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Chapter 4 - Nightmarish Remembrances
Two little boys sit in a linen closet, all but forgotten. It is their sacred space, at least temporarily. They hold hands and speak in hushed tones. They dream together of a time and place that is without full definition but is full of promise and potential.
"Tell me again! Where are we going to go? What are we going to do?" The younger squeaks and fidgets excitedly. This is all part of their sacred custom and more than the importance of what is said, is the importance of what is not said. 'After we get away from these monsters' is not said. 'Where will we go and what will we do after we are free of this hell?'
The older boy smiles in the dark shelter, lit only by the stray glimmers of light which find their way in, through the cracks around the door from gaslights in the hallway. "Anywhere! Anything!" He holds up his friend's hands and they try to keep their giggles quiet.
"What is the best part?" The young boy fidgets more, excited for the best part of the ritual.
"And do you know what the best bit will be?"
"No! No!"
"We won't have to ask anyone for anything!"
The two try to keep their mounting joy quiet. Even in this fantasy world they cannot forget what lays beyond the closet door. They are all too aware of the dangers that are only temporarily at bay. A hint of their joy might bring misfortune down upon them more swiftly and they desperately want every moment of this reprieve to last.
The younger boy takes a deep breath and lays his silver head on his friend's chest. His small frame shrinks as he lets out a long sigh. "I cannot wait to be free."
The older, only a child himself, pulls a hand free and rubs his companion's back. "When we are free we will go anywhere. We will do anything. Best of all, we won't have to ask for permission."
The two little boys sit at the bottom of a linen closet in a mansion and recite their prayer. "We'll be free." Over and over again. They may not have the words for it at this time but what they feel in these moments is Love. Their love makes these moments sacred and safe. No matter how tiny the space or brief the moment it is a safety that they cherish.
Unfortunately, as we've mentioned before, there is no moment spent in the glow of Love that is truly safe.
"SETO!" a bellow makes the two children jump. Through the cracks around the door, the cruel world is coming to break down their fortress of fantasy once more.
The smaller boy clutches at his friend, his fingers try to sink into the fabric, maybe into the flesh beneath. Anything not to be dislodged from this safety. The two knew that this would only ever be a temporary retreat but they both dearly want it to last forever. Even if it means a lifetime in this linen closet, they both feel prepared to accept that. Anything is better than returning to the waiting clutches of the monsters outside.
"SETO! WE ARE LEAVING!" A dangerous note of impatience makes the tiny hairs of the back of both of the boys' necks stand up.
"Ssh. It is alright, Max. I will be back." The tiny fingers loosen their grip, defeat makes them surrender to the inevitable. "It will be alright."
Seto slips out of the closet and closes the door behind him. The door opens a sliver when he turns. Through the crack a quivering eye watches him as he walks down the hallway to the stairs. Seto hears a tiny sniffle as he reaches the stairs but now the safety is fully behind him. He cannot turn around. He has to face forward. He has to be strong.
Before the boy has finished coming down the stairs a porcelain talon grabs his wrist and drags him down the last few stairs. The boy bites his bottom lip to stifle a gasp and is dragged along outside. On the steps outside, he watches his master tap a foot in annoyance as he waits for the carriage to be brought to the entrance.
"You should not make me wait. You must come the first time that I call you."
The carriage arrives and the driver jumps down. His master is already dragging the boy to the vehicle. The door is opened. The boy is thrown, like a doll made of rags, past the stairs and into the seat inside. As his arm is released the perfect claws rake across the flesh, leaving parallel lines of blood as the skin opens. His shoulder slams into the wall and he bites his lip harder.
The carriage barely moves as his master hops inside gracefully. He arranges his things and smoothes out his clothes. Bewitching purple eyes slide over to the boy and notice that the child is trying to make himself look smaller. He has all but bunched himself up into the corner. The master's eyes become slits and he puts his mouth close to one little ear. "Don't you like being near me?" The boy flinches. The purple eyes leer at him. The inside of the vehicle is nearly dark but the boy can feel the monster's eyes fixed upon him. "You always seem to move away. So, why don't you like being near me?"
The boy tries to pull more of himself away.
A delicate hand strikes in the dark. The dainty looking digits latch on to a small thigh. "I asked you a question." The boy doesn't make a sound. "Tell me, boy. Why do you always move away from me?" The boy's lips do not part. An answer is not forthcoming and sharp fingers begin constricting. The boy still doesn't open his mouth. His master peers at him through the dark, anger begins to rise. "ANSWER ME!"
The boy sits silently, but the monster can feel him squirming under the increasing pressure around his leg.
"You are MINE. Unless I tell you to move, you stay EXACTLY where I put you!"
The boy doesn't cry out. The monster begins to seethe. It grinds it's perfect little teeth. But the boy just stares at the darkness before him.
The boy tries to concentrate on that empty blackness. He can not allow himself to cry out. He can only focus on that emptiness. The darkness.
A cold hand brushes across his cheek and the boy flinches. The fingers wrap around his chin. His head is wrenched sideways. The carriage has stopped and there is a hazy light from a lamp in the street. This scant bit of light is enough to illuminate the big purple eyes of the monster beside him. Light glints off of the large, hungry eyes, mere inches from the boy's face. "You still haven't answered me, boy."
A soft crack fills the relative silence of the carriage, muffled by muscle and flesh. The boy winced. His eyes screw up and begin to water. Yami tilts his head to the side, quizzically. His delicate brow furrowed. The monster hungrily awaits the full tears that will surely begin to fall freely. However, strangely, they do not come.
The darkness consumes the inside of the carriage again and the boy scolds himself for his weakness. He fights to keep himself composed as Yami's iron grip massages his leg. The hairline fraction of his femur screams in agony with every movement. He tries to keep his eyes steady. He stares into the darkness again, but he knows that now the darkness is staring back at him. The monster is waiting for it's salty reward.
"Hmm. You don't cry anymore. Why?" Offhanded curiosity now accompanies the slow kneading of the claws still affixed to the little leg.
The boy knows better than to look away. He tries to keep from wincing. He focuses on the darkness of the pupils before him. Anything but the pain or the tears that threaten to blossom.
"Why don't you cry anymore? Hmm? Tell me! Why don't you?" The boy stays silent and the master's patience is nearly gone. "TELL ME! YOU DON'T CRY ANYMORE! WHY!? NOT EVEN WHEN YOU'RE ALONE IN THE DARK! BUT WHY!? WHY!? WHY!?" Yami shakes the boy's face as he shouts, determined to shake free some answer.
The stubborn boy still refuses to answer and the fingers still holding his jaw began to apply pressure. "If you won't open your mouth for me, I'll open it myself! I'll crack it open like an obstinate oyster! TELL ME!"
Fear floods the little boy. He knows that his jaw will soon be snapped off if he doesn't give the monster an answer. He can't tell the monster the truth. His master would snap his jaw off to teach him a lesson if he knew the truth. He tries to speak but with his jaw in a vice it only comes out as a mumble.
"What? What was that? SPEAK UP!" The monster shakes his face again, trying to loose the answer. When the boy mumbles again, his master laughs, realizing his folly. He releases the small face quickly, "What was that? I could not quite make it out."
"I can't, Master."
Yami snarls and grabs a fist full of the boy's hair. "LIAR!"
"I do not cry because I cannot, Master!" The boy yelps in pain. He curses himself once more for his display of pain.
Yami pulls Seto's face closer, staring into his eyes. "Can not or will not?"
"Can not." The boy squeaks. Sensations run up and down his body, pain radiating from everywhere the monster has touched.
Throwing the boy's head away with disgust, it bounces off of the wall of the carriage. Tiny drops of blood begin to form at the scratches on his cheek. Yami sniffs and investigates his nails. "You know you used to cry, even graced us with a scream sometimes. Once or twice, I saw you bawling. You were so wonderfully soft then, but," He purses his lips, "ultimately useless."
The carriage rolls to a stop and the door is opened. The monster releases the boy's thigh. The master of the house extends a hand through the open door, for the footman to take. As he gracefully exits the vehicle, he looks over his shoulder at the boy. "I expect you to perform your duties tonight." The boy does not flinch or gulp, he has even managed to swallow the sickness that these words cause him. "All of your duties. Present yourself promptly at ten o'clock. Don't bother putting much on but have them clean up those unsightly marks."
+…+
This was not a remembrance of a night which had specific significance. This was not a night which was worse than any other. This was a night which was the epitome of every night when the boy was not yet a beast. He was a child living in the ironclad grip of that monster he had called Master. The boy had fought every moment to be stronger, struggled to have some power that the monster could not strip from him. Unfortunately, it was by chipping away at his own humanity that the boy felt that he could achieve any power.
That was, until finally, his humanity was completely taken from him. As the beast he had the strength he had been fighting for, for all of those years. It wasn't until he was transformed that he realized just how much he had not known about the monster. He would never be on balanced footing with his sire. He would always be weaker. He was younger. He could never be truly ruthless. He was a powerful beast but the beast could never best the monster.
This revelation was not the worst. As the hunger rose. As Seto succumbed to it. As he fed. As he bucked, to no avail, the needs of his new existence. All throughout, he felt the wretched weight of an awful and eternal truth. He could never be human again.
But little by little, in his daily devotions to Love, in the moments he spent with his brother, the beast felt as though he could possibly regain pieces of his humanity. Even… if only as a temporary sensation.
These memories, held Seto's mind firmly in the suffocating dark. They reminded Seto that the filth that still clung to him. Reminded him of just how close Yami was. The monster was always just a few inches away. His claws would always be wrapped around Seto's flesh and they were always squeezing until, someday, Seto broke under their pressure.
The beast fell into the clutches of the dark memories. Brought in the wake a silver bird. A messenger who had already flown away. Unfortunately, the wrong message had been delivered to the beast, or so the bird thought. Fate has many ways, and Destiny even more, of pushing people onto their proper paths.