Sela’s pencil stilled. “Third time this week.”
Diel inhaled deeply through his nose and exhaled slowly. He mentally wrestled the monster back until its presence was a dull ache at the back of his head, throbbing like the very worst of migraines. Diel sat back on his ass and laid his arms over his bent knees. His head twitched as he fought the everlasting battle to keep his anger in check.
“The Brethren,” Diel said, voice raspy with exhaustion. Sela twirled the pencil in his fingers as he listened to his best friend, the stick of wood and charcoal practically an extension of his artistic hand.
Diel’s eyes lost focus as he bathed in the memory of his collar being turned off in Purgatory. Anger had filled his veins, and Diel and the monster he kept at arm’s length had become one, united in violence and death, twin dark souls synced and, for once in their lives, calm and at peace as they plunged their twenty-inch blades into the men that had destroyed their childhoods.
Destroyed every single part of them.
“D?” Sela said, pulling Diel from his stupor.
His temples throbbed, his ever-present migraine pounding like iron bars being slammed into his brain over and over again. His migraines had always been bad, the monster never sleeping long enough to grant a reprieve. It was constantly pacing at the back of his mind, desperate to finally be freed of the collar’s stringent control.
Diel rubbed the back of his neck. “I keep replaying that night in Purgatory.” Memories of killing the Brethren flashed like a highlight reel in his mind. “When the collar was off and we finally got to end them …” His cock stirred as he recalled the feel of his blades slicing into flesh, of hitting bone when they plunged too deep. But his excitement misted away to vapor when he remembered the familiar buzz of the collar being reignited and his monster being lashed and gagged once again. “And then Gabe switched it back on.” It had been like a junkie getting his fix, the most hedonistic drug cocktail of his life, only to be abruptly forced to go cold turkey afterward.
Diel’s head twitched again as his pulse began to race at just the memory of smelling the Brethren’s blood on his skin—the sweetest perfume. His hands flexed as he felt the phantom necks that had snapped under his fingers.
The collar buzzed and sent warning volts soaring through his body. His muscles tensed as he absorbed the pain, as it hissed at the monster inside to retreat. To get the fuck back. Sweat beaded on his forehead; a single drop ran down his spine.
Gasping for air, Diel submitted to the monster’s sudden surge of power to snarl, “I want this fucking collar off. I want to be who I was fucking born to be without the restraints.” Diel tensed and threw the monster back from taking control. The monster retreated, but its anger-tipped words echoed around Diel’s head like they were being blasted through speakers. Diel’s stomach turned and a fissure of panic slithered across his fractured soul at that thought. The thought off actually being free from the collar … of what that would look like, feel like …
Diel knew his monster could never be freed. He knew the collar could never come off. It would consume Diel. It would eradicate every part of who he was.
“D?” Sela asked, concern in his voice.
Diel couldn’t tell him that his monster was gaining power. Flooding Diel’s brain daily with thoughts of death and freedom and never having to obey electrical currents again.
“I want the Brethren gone,” Diel said. He had to throw Sela off the scent of his fear. “Every one of them. I could give a shit about any other murderous fucker Gabe sends us to kill. I want the Brethren. Only the fucking Brethren.” The words may have been a cover for Diel’s battle with his monster, but it made them no less true.
That night in Purgatory had done something irreparable to Diel. For years the Fallen had evaded the Brethren, stayed hidden so as not to draw their attention to the boys who had evaded the final exorcisms. Gabriel had made it that way, made them ghosts to anyone outside of Eden Manor, for their own protection. But Gabe wasn’t like Diel or his brothers. His blood didn’t sing to exact revenge on the men that had tortured them. He didn’t yearn to kill every single one of the secret sect until none of them remained. Until nothing was left of them but bloodstains and bones.
It was all Diel thought of. Day and night. Every minute of every day. It was his obsession.
Sela nodded, then, with his paper in hand, approached the bars of the cell. He kneeled down, his dark eyes fixed on Diel, and turned the piece of paper he had been drawing on. Diel’s blue gaze fell on the intricate sketch—every detail was perfect, as if created by Michelangelo himself.