Chapter 32
THIRTY-TWO
LEVIATHAN
Something’s wrong.
I sit up, head whipping in every direction, searching through the darkness, my fingers feeling at the empty spot beside me.
Where the fuck is Aiden?
I try to calm my racing heart as I get up and go to the bathroom, hoping to find him in there pissing, but he’s not there. It isn’t until I exit the bathroom that I notice my door—unbolted, unlocked, and swung wide open.
I rush out of the room in search for him, racing through the halls, looking in every room that isn’t locked, but he’s not here.
He’s not here.
No, no, no, NO!
My heart which was previously racing feels like it’s going to pop out of my chest. I run back to my room, throwing on a pair of shorts, and grab the nail-spiked baseball bat I keep in the closet.
“Fuckers!” I shout, running into the hallway, swinging the bat against every door I pass. “Where the fuck is he!”
One by one, my brothers poke their heads out of their rooms. Gore rubs his tired eyes, leaning against Bel’s chest as he yawns. “What the fuck got into you?”
“I was busy,” Asi grits out, only his face visible between his partially open door and the chain that keeps it locked.
“What do you mean, where is he ?” Mammon asks, eyes narrowing. “Did you lose the bounty?”
“No! One of you took him!” I yell, swinging the bat at Bel’s head, to which he skillfully ducks. “I want him back! Now!”
“None of us have him!” Bel shouts, raising his hands in the air, looking around. “Right?”
Asi finally comes out of his room, a streak of paint on his cheek as he crosses his arms over his chest. “Well, where is he then?”
Mammon curses sharply, pounding his fist against the wall. “Fuck, Levi! You let him escape?”
My jaw drops. No. My Aiden would never. He would never leave me, not after all we’ve been through, not after what we shared tonight. I know he couldn’t see it—or maybe he was trying to fight it—but I saw true understanding in his eyes tonight. I saw the reflection of myself in his blue eyes, his soul, and it was unfurling before me.
He was exquisite. He was calm. I was… intimate with him. Truly. Our souls melded together tonight in more ways than one. He couldn’t have just left me.
NO!
I drop the bat and slam my hands against my head. He couldn’t have betrayed me! He couldn’t have left me! Why would he leave me!
“We need to go,” Mammon instructs, jutting his chin at my brothers.
Gore’s eyes widen and he shares a look with Bel, full of too much excitement that, for once, chills my bones. “Are we really doing this?”
Asi sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose as he reaches into his room for his ax. “Fucking hell, I was busy.”
Mammon, disappearing and reappearing from his room, cocks his gun. “This is your mess to clean up, Leviathan. I expect you know what needs to be done now.”
I bite down on my tongue so hard it draws blood. While my brothers all prepare, psyching themselves up, a transformation occurs. It’s no longer playful Bel or sweet Gore. It’s no longer a disinterested Asi or a calm Mammon.
With each beating of their fists against their chest, with each hoot and holler, I know what this means.
We’re Mammon, Asmodeus, Leviathan, Beelzebub, and Belphegor.
The monsters come out from the shadows. The men underneath are gone.
The hunt is on.
“Dear residents, please be advised, this is a code red. For your own safety, please remain in your homes until the alarms go off. This is not a drill.”
“Let’s fucking gooooooo!”
Beelzbub laughs, manic and unhinged as he runs by me, scythe swinging in the air as he hops over a rose bush.
Belphegor’s right beside him, clapping his hands as he skips across a yard, knocking over the mailbox for the fun of it. “Come out, come out, wherever you are!”
“He couldn’t have gone far,” Asmodeus says as his eye twitches, slithering against the back wall of a house we cross, licking his lips. “The guards at the gate wouldn’t have let him.”
Mammon chuckles, cracking his neck in delight. “First one to find him gets a toe for his trouble!”
Shouts ring out around me, feral and completely devious. These are my true brothers. The ones that everyone should fear. The demons they hide underneath human skin. None of them are thinking clearly right now, and they won’t until Aiden’s caught.
I need to find him first.
I split off from the group, racing like my life depends on it as I search for him. There aren’t many places he can hide in this neighborhood. While it is a large complex, it’s mostly just single homes. There is a patch of wilderness we also own, so that’s where I go first, while my brothers head to the different exit points.
I don’t think I’ve ever felt fear in my life before. I wouldn’t have been able to name it before now. But this feeling of all-consuming dread, of panic, of sheer anguish has to be fear. Like my heart will crack if I don’t find Aiden. Like I won’t be able to breathe until he’s in my arms again.
I push aside my rage at what he’s done. It can be forgiven. I never knew what that meant either, but I know I’ll find it deep within me when I have him again.
I need to find him first .
I’m halfway to the woods, ready to chop down every damn tree to find him, until I hear it.
A mad cackling behind me. The sound of taunting and heckling. The sound of demons that have found an innocent soul.
I race as fast as my bare feet will carry me, my lungs burning as I push myself further than I ever have before. My lungs scream for me to stop, to take a breath, but everything is cut off when I see Aiden in the center of the complex, surrounded by my brothers, hunched on the ground with his hands over his ears.
“Stop!” I yell when I reach them, trying to break past the circle they’ve made, but my brothers have completely surrounded him. “Fucking stop! I’ll fucking kill you!”
At the sound of my plea, four sets of eyes turn to me. All I see in them is evil intent, sick and twisted amusement, and before I know it, I’m the one being surrounded.
“He ran away!”
“He left you, Leviathan!”
“Are you going to take that!”
A fist slams against my shoulder, jostling me from body to body until I’m a pinging between them. Every cruel word they say is absorbed deep inside me, curling around my organs, squeezing the sense out of me.
“He doesn’t want you,” Belphegor taunts, slapping his hand across my cheek.
My vision starts to blur.
Asmodeus cackles, slamming his fists against my bare chest. “You’re pathetic!”
My skin itches.
“He made a fool out of you!” Beelzebub mocks, stomping my foot.
My claws come out.
No, please.
No.
Stop.
“Fucking idiot. To think you could ever be like them ,” Mammon spits, a delightful glee in his eye as he grasps my collar, yanking my face against his. “Time to come out and play, brother.”
And with one slice of his knife?—
The collar falls to the ground.
I roar. My grotesque maw extends, the monster’s bone cracking and breaking as I become ten feet tall. I pound my fists against the ground. I bite and claw and scratch.
MORE!
Pain slices my fists.
HARDER!
Music fills my ears.
MAKE IT LAST!
Wetness coats my cheeks.
“L-Levi…”
My head twitches.
“Stop, p-please?—”
My jaw cracks.
No, no, no…
“Levi!”
I black out.
Mammon sits beside me on the snow-covered ground, watching alongside me as our brothers return home. Asi will probably go straight to bed, but I know that Bel and Gore will have to fuck the night out of their systems. We each deal with the fleeting high in different ways, and I’ve always let mine simply wash over me, but tonight it’s all come crashing down.
Mammon cracks his bloody knuckles, placing a firm hand on my heaving shoulders. He turns to face me, pressing his forehead against mine. He raises a hand, wiping a trail of blood off my cheek.
A choked sob escapes me as I look down at my blood-covered hands. One of them is broken, but that’s not the pain I feel. My quivering breaths cause spit and drool to leak from my mouth, snot pouring down my chin. I turn away from him, curling into myself, tucking myself away.
“See,” Mammon says, clear now, back to the human meat suit he wears. “It was always going to come to this, Leviathan. I think you just needed to remember your purpose here.”
I cry out, a painful scream tearing from my throat, scarring me from the inside out.
Only able to watch as Mammon stands, gives me a nod, and picks Aiden’s limp and broken body off the ground.
“Dear residents, please be advised, the danger has passed.”