the moon casts her glow over the macabre Christmas fuck up on the empty road, and nocturnal creatures cease their motion to watch...to watch slivers of sunlight glow and curl, vining out from small splayed fingers to cocoon the fallen animal in a nest of ethereal light....brighter than the moon, this golden illumination puts her to shame, a radiant warmth melting the snow before it can reach the hulking creature, and cradling it in an otherworldly luminescence that glistens and swirls with living light, an obelisk of glittering resplendence replacing bloodied pelt with unmatted silk, correcting bones with gruesome snaps, washing away the evidence of injury in a bath of purity, the deer aglow with the spun beams weaving from our son's touch....Holy Fuck....it hadnt been a dream...with the Omega, I'd been half dead, thought the glow was that of the Fade, but no....it was this, binding me back to life in the tendrils of enormous power...mesmerised, the deer is shaky, wobbling to unbroken legs, trembling a snort in icy air, a flick of an antlered head.....all I can do is stare, pinned as V is, to the Aurora Borealis playing out in front of us....just...fuck*
{Holy fuck..I think I left my jaw hanging somewhere down in the snow as Khaos pulls off something that could only be described as a fucking miracle, the deer that was a hairsbreadth, a gunshot from death, hauling itself up on spindly legs and bolting off into the black canopy of the forest, a lightshow to rival the Scribe Virgin herself, knitting broken bones and torn flesh, snatching life from the jaws of certain death...Holy. Shit...fucking speechless..deep-toned delerious laughter ringing out into the snowy night as I swing Khaos up into my arms, brushing the snow flakes from the spiky mess of his black hair} Well, aren't you the dark horse, kid...I guess Rudolph gets to fly home to Santa after all, true {relief and total disbelief in the wide fanged smile beamed in Tory's direction from over Khaos' shoulder} Let's get you and your sister to your grandmahmen's house before we cause any more trouble, true
(No animals were harmed in the playing of this #LoverUntamed storyline {grins})
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