Chapter 13 Riven
Riven
Bad little angel.
Turning this around on me.
Okay…I kind of swore I’d be honest if she was.
I’d rather go back to thinking about how I’m going to cut Jerry’s and Melvin’s hearts out.
I wonder if she wants to help or—
“Riven.”
I cling to the rage burning inside of me. If I stay mad, I can just let my horrors spill out. There won’t be any thinking. No reliving, no…feeling.
She won’t let me get away with that, though.
Although it would only be fair if she did.
I let her ass get away with it.
She doesn’t do a very good job of hiding herself from me anymore. Her tempting little body trembles against mine, and I don’t even think she knows it.
I tug her closer and soak in those tremors that vibrate down to my soul.
A soul that clung to the thought of her for dear life just days ago.
Ugh, fine. Let me get this over with.
“I’m the Empowerer to the Abandon. More specifically Seductions.”
“I have no clue what that truly means.”
“I know that, unfortunately. No one really does. Not even my brothers.”
My lips flap together as I blow out a harsh breath.
“For the first few years of my life, my primary role, I guess you can call it, was keeping Creed from killing everyone. If he hasn’t told you that yet, my bad, but it’s important.”
“He did. He also told me why your Chaos came out for the first time.”
I hum.
My Spyvie. I called him Snuggles.
I name all the living dead Spyvies after him.
Snuggle. Snuglacious. Snugs. Snuggie-wuggie. Snugglybug.
Oh, and Fred. She’s bad, though. Cut the shit out of my face when I was trying to name her and—
Thayla clears her throat and gives my heart a small little pat. I guess that’s my cue to come back to the conversation.
“So up until that unfortunate event, my chaos had never come out. I had no idea it was even a domain inside of me. I mean, I felt flutters in my belly when things around us were tense, but my harmony would wash it away to calm. I figured it was nerves. It’s hard for me to believe all the Beginning Gods swarming us didn’t know, though. ”
“Her, your father, and Derivius said nothing? Not once?”
“Nor did the Goddess of Creation or Goddess of Accord. Like I said, it’s hard for me to believe, but until that event happened, I really just functioned as Creed’s shadow. All eyes were always on him. So maybe they didn’t care to check.
“Regardless, that day happened and my father lost his mind. One, because he said I was marked by a traitor, aka Derivius. Two, I couldn’t get the Chaos under control. Everyone around us was losing their minds and there I was, standing in the middle of his throne room, unable to control my giggles.
“He wrapped me in his power, said he was going to kill me, but Sab—she stepped in. Told him to let her see if she could help. She took me to Seductions, to what we call the Charging Chamber, where you all rescued me from, and yes, it calmed my Chaos.”
I exhale and tighten my grip on her hip. The maddening war between my powers ignites and I blink repeatedly to get them both to obey me.
My little burden doesn’t want either in control to tell this story.
Just me.
I don’t know if just me can do it.
“You were six when that happened with Creed. So that bitch took a six-year-old to a sex room?”
I snort at the venom in her tone and that eases the battle behind my eyes.
“Yes, she did.”
“And your Harmony came back out?”
The saliva I swallow tastes like sweat, sex, and a sweet roasted scent.
“I locked eyes with a feeder who was screaming, begging for help. I stood there trembling. Transfixed. Not only on what was being done to her, but her plea for help that no one was answering. No one answered my screams to save Snuggles.”
“Bring him back. Bring him back, Creed! He wasn’t hurting anyone.”
I blink, jerking my head.
“My stomach stopped swirling and my heart started pounding. I couldn’t help but wonder if hers was beating painfully in her chest as well.
I reached my hand out to her. Not for her to take, but for my power to go to her.
Her screams calmed and morphed into moans.
I could sense her settling, so I continued to push it.
“I pushed my Harmony into her until she was no longer worried about where she was. That whole time, I was telling myself to do to her like I do to Creed. Calm her down. Lo and behold, that wasn’t what I was doing at all.”
I don’t think he knows there are tears streaming down his face.
Does it hurt him to kill people?
Does he feel the pain like they do?
I don’t want him to hurt. He’s only doing what he was told.
I grunt as I silence the small voice in my mind.
At least I hope I only replayed that mentally.
Thayla’s still as a statue and I’m too…humiliated to glance down at her. Her power pulses beneath my fingertips, but she’s doing a much better job of keeping it locked away than I am.
We have to teach her not to do that. The more she restrains herself, the more it’s always going to fight her.
I’m two against one.
She’s seven against one.
I mean, yeah, it’s seven small pieces from what I can sense but still…
She’ll lose every time.
“In the cave, your power didn’t just wrap around me and my emotions. It wrapped around my power. It settled my powers.”
Yes…the first time I touched those sweet, sweet, deadly seven.
“That’s correct. Our little secret. Before it was our secret, though, angel, it was her secret. I was the Goddess of Seductions secret weapon. That feeder I nullified with my Harmony had a domain under her, but she didn’t want to work or be in the Charging Chamber.
“She sensed instantly that my Harmony embedded itself not only into that woman’s emotions, but her actual power. I made it more cooperative. Because of that, she fed at her max capacity. Whether she wanted to or not.
“In my young, dumb mind, I told myself I helped her. I thought I had done something spectacular. Especially when the Goddess of Seduction kneeled beside me with this large, proud smile on her ugly fucking deceiving face. I remember even asking her if that lady was okay now or if she was still sad.
“She wiped the tears off my cheeks and told me I made that woman the happiest person in the realm. She then explained to me that my Harmony side is the most beautiful thing she’s ever seen, but sometimes, people take beauty and turn it into something ugly. She turned it into something ugly.”
“Riven, it isn’t—”
“She said, ‘If your father finds out you can harmonize powers—strengthen, soothe, or subdue them—then he’s going to place you with the Oblirians, and you’ll have to fight.’”
I pause. My throat works overtime to swallow the air that’s stuck. My shallow inhale is too fast.
Too full of her scent.
“You don’t want that, do you? You’d much rather be here and make everyone happy, right?”
My tongue tickles from mimicking that bitch’s words and tone.
My fingers twitch against soft skin.
“The choice was simple. It was so simple.” A quiet laugh breaks from me. “Of course I wanted to be there. With her. With all of them. They were so nice.”
The body beside me scoots too close.
It’s too hot.
Alas, I must barrel on.
“They spoiled me. Pampered me. Brought me gifts, food, and the best clothes. But then—”
I squeeze my eyes shut and tap my fists against my head. Lightly.
“THEN—they talked about me when they thought I couldn’t hear them. The very beings I was empowering. They said I was the sickest of them all. Even the God of Death and Killer of Time didn’t do what I did. What I did was both addictive and disgusting. What was disgusting?”
I grip my stomach, bending over as a harsh chuckle belts out of me.
“What was I doing that was disgusting?”
My laughter echoes around me as I grip my roots, then fling my arms out beside me. The beautiful melody runs through my mind, and I hum happily along with its tune.
“Hey, hey. Come back to me.”
Warm hands grip my cheeks and the smile on my lips slowly fades as I tilt my head down.
Blue, gold, burgundy, gray, black, and white capture my attention.
My, her eyes are ever changing. They’re so hypnotizing.
“What are you doing out of bed, little burden? We’re supposed to be having this conversation between the sheets.”
I lift her in my arms, grinning once again as she squeals in surprise.
I plop her down back in her spot and snuggle in close to her.
Hope she doesn’t mind I’m naked. It’s so freeing to sleep with no clothes on.
“Now where was I?”
“Riven, maybe we should take a break.”
“Why in the realm would we do that? We’ve opened this jar of taurnshit. Might as well let it reek up the whole room.”
“Because I don’t want it to hurt you. I don’t want talking about this to dredge up a side of you, you can’t contain. And I don’t say that to be mean or anything, but you just completely lost yourself there. I can’t lose you. In any capacity.”
“Aww, angel,” I coo, gripping her jaw and making her stare into my unswirling eyes.
“This is always going to hurt me. That’ll never change.
You won’t lose me, though. My soul will grip onto your sweet little sliver living in me and drag me back.
I wouldn’t have it any other way, so let’s get through our bedtime story, okay? ”
Her eyebrows draw down and her nose crinkles in the cutest way. I can’t help but boop it.
She huffs at me.
“Okay, so where was I…Ah yes. Everyone said I was disgusting. I, for the life of me, couldn’t figure out why beings who I witnessed do the things they did whispered that about me. Come to find out, some thoroughly enjoyed my presence in Seductions. Some did not.
“Those who didn’t, believed I needed some sort of restraint. If I became too much, I needed to be removed from the Chamber and locked away until everything was under control. That opinion came from the feeders who didn’t really want to be there but had no choice.”