Priest and his Anarchist

Chapter 11

Chapter Eleven

luna

he loved to watch me rot.

B etween overgrown vines and aged structures, I love the streets of Northern Spain at night. Daylight bores me. It’s easy to notice beauty with the aid of the sun. It’s what comes out when you have nothing but the guidance of the moon that excites me.

Steam from my hot chocolate warms my nose as my heels clink across the cobblestone pathway. Laughter sings through the air from a group of young girls ahead. Careless and happy. Freedom looks like that. Like happiness with friends after a night out drinking. I wonder what their story is and why they’re here. Snuggled between foliage of pastures lies the valleys of L’embruix, a town known for its antiquity and ancient architecture. It’s a town that isn’t visited often, simply an uncut diamond among polished gems. Most people prefer the salty coastline of Amalfi or a setting sunset in Venice.

Gasoline and buttered popcorn perfume the street when I turn the corner, and I pause when the sound of two-stroke engines ring through the night. Pointed peaks of lilac and gray stretch to the sky with the words Midnight Mayhem written over the flowing drapes of the entrance.

The pathway is warm and playful, thanks to the radiance of fairy lights. Things have changed too much over the years with Midnight Mayhem. What was once a single family of Kiznitch, where all four Brothers traveled on the road together to perform at the famous stroke of midnight, has collapsed, leaving everyone performing in different parts of the world. I personally haven’t been back to this one in some time.

Someone pulls back the fabric before I reach the entrance, and a tall figure wearing only dark jeans and boots stands before me. I’d recognize him if I hadn’t seen him since, well, since I was young enough to hold my mother’s hand and walk right into the Devil’s hutch.

The painted outline of polished bone and streaks of crimson crack when he smiles. Good to know they’re keeping the clown skull.

“Luna Nox?”

My smile widens. “Hey, Corbin.”

Heavy boots crush the scatter of pebbles before his arm is around my waist, lifting me from the ground. “You got big!”

He places me on my feet, stepping back but keeping both hands on either side of my arms. Catching a loose strand of my hair, he tucks it behind my ear. “I’m gonna kiss you, baby girl…” His thumb grazes my bottom lip as he lowers his forehead against mine. “God. I thought you would never come back to us. Your parents, they stopped talking about you and wouldn’t answer me anytime I’d ask.”

I wanted to tell him that we were twelve years old and that he was my best friend. That the pact we made the night before I left means nothing. We were two confused children who needed the comfort of one another.

His tongue slides between my lips, causing me to stiffen. I can do this for him. He doesn’t know what happened. He’s been worried. The least I can do is give him this.

The wind whisks between our lips when he releases, tracing circles against my cheek. “I probably shouldn’t have done that.”

“Corbin Ducaelin.” The smile on my face doesn’t match the hole in my heart. “Did you miss me?”

His laughter is infectious as his hand slips into mine. “Come. So much has changed.”

Sweat and spilled champagne still lingers through the air from the previous show as he gestures to the three rings on the opposite side of the stage. “You always loved the bikes. Maybe now that you’ve been away, I can finally out-ride you.”

It’s been no secret that my existence within Midnight Mayhem has always been a mystery to those looking in. Most of them hated me. They saw me as a diva with the luxury of choosing whatever path she wanted, but Corbin didn’t. He was the only one who stuck by me, and since he was the ringleader and son of one of the Brothers of Kiznitch, no one voiced what they really thought about me. They hid their snarls behind his back, which meant he never saw it.

“Hey!” I don’t realize he is back in front of me until I feel his hand on my cheek. “What’s the matter? What did they do to you?”

A lump forms in my throat. “I have to leave.”

“What?” He steps back a little. “You just got back. Surely they’ll let you do whatever you want now?” Growing up, Corbin assumed that because I had no hand in Midnight Mayhem, it was because of the EKC. Since we were children, it was never an issue, but now that we’re older and I recognize the hate in his tone, I recoil away from his touch.

He sighs, burying his hand in his hair. I should feel guilty since he’d clearly missed me more than I did him, but his words left a bitter taste in my mouth. “Lune, this is your life. The other half of your life is equally as important.”

“It’s barely a quarter of my life.” I trace the tire marks on the stage.

“So why are you here? Why’d you come back?”

My eyes snap to his. “Did you forget that I was raised here? That my parents live here? I didn’t come back for you, Corbin.”

His scowl falls along with his shoulders. “Sorry. You’re right.” Leather boots meet the tip of my pointed heels when he draws back in. “I don’t want to fight. God, Luna. I haven’t seen you since they took you!”

“They didn’t take me.” Patience is a trait I’ve not quite mastered, and he’s doing a good job at training it. “My mother didn’t give me away any more than my father doesn’t love me. I may have been a child, Corbin, but it was a requirement and an honor to be able to explore that side of my life.”

“And how much of it is your life if Midnight Mayhem is barely a quarter?” The separation between us alleviates the tension in my muscles.

I blink. “All of it.”

He pauses as a range of emotions fly over his face. From anger to sadness, the corners of his eyes finally soften and defeat wins out. “You’ll always have a home here.”

“L’embruix is my home!” I grind my teeth to stop snapping at him, reaching into my pocket to answer my vibrating phone. We both know this isn’t entirely true. It is a place I lived in for the first twelve years of my life, nothing more.

Tell me, Madness, is he as good as me?

My skin prickles as fear rolls down my spine. He knows I’ll be at the ritual. He didn’t need to fly here to remind me to be back there tomorrow. He texts again.

Lie to me.

“What’s wrong?” Corbin’s face fills my vision.

My response is quick.

I can’t remember. I was too busy trying not to die.

Seconds pass before Corbin’s hand lands on my hip, distracting me. The air in my lungs vanishes when heat spiders up the side of my neck.

He’s here somewhere.

Corbin’s touch has me drawing away from him. “I shouldn’t have come here.”

He observes every inch of me that he can see before grabbing me by the back of my neck and needling his fingers through my hair. “You can run.”

There’s no use trying to bathe his ego with a forged smile. The muscles in my face harden with each passing minute. “I don’t want to.”

His optimism falls into one of resentment, and for a moment, the memories of us when we were children surface. “Fine. You do whatever you want to do, Luna.”

He finally steps back, and the weight of his vacated presence allows the air to flow back into my lungs. He disappears through the back curtains, and I momentarily stare at the flowing velvet, processing my thoughts. Corbin always ran away. He never faced anything that met him head-on, which isn’t what holds me back.

It’s the rapid beat of my heart that’s causing my blood to rush straight to my head.

Shifting my weight an inch, I’m lazy with my movements as I tilt my head over my shoulder. Relaxing in the shadows of the darkest area in the room, the ambiguous light does nothing to hide his sculpted features. A face I tried many times to forget.

“Two times in one week.” Feeling exposed, anxiety twists my stomach into knots. “I’m starting to feel special.”

He stands to his full height, strangling all oxygen in my lungs. Being well over six feet, his movements are passive and calculated. Like a well-fed wolf, he’s patient when playing with his prey. Dark jeans, black designer combat boots, and a relaxed hoodie. So…expected. I don’t know what’s worse. Him answering with his gravelly yet distant tone, or him not answering at all.

Boots hit mine and unlike with Corbin, I have to bend my head to look up at him. “You don’t remember?”

Confusion has my mouth falling open to ask when the text message comes back to me about our last time together.

His finger slips beneath my chin. How can a simple touch shift the ground under my feet.

Directing my focus up to him, I do the worst thing I could. Stare into his eyes. When he visited the other night, I made sure not to get too close, look too long, or surround myself around him any longer than needed because I knew.

Every time I lose myself in his gaze, I fall so deep that I can’t find the courage to get back up. The power he holds is unforgiving.

Obscure lighting accentuates the green and gold speckles buried deep in his glare. The pinching of my scalp when he tugs me back by my hair snaps me back to the now. “Is that a lie, Madness?”

“Maybe,” I whisper, maiming my traitor body before it gets me in trouble. “Guess you’ll never know.”

The laughter from his chest dies out, but his grip tightens. “So delicate. So…breakable.”

“So…” I attempt to shove myself out of his touch. “Mad.” He doesn’t let up, now with his other hand on my jaw.

His eyes weaken, falling to my lips. “Wouldn’t have my attention if you weren’t…” The metal against my thigh burns as a reminder of what I’m capable of, but I let him touch me because no matter what I try to say, how hard I hate him, history doesn’t care. History doesn’t care how much you hate someone because it likes to remind you of the time you loved them.

“You kissed him.” His words shock me.

“I did…” My eyebrow twitches. I’d fall apart if he applied pressure. He can never see my weaknesses.

My scalp aches when he surrenders my hair, treading backward to create distance. “See you at the ritual.”

“Priest Hayes?” After watching Priest disappear through the entrance, Corbin’s voice kills my racing thoughts.

I look over my shoulder, catching him rolling his bike farther into the tent. “I should have known, yet I kind of thought it wasn’t going to be true.”

Refusing to acknowledge a single thing he said, I shrug. “I don’t know what it is you mean.”

His bike stops beside me, and I reach forward to touch the handlebars, feeling the rubber beneath the palm of my hand. So many unspoken words. Once upon a time, Corbin and I were inseparable. Now I crave separation.

“You should have fought for this life, Luna. Now you’re stuck there, with no one around you that you can trust.” The pity in his tone is the last straw, and my eyes snap up to his.

“How do you know who I trust?”

His eyes narrow, and the vein in his forehead pulses. “You trust him?”

“Corbin?” a girl calls out from behind me. It’s the beautiful girl from earlier who was laughing with her friends. Ah. No surprise there.

“I should let you go.” Thankfully, he doesn’t stop me as I hurry toward the exit, careful to smile at the girl in passing. I don’t want her to think Corbin and I are anything serious.

“Luna?” I stop, sucking in the brush of wind from outside. “You’ve always had control, Luna. Find the anchor again.”

I push through the doors without an answer, desperate to get away. I’ll never come back here again—big mistake this was. Our lives are so different now. Corbin was supposed to be the person I ended up with.

It’s easy to picture how my life would have turned out had I taken a different path.

It bores me.

I wish I paid closer attention to Dad when he tried to tell me about the Elite King's curse that ran through their blood. All I remember is that it would start from the ritual. I guess love wasn’t an emotion that the Kings were to feel, especially after creating so much chaos when they formed the club. Not a big fan of the witchy-woo-woo stuff, but maybe it’s true. Perhaps it was an old Hayes witch who did it and she sniffed me out the second I walked in here, hexing me too for constantly agitating her great-great-great-something grandson.

The air becomes thick around me. How are we expected to sit here for—however long it will take—without a decent amount of oxygen. I need a distraction. Moss grows on ageless concrete walls that smell of death, and although buried beneath Riverside cemetery, the space is large enough for a stadium of people—and the lost souls they left behind.

“There has to be hundreds of people here tonight.”

Dad catches my hand from beside him, placing a kiss on the back of my palm. “Five hundred to be exact, Baby Night.”

My mouth falls open. “Five hundred?”

Father’s eyes find mine when he leans in front of Dad. “Don’t. Act nonchalant. They want you to be impressed. Pull your shit together.”

Rolling my eyes, Mom wraps her arm around me and pulls me into her chest.

“Have you seen any of them since leaving?”

Her question fades into white noise as I follow the detailed carvings of images that mark the concrete floor. I’m sure each one means something important, but it's all riddles and tricks like everything else in the Elite Kings world.

“No.” I rest my head on Mom’s shoulder.

She doesn’t need to know about Priest. Since arriving home, she’s managed to keep her pestering at a minimum when questioning my time away. She knows nothing of what I went through, or what happened, and I’ll keep it that way until I’m allowed to do otherwise.

My phone vibrates in my pocket, and I fish it out as we all take our seats. Bishop Hayes, a.k.a. the God of the Elite Kings, starts speaking in Latin tongue to begin the ritual. I’ve lost interest.

You could have been up here with them you know.

Nate stares at me from his chair on stage, his phone in his grasp and a half grin spread over his face.

My reply is instant.

No thank you.

I push my phone away and relax in my seat as the ritual goes on. Minutes become an hour, and I can’t stop the yawn that escapes when people start shuffling near the front, which is only a few rows in front of us. Thankfully, we’re arched upward, so I don’t have to move a lot to see.

I lean into Dad. “What’s happening?”

“You learned about the curse…”

All night, I’ve made it my mission to not look anywhere near his general direction. I’ve seen him twice too many since being back, and it’s been two times too often. After he left me to die that night, I vowed in my most vulnerable moment that I’d never allow his evil to come near me again.

Dad continues, and I rack my brain to remember what we were talking about. The curse. The Kings lying asleep on the ground. Right. “Well, the last one to wake is usually the one who is infected. We don’t know what they see or what they’re told, but all we know is when they do wake, little by little they’ll become something much worse than what they currently are. It eats away at their soul like rot. This skipped our generation, because we weren’t in Riverside, but?—”

“Why?” I turn to Dad, tracing the lines of wrinkles around his eyes. Although age has been good to him, I’ve seen how much older he is now that I’m home. How much older they all are. My stomach twists into knots if I think about it too much, the guilt almost unbearable. I spent so many years away from them.

“I can’t imagine any of them being worse than they are now.” My eyes roll on their way back to the stage, where Halen is stirring awake.

Dad snickers. “Touché.”

Fog forms around us, obscuring my vision and filling the earthy scent with jasmine and something spicy. It distracts me a moment because my eyes land on him.

Shit.

Hidden in the shadows of a dark cloak, his broad shoulders separate him from the others. Either Vaden or War are on either side, one of them is slightly shorter than the other, and I’m guessing that’s War, since he was always a little off the mark in height.

Long fingers curl around the edge of the hood as he slowly lowers it to the back of his neck. We’re not seated far, so it’s easy to make out the finer details.

He tilts his head sideways, as if hearing someone talk, and the tiny hairs on my neck swell. Panic clenches its fist around my airways, but before it takes hold, I notice the faint tattoo on the surface of his neck. It’s so delicate that I can’t distinguish what it is.

Stalked by the persistent thud in my head, my legs turn to jelly. Great. I’m about to drop. No doubt people will notice.

An arm catches my fall. “You’re okay.” Mom smiles, twisting the strands of my hair around her finger before tucking them behind my ears. “If you’re obvious with how much he affects you, all that time was for nothing.”

My breath hikes. I’d never spoken with Mom about Priest. “What?”

Her lip twitches. “You think I don’t know the kind of love that rests in those eyes, baby girl?”

I blink, unable to give her anything else.

She shuffles into me further, probably noticing I won’t let her out of it. “I know. I smelled him on you the second you stepped through the door.”

Okay, it’s official. My mother is creepy. As if I needed more evidence to prove that fact. I’ve heard the stories about her when she was my age…

“Well it’s not love,” I murmur beneath my breath, turning to the stage.

“Oh, not yet.” She pats my thigh. “For right now, it’s obsession.”

I don’t know how much time passes until the ceremony is finally over. All I know is my skin burns, and the desperation to run is unbearable. Dad said it happened in three stages, the final one being the most important. Whatever that meant. I didn’t care and didn’t need to because it had nothing to do with me.

Every time I blink, my lids get heavier. Blood courses through my eardrums, and when I reach up to swipe the sweat off my forehead, everything around me dissolves into darkness for a moment.

I find the carvings again, focusing on little weird babies joined at the umbilical cord, but when the air around me thickens and the warning bells inside my head sound like the scream that tore out of me that night, I already know it’s because he found me.

Tracing my way over his leather boots, up the sway of his robe, and to the border of his hoodie, everything around him fades into the background until it’s only him and I. His soft lips and strong jawline cut through the shadows from his hoodie.

Moments pass, the air growing tighter.

He moves forward, and my body uncoils. Until Vaden brushes past.

I distract myself by landing on Halen.

She skims the hood away from her head. “Luna?” I don’t ask why I never saw her in all the years Priest had me locked away in his haunted mansion. Not that Halen and I were friends because we weren’t. I’d go as far as to say that she hated me at times. The older we got and the more time she spent with me, she slowly warmed, but there was always a twinkling of hatred in her eyes whenever she looked at me.

“Halen.” I follow the line behind her. “Stella and…River.”

“You’re back?” Halen whispers, shifting her hood back on. The weight of my guilt is crushing when I realize I’d spent a good chunk of my time thinking she knew about me being under the thumb of this royal asshole.

River squeezes my hand in passing before following them down the pathway.

“You want to get out of here for a bit?” Mother raises a brow at me as people start talking and finally filter out the exit.

I sigh in relief. “God. Yes.”

There have been times in my life when I’ve second-guessed my mom and everything she did and continues to do, but when you are loved by insanity, you learn to make excuses for their behavior because nothing they do will make sense. You can’t compare one to the existence of the mundane. We live a life of chaos and fire, so chaos and fire is what we become.

Finally, when I feel nature’s lungs nip at the exposed areas of my skin, a shiver rushes through me. Riverside Cemetery reminds me of a place I once knew. It was similar. Beauty on the surface, but when you dug too deep, you’d find yourself at the Devil's feet.

Some call it hell.

I have another name for him.

Mom breathes in deeply, her silver hair gliding with the wind. She’s barely aged at all. With hair of silk and eyes as freakish as this town, Lilith Patience isn’t the kind of woman you want to meet in a cemetery.

“Can you smell that?” Her shoulders lift when she inhales, a smirk teasing the corner of her mouth.

“Death?” I raise a brow.

“Well, yes, but I was also thinking…” she warms her stiff hand against my cheek. “Freedom.”

Freedom. How would it feel to be unshackled by the demons that hold me hostage? The gaping hole that spreads in my chest says it all.

“Lonely,” I say in a harsh whisper.

She studies me closely as if deciding how to reply. With the bitter taste of regret clinging to the tip of my tongue, I keep my mouth closed.

“If anything, Lune, loneliness is a feeling you shouldn’t be familiar with.” I wish she was right, but I don’t have it in me to tell her that everything she had hoped and fought for as a young girl was for nothing. It was for nothing because no matter how hard I try, I’ll still not be that person.

The person she wanted.