Chapter 13
What… has he done…?
Philip was sitting on top of the torn mess of a body for what he felt like an eternity, his breathing ragged; he didn't realize his head was ringing painfully from the assaults it had endured. His body slightly trembled from shock and pain. The curse was still spread all over his face as he slowly turned to the scene surrounding him with wide, glowing eyes. Bodies were lying on the ground, blood pooling around them and mixing with the rainwater that was pouring down from the sky. The water turned dark red as it washed over the wrecked bodies, carrying away the blood in rivulets that flowed over the ground. The metallic stench of blood burned his nostrils.
He looked back down and shakingly pulled his left clawed hand from the shredded flesh. Blood stained his arm, the rain barely washing off what he had done. Philip felt his eyes sting, and he quickly closed them as he tried to hold back the flood of emotions that were suffocating him. He felt sick and filled with shame.
He told himself that he tried stopping the humans, but they didn't listen. The last thing he wanted was to kill them, and the only reason he did so was to defend himself, yet… did he really have to kill them?
Something deep whispered to him he could have handled everything differently. He could have disarmed them and ran off if he didn't panic.
'But they were corrupted…' the voice told him, trying to assure he didn't do anything wrong.
But… were they really corrupted…?
'Of course, they were... They were using magic.'
But… from what Philip saw, the humans believed he was a monster. They probably were using magic to fight back, just like he had done against witches.
The voice said nothing to Philip's thoughts this time, leaving him to feel guilt from the possibility that he killed innocent humans. His chest clenched painfully as he kept replaying how he crushed each human, how he didn't hold back, taking them down one by one without hesitation, just like a monster would do. A demon…
"Well… from what I see and everything you have done according to the children, are you even a man?" Camila's voice, from a memory, played in his mind, questioning what he was.
The way his had hand went through the first man's chest flashed in his mind.
'Are you even a man?'
The way he had crushed the second's head before impaling the third's chest flickered in his head.
'Are you even a man?'
So much blood, bone, tissue… the last man had stopped screaming, but he had kept clawing through him like a ravaged beast.
'Are you even a man?'
Philip's shoulders trembled worse. His teeth clenched hard.
He wasn't a demon.
He didn't want to kill any of them!
'It had to be done,' the dark voice coldly said.
Philip did his best to shove what he had done in the back of his mind and try to force himself to feel nothing so he could gather his thoughts, to build the walls back around his mind, to convince himself he did nothing wrong. If he had more time to himself, he would have stopped feeling guilty, but…
"Oh, my titan…"
Philip's body went rigid as a faint, yet familiar, voice whispered above him. His eyes were wide as he slowly looked up, and through his messy of wet hair, he saw Hunter, Amity, and Willow flying on their staffs, their eyes locked in shock at the massacre below.
Guilt crashed onto him just when a thunder struck the lands. He desperately wished to tell them he didn't mean to harm the humans, but his mouth refused to move, and instead he turned his head back down to the lifeless corpse beneath him, as he tried his best to keep his heart from racing.
Hunter was completely frozen, eyes wide in disbelief.
"Belos has hurt and killed too many people for centuries." Words he had told his friends played in his mind as he looked at one mangled body after the other. "He's a terrible man who doesn't care who he hurts. He's a monster, and… he's never going to stop hurting others." His lips trembled as he stared at the blood staining the earth. "So… we have to stop him for good, no matter what."
He had warned his friends. He knew Belos was dangerous, yet he was a fool to think for one moment anything else. He was so naïve to have thought that maybe, Belos had a heart somewhere deep inside.
The lives lost were on him now, for letting his feelings blind him from the truth. He let these humans die by letting Belos free.
Luz was right.
Philip would never change.
Philip was a monster.
"Hunter…?" Willow managed to let out after struggling to gather her thoughts after being stricken by the horror underneath them. The three had been dead silent for a dreadful moment and the only things they could hear were the droplets hitting their raincoats.
Hunter found both girls looking at him with petrified looks, but also waiting for him to make a call on what they should do.
"We need to throw him back into the basement and keep him there," Hunter said coldly. "Imprison him like Luz had planned before."
"We should get the others, then. We can't fight him by ourselves," Amity whispered, barely able to keep her voice from sounding nervous, especially as she was afraid Belos might hear them and attack.
Hunter's shoulders quivered as he looked back down at Belo's form.
'He's a monster, and… he's never going to stop hurting others."
"We don't have time to get the others." Hunter's hands clenched on his staff tightly. His eyes narrowed down at Belos. "He looks tired, so this is our chance. We can't risk him having him escape and hurting more innocent people."
Willow and Amity looked at one another, as if trying to read each other's minds, before they glanced back at Hunter and gave him a curt nod, doing their best to gain some courage.
"Let's do it," Willow said.
Hunter stopped clutching his staff and took a firm grip on girls' shoulders. He teleported them behind Belos.
Willow and Amity acted in sync. Both jumped off their staffs before Willow ensnared Belos with roots while Amity created purple ooze that hardened around the restraints, trapping his torso.
Philp hadn't moved at the slightest, especially when they restrained him. His head bowed and his teeth clenched tight, trying to suppress his emotions that kept wanting to drag him down.
"Well, that was easier than I thought," Amity breathed a sigh of relief after a couple of minutes of her and Willow on guard before realizing Philip wasn't going to do anything.
Once she relaxed, she looked around the scene. She couldn't help but also notice the sword sticking out from someone's chest and metal wires that lay on the ground. Something seemed off to her. The humans didn't look ordinary based on what they were wearing. She also noticed scorched marks on certain tree trunks. "What should we do about… you know…?" She motioned the other two to the scene.
"We can't do anything for them," Hunter said, still on his staff before he began to float up. "Let's not waste any time. We need to leave now before someone sees us."
"Alright," Amity said as she attached some of her sticky goop to latch on one end of Philip while Willow secured the other end with a sturdy root, allowing them to transport Philip while they flew on their staffs. Hunter remained quiet as he trailed behind, holding back tears of frustration.
None of them spoke a word as they reached the old house. As Philip's eyes landed on the house, he jolted back to reality and began to writhe in an attempt to break free from the goop and root restraints.
"Oh, no you don't!" Willow said, her eyes glowed bright green as she rose a hand up. A barrage of pulsating green roots shot out of the front door of the house, wrapping around Philip and dragging him inside at a breakneck speed.
"Now I'll get the others," Hunter told the other two. "I'm counting on you two to keep him from escaping."
"Yeah, we got this," Willow gave him a confident smile before Hunter flew back to Luz's house.
"Belos killed four humans," Hunter didn't waste a second to say with coldness to the group in the living room after barging into the house.
"He did what?" Camila's eyes went wide with shock.
"We found him, on top of someone he tore apart. It was terrible." Hunter felt his eyes burn, and he again tried not to tear up. He was avoiding looking at anyone who were looking at him with disbelief. "Three other bodies were there, too."
"Damn it," Luz slammed a fist on the couch's armrest that she was next to. "I knew something like this was going to happen."
"Where's the others?" Gus asked with worry when he didn't see Amity or Willow walking in at any moment.
"They're holding Belos back in the basement at the other house," Hunter said, before turning to Luz. "We should… probably go with what you planned the other day," he let out, ignoring how tight his throat got as he spoke.
"What about the portal?" Vee asked, quietly.
"We got almost everything to make it," Hunter said. "We don't need him anymore…"
Luz got off the couch and gave Hunter a curt nod.
Camila followed the kids out of the house. Her mind was racing. More than ever now did she want to keep the kids away from Philip. Especially since Hunter just told them Philip had torn someone apart.
But why would he kill random humans so suddenly? Did he just snap from everything that has happened till now?
She didn't bother taking an umbrella as they ran through the forest and to the old, abandoned house.
Once inside the basement, they all found Philip trapped in a writhing mass of roots, ensnared from every direction, forced on his knees.
"You stupid witches, release me now!" Philip barked in a raspy voice, thrashing wildly against the restraints, his hair was plastered to his skull, drenched, and disheveled. Despite his fury, he was weakened from the electric shock of the bolts that had hit him. The ringing in his head was bothering him, too. He saw Luz and the rest of the group walking downstairs.
His eyes met Luz's, who was watching him with a dark expression, her eyes smoldering with anger.
"We had a deal!" he spat out, his rage mounting. "We made an eternal oath!"
"The oath never said anything about not keeping you imprisoned," Amity clarified.
"And the oath was a lie!" Luz yelled back at Belos with a satisfaction, especially when she saw Philip stopped fighting against his restraints and stared at Luz, in shock. "It was all an illusion, and you fell for it."
She… tricked him… again?!
And he fell for her deception, again?!
"Luz!" Amity was in disbelief her girlfriend would reveal their trick like that.
"It's okay. Hunter said we have what we need from him," she said, her words measured, cold. "He gave us the instructions and the list. All we need is the Titan's blood. We don't need him anymore."
Philip glared daggers at Luz.
"You… insolent… brat," he seethed before the curse started to act up again with him as he felt anger boil in his soul. His glare shifted to Hunter. "You are just like the rest of those worthless backstabbing clones! I should have gotten rid of you ages ago!"
"Since he can't really die, I guess we shouldn't worry about cutting off his breathing," Luz said to the group.
Everyone was taken aback at Luz's words.
"You mean… we should just…" Gus hesitantly asked before turning to Hunter who firmly had his eyes set up at Philip, his eyes shaking slightly.
"Yeah, do it," Hunter said, trying his best to maintain a strong front. Even though his heart was clenching.
Amity felt a twinge of unease. The sword sticking out of someone's body and the burns on some of the trees were flashing in her mind like alarms, warning her that something didn't seem right. Humans, from what she had seen out in public and from 'realistic' movies, didn't carry swords, and where did the burn marks come from? The gruesome scene that had greeted them when they arrived in the forest was still fresh in her mind, and now, as she watched Philip trash around in his restraints, she couldn't help but wonder if they were making a mistake.
"Wait, hold up, maybe let's think things through first," Gus stepped in, breaking the tense silence that had fallen over the group. Amity mentally agreed with him. They need to make sure they had all the facts before they did anything rash, even though Philip was their enemy.
But the vicious blue glow from Philip's eyes made Amity's fear flare up and get to work alongside Willow. Amity had the purple goop pull away from the walls and travel along the roots before it began to spread over Philip's form.
Philip felt the purple substance covering him and slowly hardening before more layers were added to one another. Panic gripped Philip as he realized what the kids were planning to do with him. His eyes shot up at Hunter with desperation.
"You can't do this!" he shouted, mixed with rage and desperation, still trying to use the curse to burst out of there, but it was futile. His body was too exhausted to handle the curse. The throbbing pain in his head grew worse.
Hunter maintained a cold, steady gaze at Philip, saying nothing to him. Willow also started to feel a pang of sympathy for the trapped man, but she believed that what they were doing was for the best of all of them.
Philip was losing mobility now in his body as each second passed. Terror now grasped Philip as his heart raced terribly against his chest at the fact he was basically being buried alive.
"I didn't want to kill them," he now stumbled on his words, his eyes darting to each of Luz's friends before landing on Hunter. "I tried stopping them, but they wouldn't listen to me. They thought I was some monster!"
"Hmm, that sounds familiar…" Luz mumbled to him. "Just like you wouldn't listen to the innocent people who you killed after you accused them of being witches," Luz said lowly, making Philip glare back at her.
"They were witches!" Philip snapped back.
"No, they weren't. They were human," Luz retorted. "Cause if they were actually witches, Belos, they would have never let terrible humans like you guys kill them. They would have fought back with their magic!"
For a moment, everything seemed to halt for Philip, his eyes slowly widened as Luz's words slammed into him, hard.
The memories he had buried deep within him started resurfacing, the memories of the innocent people pleading for mercy before they were hanged or burned alive. Doubts he had long forgotten started clawing their way back into his mind.
Now, the question that he never once thought of was echoing in his head. If those people were witches, why didn't they use their magic to fight back or escape?
No… there was no way…
But…
The minister had said…
The only other human he had killed was his brother. There was no way he had killed other humans before that.
But…
Philip hoped the dark voice would say something to argue back to Luz's statement, but it remained silent, leaving him alone with his dread and panic that he was having as the belief he had killed innocent humans was crashing into him.
"And even if they were witches, killing them was wrong," Luz stated coldly. "You're nothing but a monster, Belos."
Hunter looked away this time, unable to witness the scene unfolding before him.
The purple goo and the roots pressed against Philip's chest now, making it hard for him to breathe. It felt like a boulder was crushing him.
No… no, no, no, he couldn't let this happen.
"Hunter, you have to listen to me," Philip pleaded, desperation clear in his voice to the boy.
'Philip, you have to listen to me."
Philip ignored the memory of his brother begging to him to hear him out many decades ago as he felt himself almost hyperventilate. He knew if he lost consciousness, he would stay like that forever, unless they decide to release him, which he doubted they would do. They would leave him in this basement, imprisoned, forever.
Hunter's hands turned into shaky fists, as he told himself he was making the right decision. Even though his chest was twisting and turning painfully, even though his eyes stung with hot tears, even though he knew how cruel it was to do what they were doing to Belos, they had to do it. They were going to seal him up somehow anyway in the Boiling Isles once they arrived back, so why not keep him locked up for now?
Since Hunter was not meeting his eyes, Philip desperately glanced at Gus, who was staring at the scene with wide eyes. "They attacked me out of nowhere and used magic on me! I didn't want to kill those humans. I lost control!" he said, hoping the youngest member of the group would help him like he had been doing in the past days.
Gus noticed the horns on Philip's head were shrinking, and the green curse was fading away. He furrowed his eyebrows, unsure why the curse vanishing.
"Look at my memories!" Philip now let out to Gus. "You'll see they attacked first!"
"Don't do it, Gus," Luz said to the boy, as she knew there was a potential risk of Gus triggering Philip's curse even more.
But Philip was beyond desperate. "Please, just look at my memories!" he pleaded before roots wrapped around Philip's neck. "I didn't want to kill them!" The purple ooze was now encasing over his mouth before a blue flash hit his mind making Philip imagine he was small again, with massive hands around his tiny neck, cutting off the air from him.
Oh, how he wanted to scream for his brother, oh how he wanted desperately for the pain and the terror to stop, as his tiny hands clawed at the man's hands and wrists.
Dark spots clouded his sight, but he could still see the silhouette of his brother running downstairs with something long and heavy.
Philip needed him.
He needed his brother.
He needed-
Suddenly, the memory shifted to others in a quick flash before it played how he tried to stop the humans from attacking him, how they deemed him a monster before struck him. They beat him down, cut off his arm, electrocuted him before he just let the curse take over out of desperation to save himself. Then the memory stopped abruptly.
"He's telling the truth! He's telling the truth! Let him go now!" Gus yelled at everyone fast once his eyes stopped glowing blue. He ran past everyone and dashed over to where the purple ooze was pulling away from Philip's head and neck.
Philip found himself coughing and gasping to get air into his lungs, his vision was black spotted. The purple substance and the roots pulled away from his chest, helping him take in air better, but the ringing in his head was worse and he tried to make sense of things, especially after he had relived countless memories in an instant.
The restraints around Philip pulled away, allowing him to collapse on the ground. He rolled to his side, wheezing as his left hand clutched his chest.
"You're going to be okay," Gus comforted Philip as he kneeled next to him, his hands hesitantly hovering over the shaking form of the man. "Just breathe," he said softly.
Philip didn't realize Luz was arguing with the group as he struggled to breathe.
"Luz, no one can trick Gus when he looks into their memories," Willow said to Luz, who was trying to convince them that Belos was tricking them somehow.
"But he's still dangerous," Luz argued. "Even if the other humans attacked him, he didn't have to kill them."
"What if he didn't have a choice?" Amity hesitantly asked. "I saw some things at the scene that didn't make sense to me," she said. "I saw a sword, and some trees had burn marks, as if someone used fireballs at them."
"But, humans can't use magic…" Vee said silently.
"Well, either way, he now knows the oath was a lie," Luz said stubbornly. "He has no reason to hold back from hurting us now, so we have to lock him up now."
"We're not locking him up cause you messed up and told him about the oath," Hunter said quietly, making Luz look at him with confusion. He was avoiding eye contact with her, as guilt was hitting him like a ton of bricks as he saw Philip struggling to sit up with the only arm he had as the right one was completely cut off from underneath the elbow.
Hunter had messed up big time. He was too busy focusing how Philip killed humans back at the forest that he didn't bother to notice what Amity had seen. He hadn't noticed how badly injured Belos was. He didn't take one moment to see someone was out after the man.
Hunter wanted to run over to Philip, beg for forgiveness, but instead he clenched his teeth hard, angry at the people who had attacked Belos and at himself for rushing to pass judgement, and ran upstairs.
"Hunter, wait!" Willow called before she ran after the boy.
"Wait, Willow!" Luz yelled after her too. "We can't let him-" she was cut off by her mom grabbing her by the shoulder and gently squeezed it, making Luz look up at her with confusion.
"Mija, go back to the house," Camila said her before she pulled away to approach where Gus was.
"Wait, mama," Luz grabbed her by the back of her sweater. "Por favor, don't believe his lies!"
"Mija, remember, I told you have to trust me more," Camila reminded her. "I don't think he's really a danger to us right now. If there were people who sought him out and attacked him for being a monster, then that means there are people out there after him. He's going to need our help, so he knows it's in his best interest to play nice with us for now. Vee, could you take Luz back to the house, please?" she asked her second daughter who gave her a nod.
"Pero, mama."
"I'll be here in case," Amity assured Luz. She could see her girlfriend was not handling the situation well right now.
Luz pressed her lips into a thin line and at first struggled from Vee pulling her upstairs with her. She turned to where Philip was, finally sitting up, his left hand clutching the end of the right one that was cut off halfway, green substance oozed out of it as if it was blood. Philip's shoulders shook as she could hear him roughly breathing while he stared down at the ground, looking greyish and sickly.
She had just realized the curse had almost hidden away from him completely, which made him look so vulnerable. Luz felt something in her chest tighten at the sight of him, a feeling she didn't want to have associated with him, but she shoved it away as she turned to walk upstairs with Vee.
Camila sighed in relief that her daughter left the scene and both she and Amity went over to Philip.
"He's having trouble breathing," Gus said to Camila with worry.
Camila got down to her knees and reached out to him, but quickly Philip flinched away from her, as if he expected her to strike him again.
She pulled back, feeling bad that she frightened him, at the moment.
"Don't... touch me…" he struggled to say as he growled after he gathered his bearings.
Camila sighed, slightly in relief to see he was his usual self instead of the traumatic mess, as she didn't want to feel so conflicted with her opinions for him right now. She was terrified of him, especially with the blood stains hanging on his shirt. She felt safe though with Amity standing right beside them, some of the purple ooze lingering around her arms in case she had to defend them from Philip.
Though, she was wondering why the curse was now barely showing on his body…
"Can you stand?" Camila asked Philip who took a deep shaky breath before he tried pushing himself up with his good arm before he collapsed back to his knees. He grabbed his head, face pinching in pure agony.
"Some armored guy punched him a couple of times," Gus mumbled to Camila.
"He may have a concussion then," she said, and expected the man's pain was going to be worse after the stress and panic he had just gone through. She saw through his wet locks he had some bruising and swelling making its way on his human skin, making her heart twist. "Come on, let's get you out of here," she said to Philip gently, and this time, he let her pull him up by her throwing an arm around his waist and his left arm over her shoulders.
Rain poured down on Hunter's face as he flew through the forest with Willow following him. Hunter was determined to go back to the scene they had found Belos in and get as much information they could get on whoever had attacked him, to make up for screwing things up.
"Hunter, wait," Willow called out as she continued to fly after him, trying to keep up with his speed.
Hunter came to a sudden stop, his eyes closed as he shook his head in disbelief. "Why do I keep messing up?" Hunter asked with frustration and sadness, tears now streamed down his cheeks, mixed with the rain.
"Hunter, we all make mistakes," Willow quietly, trying to comfort him as she hovered near him and gently squeezed his left arm. "We all assumed he killed those humans for no reason."
Hunter took a deep breath and wiped away his tears even though it didn't do much. "But I was trained to be a soldier, a great one at that, and I just let my emotions get in the way instead of analyzing things."
"Hunter, for one, you're still a teenager," Willow said. "We teens are still growing so we're going to end up making a lot of mistakes either way, but in general, everyone, even adults, make mistakes. Like heck, look at Belos, even now he's making so many and he's super old."
"But I should be better," Hunter mumbled quietly, he gently pulled away from Willow's grasp.
"Where are you going?" Willow decided to ask instead.
"I need to see who these humans were and why they decided to go after Belos," he said. "From how badly injured he was, they are dangerous, and they may be bad news for us too. Because no human, at least from what Luz had told us in the past, is able to do actual magic here," he said before he continued to fly. Willow followed him closely.
Hunter frowned as he was looking around, expecting to have come across the bodies again, but they were nowhere to be seen.
"Did we…. somehow missed them?" Willow called out to him.
Hunter turned around and lowered himself to the ground, scanning the area as he flew between the trees. Finally, he spotted a scorched mark on one of the trees. He stopped flying and stepped off his staff. He kneeled to the ground and studied it, finding evidence of the fight.
"It was here," Hunter said to Willow when she landed next to him. "The bodies should have been here."
"But they're all gone…" Willow said quietly, completely confused how each of the brutalized body was removed from the scene.
"There is no sight of Belo's arm either…" Hunter said as he was walked, scanning the area. "I think… we weren't alone when we found Belos…" he said to Willow as she stared at him before both jumped, their backs against one another s they glanced around while they were on defensive positions.
They heard nothing but rain fall and saw nothing but darkness between the trees.
Suddenly, Hunter grabbed her arm and zipped them away from the area a bit, as they realized whoever attacked Belos wasn't done yet.
Philip sat in the bathroom, his body was completely dried after Camila asked Amity if she could dry him off with her magic, which she did, but he was still coated with dirt and dry blood. His long hair was a matted mess.
Camila turned off the faucets once she was finished filling the tub with warm water.
She went over to him. He hadn't said a word since they left the old house.
His eyes were somewhat glazed over, spacing out.
She couldn't blame him being so out of it. He had been attacked by humans that somehow used magic on him, well… supposedly, and then later Philip had almost been 'buried' alive, so it was most likely Philip was shaken up of the whole ordeal.
She hoped helping him wash up and let him get some rest would help him, even though bathing him wasn't something she was looking forward to doing, but it was the least she could do after what the kids had put him through.
Yeah, just because he had done terrible things to the kids, didn't give them the right to do anything terrible back. Two wrongs didn't make a right, after all.
"Come on, let's get you in," she said as she was pulling his boots off. Philip didn't respond till she tried to undo one of his buttons from his shirt, which made Philip stiffen and pull away from her, his left-hand clutching to it. Even though he looked like a tired kicked puppy, he managed to give her a mix look of bewilderment and hostility.
"What… are you doing?" he let out with a slurred voice.
"I'm helping you wash up. You're not in the state to do it by yourself and I'm for sure not leaving you alone while you have a concussion."
Philip's eyebrows furrowed with confusion and from frustration when he asked, "What's… a concussion…?"
"It's a type of traumatic injury to the brain," Camila explained to him patiently. "And you're showing signs that you're suffering from one, especially by how you kept losing your balance on the way back here."
Philip slowly took in her explanation, the ringing still pounding in his head.
"I'm…assuming the… ringing in my… head is also… a symptom…?" he took his time to get each word out as coherent as he could, even though he just felt exhausted.
"I'm afraid so," Camila said, and kind of feeling bad for the man as she doubted he would take any medicine she offered. She wondered if anything would help him since his body was just on a different level to the rest of them. Yet… maybe he wasn't so different by the fact he was suffering from a head injury like any other human being would if their head connected to the ground after getting punched to the face with metallic fists. "Now, come on, let me just undo this," she said as pried off his hand gently so she could unbutton his shirt for him. If Philip's head wasn't pounding on him or if he didn't feel utterly exhausted, he would never have let anyone undress him. The only other person who had seen him naked was his brother when they were kids, when Philip used to bathe him as a child. She pulled him up to his feet, and he had to hold on to her shoulder as the world seemed to spin on him. "You're alright," she assured him, holding on to his waist, to keep him grounded.
"I can… wash myself," he said stubbornly, his eyes were closed, and his breathing had become slightly rough from moving.
"No, you can't," Camila argued, patiently, pulling his shirt off, which made him shy away from her. She tried not to look at him as she could tell he looked very uncomfortable showing too much skin.
He was grateful she didn't make him take off his trousers before he was helped sit in the tub full of warm water. He was avoiding eye contact with her, especially when he noticed she had a shock look to her eyes.
Camila didn't say anything. His body was lean, with well-defined muscles, but she couldn't help but stare at what looked like a canvas of scars with some of the green curse hugging his body. Some scars were thin and white, barely visible against his pale skin, while others were deep and pronounced. The ones on his back were the ones that caught her attention, a web of crisscrossing lines, the green curse laying there. She couldn't help but imagine they had come from a brutal whipping, which made her feel sick at whoever had done such a thing to Philip, unless she guessed it was probably from a well-deserved punishment like for killing someone, but something told her that wasn't the case, which made her stomach drop. Majority of the scars looked old, the skin around them puckered and discolored with age.
She continued to study the scars and her gaze drifted down to his arms, especially the left one since the right was half gone. There were a series of symbols etched into his skin, as if they were carved into his flesh with a knife. She couldn't help but pull his left arm to look at it closer before she realized the symbols weren't just any random symbols, but where the glyphs her daughter had been teaching in the past months.
Philip did his best to pull away his arm, pressing it against his chest as if to hide it from her like an injured dog; to hide one of the biggest mistakes he had done in his life.
The bathroom fell silent, while Camila held herself back from asking him why he had the glyphs carved onto his skin? Did he do it to himself? If he did, then why would he do something so… horrifically dangerous?
Even if she still didn't know everything about the glyphs, just the thought of carving them permanently into one's skin was something she wouldn't have dared to do.
And by the way Philip was holding his arm from her sight, she could tell he didn't seem so proud of having them on his arms either now.
She also couldn't help but feel her stomach drop at what had made him so desperate to had taken a knife to his own flesh, carving himself up almost as if he was a Halloween pumpkin instead of just using ink. Now, that she thought about it, she looked to his ears, and yes… she had been wondering for a while how he had pointy ears as like a witch if he was human, but when she got a closer look, she saw the ends of each ear were tapered to a sharp point, evidence he had probably sliced them off himself.
Camila slightly pulled away from him, kind of uneasy that he had cut himself up, confirming her opinion more than ever the man was very disturbed.
'Come on, Camila, pull yourself together,' she told herself when she noticed how tensed Philip's back was to her. She wanted to apologize to him for staring, and for making him feel so uncomfortable, but… she was afraid to make him feel worse by making him know she was judging his self-mutilation. He had already gone through too much that day.
She grabbed a bowl that she had placed by the side of the tub and scoop up some water before pouring it over Philip's head.
Philip's muscles continued to be tense, especially as he felt so exposed. He hadn't been bathed by anyone but his brother and that was when he was little. He tried to focus on the ringing in his head, as he pressed his forehead against his knees, though, he slowly began to relax as Camila, carefully, scrubbed shampoo over his head. The warm water and her soothing touch felt like a balm to his weary body, and he couldn't help, but close his eyes, remembering when his brother would leather the shampoo on his head gently, before he had grown and told Caleb he was old enough to wash himself alone and did so for the first time when he was six.
He recalled Caleb smiling at him proudly before he said, 'Look at you, so grown up.'
Now Philip had wished he wasn't in such a rush, when he was a child, to grow up…
Philip felt a wave of emotions wash over him, as Camila poured warm water over his head, to wash away the shampoo. The warmness brought a sense of nostalgia, comforting him, helping him for a moment soothe away the dread he was still feeling from getting trapped underneath Willow's roots and Amity's purple ooze.
Philip curled up a bit as he couldn't help but do his best to keep the tears from escaping, as his desire to be back in his young years was crashing down on him, but… he was just so… tired… to hold it together.
So… so… tired…
'You're so pathetic…'
One tear finally trailed down his cheeks, and he quickly wiped it away with his arm with frustration, which didn't go unnoticed by Camila.
Despite all the terrible things he had done to her daughter and to others, she couldn't help but feel a sense of empathy for him. Camila looked away, stopping from washing him as she wasn't sure what to do now.
To tell the truth, she felt she was betraying her daughter by being kind to the man, she felt he didn't deserve anyone helping him, especially since he was so stubborn to realize how wrong he was about so much, but as she saw the quiver in Philip's shoulders, she couldn't help but feel a sense of sadness.
She wasn't sure what exactly was making him want to cry, but she guessed he wasn't handling events in the past days so well and she could see he was trying to bottle up his emotions, just like she had seen him do a lot.
Yes, she had realized that was what he did. He would just shove down his emotions and act as if he didn't have some sort of panic attack or traumatic episode.
She asked herself, if he held back from feeling since he was a child, since he did come from an era that possibly didn't let boys think it was okay to be vulnerable. And thinking that he had done it for the past 400 years, and continued to do so, made her believe he probably felt so alone and suffocated, as he possibly felt there was no one he could turn to.
Camila wanted to let Philip know it was okay to let the tears out and show emotions, but she had a strong hunch he would just lash out at her for even suggesting such a thing.
Learned behaviors wasn't something someone could just change in a blink of an eye. Especially if the habit was… done for centuries.
She noticed his body had stopped shaking, and he was just sitting there, head against his knees. She guessed he had, somehow, with how terrible his head was feeling, was able to go back to feeling nothing like aways.
Camila sighed, not okay with him cutting off his feelings like that, but she just didn't know what to so or do except scrub his back.
Philip had tensed up again when he felt her hands on him. Eventually, he took whatever she was using to scrub his back and used it on his front and his right limb. Camila noticed the green oozing had stopped and looked like his right arm grew two inches past his elbow now.
Camila persuaded him to let her wash his left arm for him, even though he was reluctant to let her do so at first but was too tired to argue with her.
He hoped he was done soon so he could just sleep and hopefully get rid of the incessant sound buzzing in his head.
Jacob stared in complete shock at the video of the old man with horns on one of the monitors from countless others on a wall. Jacob kept rewinding the video, playing it again and again as he held on to the headphones against his ears tighter to hear, "My name is Philip Wittebane."
"Impossible," Jacob muttered, rewinding it again. "How is he still alive?"
"I'm not your enemy. I'm human," the old man's voice echoed in Jacob's ears. "My name is Philip Wittebane."
Jacob's cousin, Jason, sat next to him, staring at the monitors with confusion. They were surrounded by other agents, all replaying scenes and analyzing data they had gathered from scanning Philip when he fought the men they had sent out to fight him.
"Listen to me," the old man's voice said again in Jacob's headphones. "I'm not what you think I am. I'm not a monster. I'm also a witch hunter."
Jacob's head spun with realization. "That's why he looked so familiar," he said to himself, pulling the blonde woman's attention from another monitor.
"What are you talking about?" Jason asked, completely lost.
"Jason, you really don't know your history," Jacob scoffed at his cousin. "Philip Wittebane was a famous witch hunter from Old Gravesfield. He was the younger brother that ran off looking for his older brother who got taken by a witch. Both never were seen again."
"Till now," the woman said with amusement, glancing at the monitor Jacob was looking at before. "Interesting," she said. Jason could sense something dark beneath her words.
"Was he a demon this whole time?" Jacob asked out loud in wonder.
"Or he turned into one and somehow was able to live for centuries," the woman said, her tone calm and collected. "I mean, he does show similarities to certain monsters my people have come across in the past."
"Oh?" Jacob looked at her right away. "Like in the pictures you showed me, a wendigo," he said, remembering the images she had shown him before.
"Yeah, and we have tried capturing them, but unfortunately we had ended up killing them instead," she sighed with disappointment, making Jason confused. Wouldn't they rather kill monsters? Why would she want to capture one and keep it alive instead…?
Jacob scoffed. "Pshh, are you sure they killed them? Cause your men got totally wrecked there," he waved at the other monitors showing how Philip was killing the four agents.
"Oh, please Jacob, don't be silly. They were sent for something else," the woman chuckled.
"What?" Jacob blinked with confusion.
The woman grabbed her phone and showed him a picture of Philip's right arm, the one that was slashed off him now stored in some sort of metal container.
"We want to make sure we know exactly what we're dealing with," she said now with dark amusement.
Jason was shocked at the details. "You guys… sent your men on a suicide mission?"
"It's alright, they weren't our best anyway," she dismissed Jason's disbelief aside as it was a mere fly. "They did their job."
"I… don't get it," Jacob said, his confusion growing. "Didn't you say you wanted to capture him? He didn't look so strong to me, so didn't you guys go all out right away?"
"This demon was holding back," the woman began to explain with patience. "And holding him without killing them is tricky, so I just want to make sure I know what makes him tick. Because he's made from magic, but… it seems from our readings it's not like ordinary magic. It seems… darker…" she said as she looked back at the monitor displaying the scans that they had gathered from Philip's arm. "Oh, I'll have you soon, my witch hunter," she whispered to herself with a chilling tone that sent a shiver down Jason's spine.
The rest of the story is in archive of our own under the name Nisroc Chico : ), incase anyone wants to read the rest. I will be posting up the rest of the story, but in a timely manner for peeps who don't have access to archive of our own.
You guys can leave a review/comment here if you guys can't in archive of our own : o, otherwise, i prefer archive of our own so i can respond to them :) and there is more engagement there with others too plus fanarts for you guys to enjoy : )
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