Chapter 8 #2
For the first time since walking out of prison, something like belonging settles in my bones.
Tastes like home. Not the home I dreamed of inside.
Not the home with Savannah's laugh echoing through clean rooms.
But a home nonetheless.
A place where my demons are welcome, where my silence is understood, where my loyalty is rewarded.
I nod once. Sharp and decisive.
Ready for the mark.
Ready to become what I've already been for years.
Ready to make official what prison and pain have already carved into my soul.
Chains presses the iron against my chest.
White-hot agony tears through me. The smell of my own burning flesh fills my nostrils, choking me worse than any prison smoke. I don't make a sound. I've learned to swallow pain. Learned to let it sink into bone rather than spill from my mouth.
The club roars around me—thunder in human form. Their voices blur into a single, primal sound. Not cheering. Something older. Something sacred.
The iron lifts away. The pain doesn't. It pulses with each heartbeat, angry and alive.
Diesel steps forward, slaps a bandage over raw, branded skin. "Wear it proud," he says, voice low enough that only I hear. "You earned it twice."
Brick holds out the cut again. Black leather, worn soft at the edges. Badlands MC patch sewn into the back—skull wrapped in barbed wire, rising from cracked earth.
The symbol of what we are. What I am now.
I slide my arms through. The weight settles on my shoulders like judgment. Like belonging.
"To Legion," Brick calls, raising his glass. "Blood in."
"Blood in," the room echoes.
The celebration becomes a blur after that. Whiskey flows. Music pounds. Stories spill—prison tales, run stories, near-misses with death.
I drink until the burn in my chest becomes background noise.
Until Savannah's ghost stops haunting the corners of my vision.
Two hours later, I drag myself up the metal stairs to the bunkhouse. Each step echoes, bouncing off concrete walls. My new brand throbs beneath the bandage, a heartbeat of fire just left of center. The cut hangs heavy on my shoulders, still stiff with newness.
My head swims with whiskey. Too much. Not enough. The kind of drunk where the room tilts but memories still cut clear. Where you remember everything you're trying to forget.
The upstairs hallway stretches longer than it should. Doors line both sides—some open to empty rooms, some closed tight. I count them as I pass. Habit from inside. Always know your exits. Always count your steps.
Room 3. Mine now. Has been since I got out, technically, but tonight makes it real. Tonight makes everything real.
I shoulder the door open. Don't bother with the light switch.
Sunlight spills through the duct-taped window, casting golden light across the sparse furnishings.
Steel-frame bed against one wall. Gun rack, empty except for the 12-gauge I keep for emergencies.
Metal locker for clothes. Door in the corner leading to a tiny bathroom—the only room in this hallway with an en suite.
My smile is stupid, but it’s real.
I made it.
I fuckin’ made it.
Nah, it’s not the home I hoped for. But it is still a home. Which is more than I can say for that godforsaken trailer that spits out evil every time someone goes in.
I'm halfway to the bed when I see her.
Small shape curled on my mattress. Dark hair spilling across my pillow. Knees tucked to chest.
Mercy.
Fuck.
I forgot she was here.
She's fast asleep, wearing someone’s borrowed shorts and a club t-shirt that ten sizes too big for her.
She’s got the BB gun tucked against her chest like a teddy bear, finger resting near the trigger even in sleep.
Her face is relaxed in a way it never is when she's awake—softer, younger.
Reminds me how fucking young nine really is.
I stand there swaying, trying to decide what to do. My drunk brain offers no solutions. I should sleep on the floor. Let her have the bed. But my body aches for a tiny bit of comfort as the brand throbs under my cut.
"Mercy," I whisper, then realize I'm still too loud. Prison voice. She doesn't stir. Sleeps the deep sleep of the exhausted, the kind I haven't had since before Whitefall.
I ease down onto the edge of the bed, careful not to disturb her. The mattress dips under my weight. Springs creak in protest.
Her eyes snap open. Alert instantly. No slow drift to consciousness. One moment asleep, the next fully aware, gun barrel shifting to center on my chest.
"Easy, there," I slur. "Juss me."
Recognition dawns. The gun lowers fractionally.
"You smell like whiskey," she says, voice scratchy with sleep.
"Yeahhhhh." No point denying it. "Party got wild. You okay up here alone?"
She nods, sitting up. The BB gun never leaves her grip. "Diesel brought me food. Said to wait for you."
"You can have the bed," I tell her, starting to stand. "I'll take the—"
"No." Her hand shoots out, grabbing my wrist. Surprising strength in those small fingers. "Stay."
I look down at her. Really look. See the fear hiding behind those Kane eyes—the same eyes that stare back at me from the mirror. Fear of being left. Of being alone. Of waking up and finding everyone gone again.
"Ight," I say, kicking off my boots. I’m hardly in the mood to put up a fight. Especially over something I want. "Scoot over."
She slides to the wall, making room. I stretch out beside her, on top of the thin blanket while she stays beneath it. The bed's barely big enough for me, let alone both of us, but we make it work. She curls against my side, small and warm, the BB gun now pointed safely away.
"They burned you," she says, not a question. Her eyes fixed on the bandage visible through my torn shirt.
"Yeahhhhh."
"Does it hurt?"
"Yeahhhhh."
"Good," she says with fierce satisfaction. "Means it's real."
I chuckle with my eyes closed. Smart kid. Too smart. Sees right through me, right through everything. Always has.
"What's it mean?" she asks after a minute. "The mark."
I open my eyes and stare at the ceiling, watching shadows dance across water stains. "Means I belong here now. Means they belong to me."
"Like family?"
"Somethin’ like that."
She's quiet for so long I think she's fallen back asleep. Then her small voice drifts up again. "Will they help us find Destiny?"
The question hits. Destiny. My middle sister. Seventeen, and pregnant, and gone.
Another failure. Another person I couldn't protect.
"Yeahhhhh," I promise, though I have no right to. "They will."
"The demons will help?" she asks, and there's something in her voice—not fear, but something close to reverence.
I look down at her. "Whah?"
"At school," she says, matter-of-fact, "they call you Demon Kane. Say you got demons inside you. A whole legion of them."
A laugh bubbles up from somewhere deep, somewhere I thought had dried up years ago. "That what they say?"
She nods solemnly. "Miss Wilkins tried to make them stop. Said it wasn't nice. But Tommy Harkinson said his dad told him it's true. Said Mark 5:9 proves it."
Mark 5:9.
The verse that gave me my name.
The curse my mother spoke over me the day I was born, high on something that made her see angels and demons battling for her soul.
"My name is Legion," I whisper, "for we are many."
Mercy's eyes widen. "So it is true?"
I should tell her no. Should explain it's just a story, just people being cruel. Should protect her from the weight of our family's reputation.
Instead, I say, "Maybe it is. Maybe I do have demons inside me." I brush hair from her forehead, gentler than I knew I could be. "But they're my demons, Merce. And they'll tear apart anyone who tries to hurt you."
She considers this, head tilted like she's working through a complex math problem. Then she nods, satisfied with my answer. "Good." She settles back against me, eyes drifting closed. "I like having a demon for a brother."
Within minutes, her breathing evens out. Sleep reclaims her, innocent and deep.
I lie awake, staring at the ceiling, feeling the brand pulse on my chest and my sister's small body curled trustingly against mine.
My demons and I, we'll keep watch.