Chapter Text
It was a special occasion, a very special occasion. An event that had not happened in Titus’ lifetime, and only once in his father’s when he was still a young man barely into adulthood. To say this shit was rare would be an understatement.
A high council family had been wiped off the face of the earth.
An entire family, gone within the blink of an eye because one of them broke one of Mr Le Bail’s rules - like a fucking idiot.
The bylaws stated there had to be six families in the High Council at any given moment, and so they had all gathered to see which of the lower families under Mr Le Bail’s contract would win tonight’s hunt and enter the inner circle.
The heads of the lower families were already frothing at their mouths at the prospect of all that power. Titus let his gaze travel over the people gathered in the reception room of the Danforth lodge. Since his father held the High Seat, it fell to him to host, and Chester would never pass up an opportunity to flaunt his wealth and power in front of the other families.
Titus watched the families and their entourage like a shark would its next meal.
High Council families were not permitted to kill each other, but such rules did not apply to the lower families. Tonight, one member from each of the sixteen families eligible for a seat on the High Council would be chosen by the head of the family to represent them in a deadly game of Hide and Seek, since that was the ancestral initiation rite of the Le Domas family. One last game of Hide and Seek before that family fell into collective forgottenness.
The last one standing would bring the ultimate honour to their family.
Titus wondered who’d be chosen.
The High Council families were already placing their bets, a way to pass the time and soothe the disappointment that their hands would see no blood tonight.
It irked Titus that he would not get to participate. He did not enjoy sitting idle while others got to have all the fun, and he never passed up a chance for some fun.
“The Covingtons have arrived, Sir.” The butler announced in his haughty tone of voice that never failed to make Titus’ eye twitch.
“They are late.” Chester sniffed, visibly affronted by the tardiness of a guest who, according to him - no doubt - should have fallen to their knees and licked his boots in gratitude for the honour of being permitted to exist near him.
“There was a problem with the youngest child, I heard. The daughter is… troubled, they say.”
“Troubled?” Ursula raised a brow. Her perfectly manicured fingers wrapped around the thin stem of a wine glass, she looked past the butler to catch a glimpse of the group entering the reception room. A man, broad-shouldered, grey-haired with a steely expression that gave away not a single glimpse into his inner workings, led a group of men of varying ages, six total, each one with the same eyes as him - his sons, no doubt.
The head of the Covington family was a stern, cut-throat business man, a tech mogul renowned for supplying the military institutions of the world with state of the art cyber security systems. Titus was pretty sure they guarded the Danforth’s online activity as well. Not that his father trusted him enough to ever involve him in the finer details of business. No, that was a place always and forever reserved for Ursula.
Titus’ grip tightened around his cigar, and he had to use a considerable amount of willpower to force his fingers to relax again before it crumbled in his hand and drew the attention of his father.
Richard Covington did not fidget like the other heads of the lower families. He did not exude an ounce of nervous energy, not because he was any better at hiding it than the others - Titus would have noticed, nobody hid from Titus - apparently, Richard simply did not fear tonight. He acted like a man who was already sure of his victory, and the only reason he was not yet drinking to it was that he had been raised with manners.
He glanced over his shoulder, as though responding to something one of his sons said, and in doing so, he revealed a glimpse of a girl.
A woman no older than mid-twenties, encompassed in the throng of strong young men.
You were the smallest of the bunch, a good head shorter than the smallest of your brothers. Next to them, you looked like a wisp. A joke made by the universe to taunt a proud, tall man after gifting him one strong heir after another. Deep, dark shadows clung to the bottom of your eyes, giving you a sickly, haunted appearance that was oddly alluring, a cacophony of darkness and grace, angelic beauty defaced by hell’s enticing touch.
Your hair was braided into two pigtails, the ends resting gently against your collarbones. You wore a simple, short black dress, the skirt falling down your thighs in soft folds that shifted with every step you took. The top was made out of a rose-embroidered mesh fabric that melted into long sleeves curling tightly around your arms, hanging down stiff and unmoving at your sides. Titus almost mourned the sight of the layer of black fabric preserving your modesty - if only just barely. See-through black tights covered your legs that ended in tightly laced, perfectly polished combat boots.
You stood out among your brothers, each the picture-perfect rich, posh heir of a multimillion-dollar company.
You, you were a black sheep, an anomaly, a chip in grandma’s perfect china.
But instead of casting you out, like Titus’ father had thought about many times and didn’t do only because he feared the hit his reputation might take if he did, your family seemed to coalesce around you. The protectiveness your brothers felt towards you was evident in every tensed muscle in their backs, in every sneering glare directed at any and all men who dared as much as glance towards you.
Your father offered you his arm, and after a brief moment of hesitation, you stepped out of the protective cocoon of brothers and into the crystal-filtered light the chandeliers cast down upon them. Your hair gleamed like molten, precious metal beneath the shine, and Titus could not help but wonder how it would look in his fist, torn from your scalp in fleshy chunks, covered in your blood.
You leaned into your father, tipping your head back when he lowered his to whisper something to you.
Titus thought, sucking on his cigar while his eyes followed your every step, that you looked deliciously like a doe faced with the hunter’s rifle. Young, obviously terrified, clinging to your father’s arm so hard your knuckles went white against the expensive, navy fabric of his suit.
“Don’t even think about it.” Ursula hissed in his direction, souring his fun before Titus had a chance to think about what even that fun was.
He scowled at her. “Think about what, dear sister?”
“Her.”
“I am observing potential new allies.”
“Covington has been father’s business partner for years. The only reason he is not on the High Council yet is that new families don’t usually join! He and Father have been asking Mr Le Bail for this opportunity! The entire family adores that girl. And she’s sick, apparently, so you will stay away from her! Try not to fuck this up for Father, Titus.”
Titus’ lips rolled back in a barely concealed snarl. “Stop treating me like a fucking child! I haven’t done anything."
“Yet.” His sister muttered into her wine glass. Titus’ jaw tensed.
Yet.
That was the thing. The tiny little detail his family never let him forget. They all believed Titus Danforth was, at any given moment, only seconds away from fucking something up. Always. And no matter how often he didn’t fuck up, how often he won hunts or struck advantageous business deals, he knew he was doomed to mess up sooner or later. They knew, and they never let him forget it.
No matter how long he managed to not fuck up, they only ever saw him when he did.
“Chester.” Richard shook the Danforth patriarch's hand, you still clinging to his arm, practically glued to his side. Your eyes flicked nervously between the three Danforths. “Do forgive our tardiness. It was more difficult than I had anticipated to get this one to leave the car.” He spoke with the easy charm of old British aristocracy. You frowned at his words and attacked your bottom lip with your teeth. A displeased whine slipped from your tongue, but Richard either didn’t hear it or didn’t care to.
“Your youngest?” Chester looked at you as he looked at everything he had not yet appraised the worth of. You did not weather his attention well. You crumpled like a dried leaf under his shoes, pressing your slight body into your father’s side.
“Indeed.” Richard smirked. He lifted his free hand to pet the top of your head, a gesture that exuded both tenderness and condescension at once, all the while never once taking his eyes off Chester. “Why don’t you go with Caspian to find a drink, darling?”
“Daddy, I mustn’t drink.”
Richard’s nostrils flared ever so slightly, but his arrogant smirk remained plastered onto his lips. “I think we can make an exception on such a momentous occasion, no?”
“But, daddy, my doctor said, with my meds, if I drink I could-”
His head snapped towards you, all fatherly affection evaporated, there one second and gone the next. His brows pulled together in a glare that Titus expected to have you cowering at your father’s side - but you didn’t. Your fear was still there, palpable, permeating the air around you with a sweetness Titus would like to lap off your skin, but your father was not the source of it.
Interesting.
“I don’t care if you get wine or fucking apple juice, yeah? The important part of that sentence was go with your brother.”
You pouted. “Just say that then. You know I can’t have-” You were cut off by your father’s hand against your back, shoving you gently towards one of your brothers.
“She takes everything far too literally sometimes.” Richard huffed in a painfully transparent attempt to smooth over the rough edges of losing his composure in front of someone he clearly deemed an important ally. You were still pouting, eyes treacherously wet, when your brother - Caspian, the oldest of the bunch, thirty-two if Titus remembered correctly - closed his hand around your upper arm to steer you away.
Richard sighed. “And now she’ll pout for the rest of the evening because I raised my voice at her. I swear, all the sensitivity my boys lack got concentrated into her. One slightly too harsh criticism and she is a weepy mess. I can only presume that is the cross one has to carry when raising a daughter. Ah, but then again, perhaps it simply does not do someone of her disposition well to grow up in a house with seven men and no mother.”
“Ursula never cried, not even as a baby. Titus, on the other hand… well.”
Titus gritted his teeth. His nails dug into the velvet-padded armrest of his chair.
“It goes to show how different children are, and how weakness sneaks in despite our best efforts as parents. I don’t believe I have met your daughter before.” Chester continued.
“She does not get out of the house much.” Richard shrugged. “Company does not suit her and, to be quite frank, these things tend to overwhelm her. Not that I mind how easy she makes it for me to keep her away from the wrong kind of male attention." His eyes lingered on Titus for a moment, who merely smirked around his cigar, before resuming to look in your direction again, all but staring.
You were standing next to your brother, stiff, eyes flitting across the whole room as though looking for a threat, flicking up to the ceilings where a heavy chandelier hung every once in a while. Caspian was deep in conversation with a group of heirs. Some of the men tried to catch your attention now and then, seemingly oblivious to the iron grip with which you clung to your glass - indeed apple juice, judging by the colour and earlier comment your father made.
You did not engage with them.
When they talked to you directly, your attention shifted to them for a brief second before flitting back to your brother, who would answer in your stead.
Titus could not quite decide whether you were just incredibly sheltered and shy - or that deep under your family’s thumb, you did not even dare answer some small talk without their approval.
“You never said what exactly is… wrong… with her, I think.” Chester made a vague gesture towards you. Richard’s expression hardened. Titus could have sworn the temperature around them dropped several degrees.
“Nothing is wrong with her.” Your father said calmly, the type of calm that was wrought from murderous hunger and shameless bloodlust. “She is simply wired a little… differently.”
“I must say, I find it curious you brought her along. Tonight’s festivities won’t hurt her disposition?”
“Oh, I doubt that will be a problem.” Richard clasped his hands behind his back. His winning smile returned. “Well, it was delightful as ever to see you again, Chester. I have a few more greetings to get through before this evening commences. I am greatly looking forward to it.” His smile shifted into a crooked grin that revealed a single, too-sharp canine.
“I am looking forward to finding out which of your sons you’re sending into the hunt, dear friend.” Chester’s arrogant smile only lasted as long as it took your father to disappear into the excited crowd, trailed by three of his sons. Two split off the group to join the oldest and you, flocking to you like a horde of overprotective geese.
“Wired differently.” Chester scoffed into his whiskey. “She’s a fucking nutjob if you believe the help.”
Titus was sure the help called him a fucking nutjob too, and they could not be further from the truth. What did the help know anyway, aside from envy and resentment?
You were a pretty thing, Titus could not deny it, not that he cared to try. You had that air of innocence wrapped around you like a shawl that would drive any hungry man up the walls. Your big doe eyes would make a more composed, more controlled man salivate, and the way you so desperately clung to the men in your life, as though you placed your entire life into their hands, all your trust that they’d provide for you and keep you safe had his slacks feeling just a little too tight.
He pictured those big, teary eyes seeking assurance and protection, peering up at him while you knelt between his feet. He pictured how soft your hair must feel, how warm those pouty lips would be… how pliable your body…
Not that Titus ever got much further than those pictures, he thought bitterly and took another drag from his cigar, trying not to scowl. Ursula would notice, and he did not need his twin sister in his head while fantasising about a far too young, pretty little thing like you.
Your dress was just long enough to not be indecent, but with the way you wore it and carried yourself, Titus doubted you could look indecent even if you tore all your clothes off your body right then and there and showed the world every inch of your bare skin.
What a little angel you were…
Titus grew up on a short leash, to the point he now barely felt it. His father had made sure to teach Titus young what happened when he did something old Chester Danforth would disapprove of. Fooling around in boarding school was out of the question - there had been no boarding school for Titus. Just endless, gruesome hours locked in the library with personal tutors and barely a break to catch his breath while Ursula got to go abroad. She could be trusted with freedom for some reason, and Titus was not even permitted to prove he could be too.
He wasn’t as intelligent as her, nor as cunning as his father, and for some reason that had been enough for both of them to decide Titus was good for nothing but his hunger for brutality and bloodshed.
They were the brains, and he the fists - and attack dogs who did not listen were put down.
Titus learnt this lesson young.
It was beaten into him with the same ferocity his tutors tried to make him smarter, just with the difference that Chester had been more successful.
On his sixteenth birthday, Chester introduced Titus to the most gorgeous woman Titus had ever seen up until that moment. She had long, dark hair, full lashes and a smile as sweet as it was wicked. It was embarrassing how long it took Titus to figure out she had been paid by his father to be there. None of the secret whispers and sly touches had been real. She crawled into his bed, not because she found him charming or handsome, as she claimed; no, she did it for the money Chester had promised her.
Money in exchange for making Titus a man.
The few times Titus managed to get out from under his father’s and sister’s thumb long enough to meet a pretty woman, he either fumbled it all up by embarrassing himself or accidentally offending her - or he heard their voices, telling him how worthless and inadequate he was and who could get hard with their sister whispering in his ear?
To claim Titus was frustrated would be an understatement.
A leashed, castrated dog never allowed to be his own man, to be more than Ursula's untrustworthy twin, Chester's fuck up of a son, the family disappointment…
Titus thought about life without them more and more these days, a life in which nobody told him what to do, where nobody spoke down to him, struck him, or made him feel like he was even less than dog shit under their shoe.
There was no rule against killing a family member.
He checked the bylaws.
He’d checked them many times, caressing the empty space where such a clause should be written, but wasn’t. Mr Le Bail would not punish or stop Titus from tearing free of his leash, but the simple truth was… Titus was too much of a coward to do it.
Ursula and his father were all Titus had.
The only people who would ever see an ounce of goodness in him, or at least usefulness. Yeah, he wasn’t the smartest or most composed, he wasn’t all that good with the business, but he never lost a hunt. That, and the Danforth blood running in his veins, alone gave him worth. And he clung to it as desperately as a little boy to the bloodied, disfigured body of the mother that dared love him too much, that dared make the great Chester Danforth's heir weak.
***
The gathered guests fell silent at the first chime of the bell.
The High Council families gathered at the head of the room, by the lectern where the Lawyer placed the ancient tomb holding all their contracts and bylaws since… honestly, Titus had no idea. The old, faded pictures preserving the history of the High Council showed glimpses of the Lawyer throughout the centuries. He always looked the same, exactly as he did today, opening his ancient tomb and addressing the room.
You waved at him from where you stood, hiding behind your father. For the first time all evening, you smiled. Something hot and volatile and gastly flared in Titus' chest at the sight of it. He could not make sense of it.
The Lawyer smiled back at you, eyes crinkling at the corners, and he winked.
How did you, the most guarded secret of your father's legacy, know a being like the Lawyer?
“We have gathered here today to fill the empty spot on the High Council. Sixteen of the lower bloodlines have been chosen by Mr Le Bail to be given the chance to prove themselves worthy of a seat on the High Council. The Heads of your families will now announce the proxy they have chosen to represent their blood on today’s hunt. Choose well, ladies and gentlemen, for only one will survive the night.”
Konstantin Von Arco was first in line. He appointed his third-born son, a brawny, twenty-nine-year-old who looked as if he had more muscle than brains. It continued down the line of prospective families, each chosen proxy was the strongest, biggest fighter the family had to offer, and likely trained for this very day for as long as they had lived.
Titus could not help the urge to find you, pick you out of the crowd of heirs. You were surrounded by your brothers once again. The glass you held for most of the evening but never actually drank from had disappeared from your stiff clutch, leaving you no choice but to fidget with your fingers, digging your long nails into the sensitive flesh around your nails and tearing at the skin until you bled.
You were staring at the ground to your feet, as though desperately trying to forget where you were, forget the people surrounding you.
Titus wanted you to look at him.
You didn't, and his hands curled into fists from the inexplicable rage your silent refusal poured into his body.
One of your brothers - Tobias, Titus believed to remember his name was, the second-born - placed his hand over yours, effectively stopping your attempts at self-mutilation. You looked up, an air of surprise cutting across your face, just to make room for a gentle smile.
Your father stepped forward.
“I - Richard Covington - appoint as my proxy to represent me and my bloodline-” The gathered guests held their breaths. On which of his sons his choice would fall had been the topic of the evening. High Council family members exchanged glances, some already grinning, believing their wagers to come true any moment now- “-my beloved daughter.”
The uproar was immediate and violent.
A barrage of confusion and disbelief so loud Titus felt it punch against his eardrum.
It drowned out your name on your father’s tongue. You flinched at the sudden clamour, which only seemed to add fuel to the fire.
“What foul game are you playing, Covington?!” The head of another lower family shouted across the room. Richard’s smug expression did not waver once. “If you believe our heirs would hesitate to kill a little girl, you are sorely mistaken!”
“I have chosen a proxy, Declan, as is demanded by the rules.” Richard turned towards the lawyer ever so slightly. “I am permitted to choose anyone who shares my blood, am I not?”
“That is correct.” The Lawyer smirked as though he'd known all along the choice would fall on you and found the room's reaction amusing. Wasn't that curious?
“Then I choose my daughter.”
You were still standing in the circle of your brothers, unmoving aside from the tiniest tremble shaking the tips of your fingers. Richard’s hand clamped down on your shoulder, a little rougher than necessary, and dragged you forward, forcing you to stand in front of your families just as the other chosen proxies were already doing.
You looked even smaller, so exposed, served up to the hungry leering of starving predators on a silver platter. A few fine hairs had fallen from your braids and now framed your terrified, pretty face.
Titus mourned his exclusion from the hunt even more now. It would be nothing short of delectable to chase you through the woods, hearing your whimpers and tasting your tears before feeling his war pick shatter your skull.
“If you didn’t want the seat, you could have just said so.” Another patriarch jeered after announcing his choice - his oldest son, another brute about twice your size who was already sizing you up.
Titus’ jaw tensed at the way the man’s eyes raked over you, as if you were someone he had any right to look at that way.
“A shame.” He tutted. “To waste such a nice piece of ass on a game rigged against her…”
Your eyes flicked towards him, gaze sharpening, posture shifting out of the meek cower terror held you trapped in, tensing, morphing into something deadly - there and gone again so fast Titus wondered if he had truly seen it, or just imagined it.
He must have.
Nothing about the way you behaved tonight screamed, even whispered, ‘killer’. He was loath to agree with an oaf like Svetlitskiy’s son, but you did have a very nice ass, and it was a shame to waste you on a game you could not possibly win. What was your father doing?
“There are easier ways to get rid of a disappointing child.” Von Arco chuckled. Richard’s posture tensed, but before he could say or do something, your voice rose over the excited clamour, quiet and soft, but clear, bright like nothing in this room, this life of theirs, could ever be.
You turned, just your upper body, feet remaining firmly planted against the ground, and tipped your head to the side. “You want me to kill these people, daddy?”
Something about your casual tone choked off the guests’ laughter. The question was phrased too lightly, too unbothered to come from lips like yours, your voice far too sweet for the meaning of your words.
“I want you-” Your father stepped forward. He put his arm around your shoulders to catch your chin. He pushed your head back towards the Lawyer, making you look at him before speaking again, lips brushing the shell of your ear. “-to listen to the Lawyer, and follow his rules. You will follow his rules like you follow your doctor’s rules, hm? As if they were daddy’s rules, is that clear?”
“Yes, sir.” Something changed in your eyes and smile then. The corner of your mouth curled. Your gaze sharpened, leaving innocent curiosity behind for something far more sinister. Titus watched these minuscule changes with parted lips, hunger and greed swirling aimlessly through his insides until it required all of his fragile composure not to break rank to grab you and lay claim over you right then and there.
Ursula shot him a warning look from the side that he missed entirely.
You listened with rapt attention, clinging to the Lawyer's lips and every word as he explained the rules, nodding every once in a while. Your body practically vibrated with excitement the room mistook for anxiety, but Titus saw the difference.
He watched your anxiety all day; this was different.
The Lawyer closed the book, and a chime sounded in the distance. Half the proxies rushed out, abandoning the room and the weapon’s stand in the middle of the circle, choosing to win ground and distance over joining the no doubt bloody fight about to erupt for the array of weapons to choose from - well, to choose from for those who reached it alive.
Von Arco’s son and Collett’s daughter decided to go for the weapons at the same time and were soon locked in a bloody fist fight.
Two more proxies chose to run instead of fight.
You remained right where you were. Svetlitskiy’s son was still watching you, hunger ablaze in his eyes, licking his lips. There were no rules dictating that he could not hurt you before killing you. No rules to keep him from sating his hunger before letting your blood soak into his hands, and Titus didn't know what he'd do if Svetlitskiy’s son attempted any of it.
“May I kill them now, daddy?” You spoke without taking your eyes off the fight, waiting patiently for permission even when your fingers twitched at your side. The other High Council members laughed, chuckling at the naive, silly little girl. Even Ursula grinned.
Titus didn’t.
Instead, a cold shudder ran down his back.
He remained perfectly still, hazel eyes trained on you, unmoving.
He saw something none of them saw, he realised then. He saw your darkness where your pretty, young face and peculiar behaviour still fooled the rest.
You were a monster, tamed, obedient only to your father's word, yet still wild, longing, yearning to sink your teeth into warm flesh and taste blood.
“Yes, darling.”
You moved the second your father was done speaking. In a single, fluid motion, you shifted from standing to lunging. You took down Svetlitskiy’s son with three precise, hard hits - the heel of your hand slamming upwards into his nose, your knee sinking hard into his stomach when he toppled over, blood spouting from his nose, and at last, tackling him to the ground with all the force of a rabid bear.
It did not matter that Svetlitskiy was twice your size. It did not matter that he was older, that he was nothing but sheer muscle, with hands as big as your head.
You took him down with bared teeth and bare hands as though you’d been born for this.
“What did you say about my ass, hm? Why don’t you fucking say that again?!” You cupped Svetlitskiy's cheeks and slammed the back of his head into the parquet. The crunch of shattering bone was sickening, echoing through the suddenly quiet reception hall. Deafening. Again and again.
Titus found himself enthralled, utterly enthralled, by the sight of you.
“I can’t fucking hear you, you pathetic piece of shit!” Your fist came down on his face, shattering what remained intact of his nose, driving bone fragments into his brain, pulverising his cheekbones, every last part of his facial structure, until the parquet was covered in a crimson puddle and your knuckles split. Blood splattered through the air, drizzling your face in a red mist that ran down your neck in a narrow trickle and left your teeth covered in a pink sheen.
You wore blood well, Titus thought, and a picture of you wearing nothing but the blood of your enemies popped into his head, unbidden and so very persistent.
You put your thumbs over his eyes and pressed, squeezing soft tissue until it popped under your manicured nails. A deranged grin cut across your face, distorting your pretty face into something not quite human, a mutilated appropriation of human delight. Titus found himself unable to look away. The room around him faded away. He wasn’t even watching the blood pouring forth from the eye sockets to drown your thumbs and pale yellow nail polish.
He watched your face.
The way the corners of your mouth twitched. The intense focus tensing your facial features, that feverish, edging on deranged expression gleaming in your eyes.
Titus almost forgot himself, almost forgot the people surrounding him - and you - almost forgot his sister and father and their scathing disapproval for everything he did and all the potential he lacked.
You looked up at that moment, hungry eyes finding Titus among the crowd of stunned High Council families. The tip of your tongue darted out between your plush lips, swiping away some of the blood clinging to them.
Titus’ heart stuttered in his chest, a feeling so very foreign to him, it startled him.
You tipped your head to the side, like a puppy trying to understand the world it had been tossed into without any instructions. Your thumbs still pressed down on your prey, the pale, innocent yellow of your nails now entirely swallowed up by the gory eyesockets.
If Titus were more of a man, if Titus were the man his father had tried to raise him to be, he’d abandon his position at his family's side and go to you. He was a Danforth, and Danforths did not ask permission to own what they desired, and Titus could not remember a time in his life when he had ever wanted something as much as his wicked soul craved you in that exact moment.
He pictured it, stepping through the bloody puddle your hunger tore into your victim, now staining the vintage wood, grabbing you, hoisting you up and into his arms… he pictured taking you right there and then, the blood of your kill still warm beneath your bodies as he claimed you as his-
“Fourteen more to go, sweetie. Don't get distracted.” Your father’s voice cut through Titus’ quickly escalating fantasy, and as much as it soured the sweet pictures Titus’ mind conjured - it soured the satisfaction you’d found in carnage even more.
Your head whipped around, eyes locking in on your father, the snarl meant for Svetlitskiy still stretching across your lips. Your father tutted. Your snarl fell away. A chided dog remembering who its master was. You got to your feet after another second of hesitation, clearly unwilling to leave behind your prey.
How cruel to make you.
How utterly cruel.
Titus would never force you to abandon your meal, especially when you looked so beautiful while devouring it…
You sucked your thumb into your mouth, licking off blood soaking your skin as you sauntered over to the weapon's stand. Collett stared at you from where she was cowering next to her kill, wide-eyed. She scampered backwards over the ground, her blood-stained hands slipping helplessly over the ground in her desperate attempt to get away from you.
Blood shone wetly on your dress and tights, covered your hands and ran down your arms. Your braids rested innocently against your collarbone, the ends dipped in blood.
You hummed as you observed the weapons.
Titus had no words to describe you, no words to make sense of what he was seeing - angelic was far too tame, and demonic did not give your sweet beauty the praise it was owed. Was this how Lucifer had looked? In the hour of his banishment? God’s brightest and most beautiful now cloaked in the deepest, darkest shadows of creation?
“I can take whatever I want?” You tipped your head to the side again, looking up at the Lawyer for answers. He inclined his head in a nod, a smile curling around his lips.
Titus half expected you to choose a firearm.
It was easy. Clean. Anyone could learn to be a good shot, and most women he’d encountered during these kinds of hunts preferred the long-range weapons. Less personal.
You didn't.
You picked up a battle axe that looked too heavy as that you should be able to wield it with such smooth ease as you did when you wandered over to Collett and brought the sharp edge down on her fear-drenched face. Blood hit the ground with sickening, loud smacks. Collett’s father stifled a shocked scream.
Your grin widened, edging onto mania.
You cocked your head at the split skull beneath you and the brain matter smeared across the axe blade. You set your boot against Collett’s unmoving shoulder to pull your axe free. The blade slid free with a wet smacking sound, followed by the dull thud of the unmoving body hitting the ground.
As soon as you left the reception room behind, the gathered guests flocked towards the TV screens showcasing the different angles of the extensive CCTV system. The other contenders had been forgotten, wiped from the collective conscience of the invited guest by your gruesome display of startling competency and ruthless bloodlust.
Your father wore a smug, pleased expression at the excited chatter rising all around him. Caspian scowled and turned away, taking two of his brothers with him to move towards the refreshments. Titus followed. He stayed at a distance, enough to conceal his intention but not so much that the audience's excitement at the hunt picking up would drown out their conversation. Always the hunter.
“This is a fucking mistake.” Caspian hissed at one of the hors d'oeuvres as though the smoked salmon had just insulted his mother.
“I don’t know.” Sebastian hummed as he popped a grape into his mouth. “This seems right up her alley. No restrictions, no rules? That’s much more to her taste than the morsels father feeds her to keep her compulsions fed and her compliant.”
“She’s happiest when people don’t interfere with her kills, brother.” Tobias added.
“Exactly.” Caspian crossed his arms in front of his chest. “She isn’t used to her prey killing each other, or to them fighting back! This is reckless and short-sighted. What if she gets hurt? We have no idea how she’s going to react to that.”
“Do I detect a flicker of jealousy in your voice, Caspian?” Sebastian grinned. “Because father chose her, and not you?”
“Please.” Caspian sniffed and adjusted the cuff of his dress shirt. “This kind of… event is much more to your taste than it is mine. Besides, Father is simply seizing the opportunity that, for once, his deranged daughter is useful for something. He is making her pay for the years he’s been protecting her, for ‘allowing’ her to sate her hunger.”
“What has you scowling then? Our sister gets to live out her dark side, and Father gets his seat on the High Council. Seems like everyone wins to me.” Tobias observed his brother. “Isn’t it a good thing she gets to let loose for once? Father’s rules can be suffocating, you’ve said so yourself.”
Caspian glanced over his shoulder towards their father. One of the cameras was following your movement down the east wing. You were dragging the axe behind you, leaving a trail of blood in your wake.
“And I stand by that. But what do you think happens when she realises she does not get the fifteen kills she was promised? One proxy has already been killed by someone who wasn’t her. And how do you think she’ll react when Father tries to force her back into her cage after letting her act out her bloodlust to her heart’s content? Do you think she’ll accept everything going back to the way it was before? She isn’t twelve anymore!”
Titus slipped away towards the bar before his presence could be noticed by the brothers. A fresh drink in hand, he made his way across the room once more, pulled towards his family by the force of loyalty instilled in him and the lack of other options.
Who did he have in this life besides them?
On the screen, Titus watched you sneak up on another proxy, a woman about twice your age cowering behind the bar in the small ballroom - whether to stalk another proxy or in an ill-advised attempt to hide, Titus couldn’t tell. Not that it mattered. Not with you there. You grabbed her hair, yanked her head back in a violent tug and cut her throat with a dagger, wide and deep, so deep you hit bone, leaving the woman’s throat a gaping, blood-spouting mess.
“She’s just mowing through them all, isn’t she?” Ursula hummed, eyes glued to the screen, clearly trying to decide how much of a threat you were.
“Unexpected.” Chester Danforth was not a man who appreciated unexpected things, but he did not show his displeasure outwardly, especially not when Richard joined him, whistling a playful tune to himself.
“Quite something, isn’t she?” Your father folded his hands behind his back. His lips curled into a sardonic grin as he watched you smash Von Arco’s face into the bar top, reducing it to a bloody pulp. “Though, of course, I’ve heard your children are quite - ah - skilled as well. One must defend their assets, no? Your father certainly knew that.” He glanced at the ring on Chester’s finger. The ultimate sigil of power.
Chester ignored the obvious dig at his position as keeper of the High Seat, a position he inherited from his father, rather than earned himself, something that had always been a sore subject for Chester. Only the slight jump of the muscle in his jaw gave his emotions away.
“I certainly see now why you’ve chosen her.”
“I didn’t want another child.” Richard mused, swirling the glass he'd picked off a server's tablet in his hand, watching the dark red wine slosh around. “Much less a daughter. What use do I have for a daughter? But my late wife… ah, she wanted one so badly. I confess that is the only reason we have so many sons. She was not willing to give up. She grew so desperate that she asked Mr Le Bail to bless her with a daughter. Well… one should be careful what they ask Mr Le Bail for, no?” He grinned. “She got her daughter, but she was never quite… right.” Richard’s grin widened. “She was eight when she killed her mother. Said the man in the chair at the head of the table told her to do it.” At that, your father laughed, actually laughed. “Every time she talks to him, I wonder whether she actually sees him or is simply crazy. Oh well… I got everything I could ever want from my wife, no great loss there, and my daughter… I'll freely admit that I enjoy being a girl dad, as the young folk today say, more than I ever thought I would.”
Titus could not quite decipher the way your father looked at you. It was a mixture of a businessman watching one of his long-term investments finally paying off and that of a doting old man looking at the single most precious thing of his whole life.
Titus looked back at the screen, at you.
Every little detail Titus learnt about you only made him crave you more.
He had to have you. In what way, he could not quite tell yet.
It was almost a shame you would soon be part of a Council family - after all, which of the other proxies would possess the power to best you? Especially if Mr Le Bail’s favour was with you, as your father seemed to insinuate - for killing you would surely be one of the most delectable indulgences Titus in his lavish, privileged life had ever partaken in.
But another, increasingly growing in strength, part of him revolted against the mere notion of any harm coming unto you, ever.
Hunger prickled under his skin, squirming like maggots devouring his flesh. It was almost unbearable to know he had to wait. Wait for you to finish your hunt. Wait for the watchful eyes of your brothers to be clouded by fatigue and alcohol. Wait for your father to be busy celebrating his victory. Wait for him and his own father to be distracted by instructing Richard on the privileges and obligations of his new position.
Wait.
Wait until he could find you - what he’d do when he had you alone… Titus wasn’t sure. He just knew that he had to get closer to you.