Chapter 29 Creed #2
“I don’t know. Like I already told Creed, my father and an army showed up at the new location and took me. I woke up the next day chained to a bed with healers still working on me. You all were already gone. Made it out.”
“We didn’t make it out. We got taken out,” Kyzen says and Sevryn’s eyebrows draw down.
“That’s not the story I was told. My father told me you all tried to burn down Seductions with everyone inside. Then you went on a rampage through the heart of the Abandon and when your father showed up, you starshot out.”
“Uh, that’s not even remotely true. The only part of that close to the truth is trying to burn down Seductions. I definitely did try to do that,” Riven admits with a sinister smirk on his face like this isn’t fucking with him at all.
“So when your father arrived at the original meeting location and I didn’t, you all assumed I told?”
“We didn’t just assume. Our father laughed at us and told us to pick wiser friends. You were the only friend we had and were the only person we told,” I say.
Thayla’s head cocks to the side as she bounces her gaze between all of us. I wouldn’t have to sense her confusion to know she’s lost in the conversation.
We’ve got to tell her what happened that day.
“Wiser…” Amick murmurs. “What did you do with the letters we sent you?” Amick asks.
“Destroyed them like you told me to.”
“Every one of them? As soon as you got done reading them? And you checked under your pillow first thing when you woke up?”
“Yes, as soon as I…”
His eyes grow wide, and he runs his hands down his face before cupping his mouth.
“What?” Amick asks impatiently.
“The night he killed my mom was the same night you sent the original location and said two days. I didn’t see it until the middle of the next day.”
Thayla and Yemi both gasp and cover their mouths, and I tighten my lips at that awful reminder.
Sevryn’s mom was way more of a mom to him than what we ever experienced.
On the night he’s referring to, she tried to take him and run.
She was caught.
They almost made it out, though. They were gone for hours before his dad realized they were missing.
“Fuck, I’m an idiot,” he grumbles before he starts pacing in his place.
“He was so calm, collected, and I was a fucking wreck. He grabbed my shoulder, with this cruel smile on his face, and asked, ‘You wouldn’t ever run from me, right, son?’ I said no.
Fuck. He said, ‘Wise choice.’ He set it up.
He already went through my room looking for me when he was told she was gone. ”
My mouth parts, but no sound comes out. I can literally picture his father in my mind doing that. The God of Pain loves mind games. He likes to work you up as much as he can before delivering his final blow.
He’s almost as cunning as our father.
“He found my letter first. Told our father, then sent you another letter with a different location, stating it was from Creed, but kept the time the same to see what you’d do.
You were distraught over your mother’s death and didn’t question it at all.
You showed up at the location he gave you. Our father showed up for us.”
Thayla squeezes her eyes shut and reaches over to grip Amick’s forearm. Everyone picked up how insensitive that sounded. Except for him.
But it’s the truth.
For twenty years, we thought our only friend betrayed us and he thought we left him. This whole time, our fathers played us. Again.
Fuck. I did leave him.
I left him in Hellveilious. Not that I knew he was there, but if I had been going down there like I was supposed to, I would’ve found out sooner rather than when I did.
“Well, damn. You didn’t betray us,” Riven says.
“No, I didn’t. You all didn’t leave me.”
“No, we didn’t,” all four of us say.
The weight of our words settles over us, heavier than the scars that were left behind and the marks left on our souls.
Our shoulders drop, and we stare at each other as the truth unravels years of anger in a single heartbeat, a collective breath.
Just like old times. Five teenage boys, huddled together, just trying to survive and figure out how to escape our fathers.
Sevryn eventually rubs his hands down his face once again, then perches them on his hips as he glares down at the ground.
“I think I’ve had it for one night.”
“Then let’s go kick Havar out of the bed,” Yemi whispers, reaching her hand out to him tentatively.
He looks at it for a minute, then lays his in hers.
“Sevryn,” I call as they turn away. “I didn’t know.”
He doesn’t look back at me, but his shoulders deflate.
He knows I don’t mean what we just discussed.
Thayla clears her throat, stepping out from the centered position we’ve had her in.
“I’m going to go get my pajamas on and lie down in my spot. You all are going to come lie down with me and tell me the rest of the story.”
She doesn’t give us the time to agree or argue as she makes her way into the carriage.
“Bossy-ass, little thing,” Riven scoffs and I peer over at him.
“She is, but she’s our bossy thing,” I say, exhaling sharply even as they all gawk at me in surprise. “Let’s get this over with.”
“Who’s going to tell her?” He follows up immediately, not doing a good job of hiding his nerves.
“I—”
“I got it, Kyzen.”
He whips his head to me and the tremors in his hands stop.
I don’t make it a big thing. I just make my way through the door, thinking about what and how I’m going to say everything I want to say.
I’m not telling it all tonight. There’s a time and place for her to have private conversations with each of us.
I won’t be bearing my soul in front of my brothers.
The living room is empty, aside from V, who’s nestled on the bookshelves in the blanket Thayla put up there for him. He gives a little hoot as we walk by, as though that’s his way of giving us encouragement.
Thayla’s already in her spot, like she said she’d be, when I push open our door. It’s not that surprising, though. Now that I’ve slept in the same bed as her for four nights, I’ve quickly learned she isn’t changing her pajamas for us.
A T-shirt and underwear, and that’s it.
I don’t think she cares how tempting of a look it is.
She just wants to be comfortable.
The bathroom light is still on, providing enough of a glow for us to see, and I make my way over to my bag.
I feel her eyes on me and her soul caresses mine as I tug my shirt over my head. My soul responds without my command, drawing a grunt from my lips as I slide my pants off.
As quickly as I fucking can, I replace them with a sleep pair.
My inhale is sharp, matching hers as the four of us step up to the bed. Based on the reddening of her face, though, I’m positive our deep breaths are for two different reasons.
Maybe.
I climb in first until there isn’t an inch of space between us and the bathroom light goes out as soon as Kyzen gets himself situated on the other side of Riven.
Slowly, I lace my fingers through hers as the five of us stare up at the stars in silence. Her encouraging squeeze presses me on.
“Despite it seeming like the simple thing for us or anyone really, to do would’ve been to just starshoot out of the Abandon, that wasn’t an option.
Our father had used the Veil on his side to bind our ability to starshoot out of the Abandon, just like how there’s a binding around the Godsdawn that doesn’t let us leave now.
Not only that, he kept a very close eye on our power usage.
Every time we used them, he knew. Sometimes he’d ask what for, sometimes not.
So we knew we’d be leaving the Abandon on foot, and we couldn’t use our powers.
“Amick spent years working out a plan. That plan only deviated once and that was to include Sevryn. We’d been raised in the same kind of hell together, and he wanted out just as bad as we did.
He talked about running away all the time.
We decided together, the four of us, we’d take him with us.
The day we first told him what we were planning, he nearly cried.
He said nothing would stop him from coming with us.
Amick would write him letters and starshoot them under his pillow to keep him updated when our roles grew more intense and we didn’t have as much time to spend with him alone.
“During the time leading up to when we planned to leave, on top of the roles we had to fulfil, we started creating routines—habits—that people got used to seeing us do. One of those habits was us going into the heart of the Abandon every afternoon we could together. We’d do different things, fuck around.
The main thing that always got people’s attention was us going into Seductions.
Our father was a frequent visitor, so it was normal for us to be seen going there looking for him.
“Seductions is the Goddess of Seduction’s hellhole. It’s a fucking feeding ground for the beings with her domain to gather and do the vilest of things. If it creates sexual tension, it’s allowed.”
All four of us make gruff, unpleasant noises. The shit I’ve seen in there still haunts me.
I can’t imagine what…never mind.
“The day of our escape, we decided that Seductions would be the place we wanted to be seen the most. We knew if word spread that we went there, we’d have a few hours before any questions on our whereabouts started.
The condensed plan, which ended up not mattering anyways, was we were going to use that time to trek to the outskirts of the Abandon and pass through the barrier farthest from the side Hellveilious is near, then make our way through Godsden. ”
“I just want to cut in to add, we didn’t participate in the activities that went on at Seductions. Ever,” Kyzen adds.
Thayla’s fingers clench mine in a death grip, and her exhale isn’t subtle in the least.
This is why he’s the best at explaining shit. I didn’t even consider clarifying that.
She was probably getting ready to stab me. Or all of us.