Page 50 of Decimation

That’s the final trigger.

His face darkens, a storm breaking. All traces of the haunted man are gone, replaced by pure, unadulterated rage.

“You ungrateful bitch.” he screams, the sound echoing off the cold walls. “After everything I did for you…”

His fist connects with my stomach.

The air leaves my lungs in a whoosh. The pain is a supernova, blinding and absolute. I double over, but he holds me up by my hair and hits me again, this time in the ribs. I hear a crack, feel a searing hot lance of agony. I’m screaming into the gag, the world dissolving into a haze of pain and terror.

“Stop pretending.” he bellows, driving a knee into my thigh. “Stop denying me. You’re her. You’re MINE.”

He throws me to the floor, and the marble is unforgiving against my bruised, exhausted body. I try to curl into a ball, to protect myself, but he’s on me in an instant. His hands are on my clothes, grabbing, pulling, ripping. The cold air hits my skin, and a new, primal terror takes hold.

He’s a frenzy of violence. My clothes are shredded and pulled away as I kick, thrash, and try to fight, but I am a paper doll in his hands. A thing. He forces my legs apart with a brutal knee, his weight crushing me into the cold, hard floor.

I am screaming, screaming, screaming, but the sound is trapped inside my own skull, a silent plea to a God who abandoned us the day we were born into this man’s shadow.

He fumbles with his own clothes, and I squeeze my eyes shut. I can’t look, I can’t see this. I try to leave my body; to float away from this horror but the pain anchors me here, in this moment.

The searing, tearing pain as he slams into me almost makes me pass out. It is a violation so complete, so absolute that it shatters inside me, taking me right back to where I was all those years ago. Right back to Ezekiel. Right back to that horror. The world narrows to this agony, to the crushing weight of him, to the smell of his cologne and his sweat, to the sound of his ragged breathing in my ear.

And then, the chanting begins.

A low, guttural mantra grunted with every brutal, horrific, punishing thrust.

“Ines.”

Thrust.

“Ines.”

Thrust.

“Ines.”

Two years. Two fucking years of planning, scheming, manipulating those around me and still it is not done, I am not avenged. I know it’ll be worth it, I know my patience right now will pay dividends but some days, Christ, some days the temptation is so much it’s all I can do not to gut my brother and just be done with it.

He doesn’t suspect anything. Of course he doesn’t. Stupid fuck is still so focused on hunting down his wife’s murderers that he can’t see anything else, can’t think of anything else. He’s useless, inept, more inept than ever. Of course, that has it’s advantages. That has helped me to no end. I’ve ensured all the people who might see through my ruse, who might realise what is really happening have been removed from the equation, have been eliminated entirely. It helps that the Esau have had another revival, that with the U.K. Chapter having a shakeup there’s been a little drama to hide my own activities.

The only person I haven’t dealt with, the only man I don’t dare to is Antonio. Thankfully he’s too focused on fucking his best mate’s daughter to notice what is happening over here.

All this time I’ve been playacting, play pretending, being the man everyone needs, being the leader my brother should have been. I had my body altered, had it marked with all the sacred symbols that enable me to pass perfectly as Grand Master. It’s all part of the plan, all part of ensuring stability while Konstantine is incapacitated – at least that’s what everyone who knows believes.

I draw in a deep breath and wince at the wound down my chest. It matches my brother’s exactly, though his is needed, his was necessary for the transplant. Mine on the other hand is pure aesthetics. I needed it so that the Guardians wouldn’t realise I wasn’t him, I needed it so that if word gets out, they still cannot tell us apart. I run my hand down, feeling the flash of pain and a wave of annoyance too.

My brother was meant to die. That was the plan, that was what was agreed. And yet still, still God favours him, still God cups his hands around my brother’s flame while I stand in the cold, waiting for my turn at the fire.

He’s been here ever since, recovering, brooding, becoming even more of a recluse while I tighten my grip around his throne. But what will happen when he recovers? When he takes it all back again and destroys everything I have worked so hard to fix?

The thought slithers through my mind like a serpent, cold-bellied and venomous. I don’t want to consider it. Not yet. Right now, I just need to focus on this, on fixing my father’s legacy, on rebuilding the corpse of a dynasty into something that can finally, finally belong to me.

But as I stalk through the halls, something shifts in the air. A wrongness. A disturbance in the familiar darkness. I glance at the guards. Even they look spooked, their faces pale in the corridor’s gloom.

“What is it?” I ask, the words sharp as flint.

Has my fucking brother done something heinous? Has he become a crying, broken wreck again, a ridiculous spectacle of grief for the entire household to witness?

“Magnus dropped off a present for Konstantine hours ago,” he says, his voice low, almost conspiratorial, a whisper that seems to crawl along the stone.