Page 13 of Song of Tenebrae

He finally begins to calm down as the effects of the weed slowly permeate his brain. I love my baby brother but he has separation issues. Not that I blame him for that. What we endured as children and adolescents was atrocious and it propelled us on the path we travel today. Everything feels fated and I know I was meant to find Tempest, but it wouldn’t have happened without catalytic events. Our parent’s car accident had no other family, and then ended up in Loving Beginnings Orphanage. Being raised and abused by the Catholic church is what made worshipping Satan so appealing. If it was just the Satanic religion, we would’ve been fine since it’s the religion we believe in still, but it wasn’t. It was a large organization that liked to delve deeper into rituals and trade in the souls of lesser people.

They suck you in on promises and they deliver, as long as you do as well. In the beginning you feel justified, that certain people had to die, and it made no difference whose hand dealt the final blow. A sacrifice meant another platinum record, or a mansion, and it always meant we stayed together. Most of these people were drug addicted sex workers and that somehow made it feel justified. It took my demon with her storming grey eyes to make me see reason. When I found out she was chosen for me, I had to find her and see what she was about. I dragged Torrent with me to The Temple and we watched her dance, her body moving like a snake, hypnotizing everyone.

I couldn’t walk out of there without knowing what she tasted like, I was obsessed. I couldn’t control myself that night and I tasted her and felt her, after that I knew she was mine. She was meant to be a sacrifice but I couldn’t do it, when I pleaded with Kenny, and when I spoke to the elders, all they saw was my desperation. They fed on it like a feast and became just as obsessed as me, claiming I needed to kill her or be killed. So, I chose the option not given, I killed them instead.

“Having fun without me, huh?” Squall comes into the room. He’s always larger than life and he commands a room like no one else.

“Nah, Raiden is having all the fun.” Torrent squints through the cloud of smoke.

“He’s earned it.” Squall is a faithful friend and brother.

He grew up in the Loving Beginnings Orphanage with us and he left with us too, never questioning if he should or not. He was there long before us, his mother having left him on the front stoop, and never returning to claim him. He’s tall and wide with white-blonde hair and near ice blue eyes. His features look Nordic but he really has no clue what his actual culture is.

“Kenny is whining for food.” Squall pops a frozen meal in the microwave, “when is he due for another video call?”

“Four days,” I reply.

“Okay, so we’ll hold off on the shaving for now. What do we tell them about Tempest this week?”

“Maybe tell them we located her mother in Arizona.” Torrent exhales his smoke and tosses the roach into the ashtray.

“They will use her mother to bring her in.” Squall looks between us.

“And?” Torrent raises a brow.

“Not yet.” I snap and stand from the table, “we’ll tell them we’re trailing her along the southern states.”

“They’re going to begin to get antsy.” Torrent calls to my back as I leave the room.

They will get antsy but they won’t want to do anything until they absolutely have to, that’s why they have us, their soldiers. I pass Hail’s room and find him sitting on his bed, his face illuminated by his phone. He’s been different since Dominica and I know it’s because he found the same thing in Sky that I found in my demon.

“I saw her tonight,” I tell him as I lean against his door frame.

“And?”

“Tempest almost found me and Sky was pissed.” I chuckle, “she’s been threatening me not to go back.”

“Have you convinced her to unblock me?” he holds up his phone.

“You know I can’t do that,” I shake my head, “why don’t you start paying her a few visits?”

“I’m ashamed.” He says it quietly and it tears into my heart. “What happened to her, to her aunt? I did that.”

“Convince her you’ve changed.”

“Have I?” he finally looks up at me, “have any of us?”

Hail grew up staunch Catholic, his mother being an immigrant from Italy, and his father a first generation American in an Irish family. To the outside world, they were a perfect little unit, and attended church every Sunday. What no one knew was how much his father’s family resented Hail’s mother for not being Irish and they cut his father off from the family fortune. His father grew more and more resentful of his wife. The sporadic slaps became frequent beatings and then one day when Hail was thirteen, his whole life changed. His father pulled a gun on his mother, shooting her three times in the head before shooting himself, and Hail found them a few hours later when he returned home from school.

The state located his father’s family and when they set sights on Hail, they refused to take him. He looked too much like his Italian mother with his dark hair and olive skin. So, with no one else to care for him, Hail ended up in Loving Beginning’s Orphanage. It was like fate putting us all together.

He looks at me with those dark almost black eyes and yanks on his long grey goatee. He’s waiting for an answer, something to help him at least sleep tonight, and I can’t seem to find the right words. He toys with the ring in his lip and then lets out a pained chuckle.

“She’ll kill me.”

“We’ll both be dead soon,” I mimic his chuckle, “you remember Tempest, she’s out for blood.”

“I don’t think I could ever forget her,” he drops his head, “I saw it inside of her.”

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