Kent groaned as he began to stir. I’d hit his head hard enough to break the skin, so his gray hair was streaked with red. There wasn’t much in the old shed: a bare bulb hung from the ceiling as our only light. A few rusty metal gardening tools were hung on the walls, and there was an old shelf covered with pots and bags of fertilizer. It was distant from the house, and with the loud music from the party, no one could hear if someone yelled in here.
No one would hear if someone screamed.
Kent shifted, and his shoulders stiffened as he realized his hands were bound. He blinked rapidly as his eyes opened, and I wondered what he took in first. Did he recognize the stone floor, did he recognize the walls enough to know where he was? Or was this a place he’d never even bothered to look inside, a place too below him? What did he think when he saw my boots standing in front of him? What did he feel, as he slowly raised his head and met my eyes — a skeletal woman in a dark suit — looking down at him?
He stared for a long moment, the wrinkles around his eyes and his forehead deepening. “Who are you?”
Zane was pacing behind me, like a rabid dog, eager to bite. The bloodlust was infectious between us. The more my excitement grew, the more he paced, clenching and unclenching his fingers.
“You know who I am, Kent.” I thought back. I remembered, but I did it with intention, with my own free will. I softened my voice and said, “Please. Don’t. The God isn’t real. It’s just an old story.”
Recognition struck his face. “Juniper Kynes. Dear God…”
“It’s been a long time.” I crouched down, arms resting on my thighs as I looked at him face to face. Up close, his age was even more evident. He hid it well, but he was weakening. The monster in my nightmares, the face I saw looking down at me with sadistic joy — was now an old man tied up at my feet.
It was the greatest euphoria I could ever feel.
“Did you miss me?” I said. “You looked for me. You tried so hard to take me.” I leaned closer as his eyes widened in trepidation. “But I was your greatest failure, Kent.”
I whipped out my hand, my knife clenched in it. The blade caught him across the face, and at first, he didn’t seem to realize what had happened. He blinked rapidly, looking at me in confusion, and then the gash across his cheek, across his lips, began to bleed.
“God,” he whispered, his voice shuddering. “Dear merciful God…”
“What God are you calling on, Kent?” I hissed. “Certainly not the Deep One. You think that monster in the mines is merciful? You think It cares? I’ve heard It, Kent. I’ve heard It for fucking years, Its voice in my head. I’ve seen It in my nightmares. Your God craves pain and suffering. Your God would revel in this. But you already know that. You know what It wants. That’s why you did this to me.” I stripped off my jacket, and tugged open my shirt so hard that the buttons popped off. In the dim light, the deep, ragged scars on my chest looked even worse. The shadows settled in them, and not even the tattoos, not even Zane’s mark, could hide them. “Do you remember, Kent? I screamed. I begged you. I was a child.”
“I had to,” he whimpered, and Zane snarled viciously behind me. “I had to, Juniper. You don’t understand. You don’t know what it’s like to serve the Deep One, we — we do only — we do only as we are ordained —”
I slashed again, and this time, he felt the pain and screamed. His other cheek opened, welling blood down his face. He gasped, shuddering, trying to spit away the blood spilling over his lips.
“You should be honored,” I said. “You’re going to be a martyr. You’re going to die for your God.”
He began to shake his head, frantically, his breath puffing. “No…no, no, no, Juniper, you don’t understand. You don’t understand. I’m doing only what I must — only — only what we’ve been asked to do. Y-your suffering…it…it should have been beautiful —”
I widened my eyes. “Oh, I see. Suffering is beautiful.” I nodded slowly and stepped back. “Zane, is suffering beautiful?”
I glanced back at him. His eyes were fixated on Kent, golden irises ringed with black. His eyes seemed to get darker with every passing day. “Oh yes,” he said. “Suffering is beautiful; it’s exquisite. Suffering is luxurious pain.” His eyes darted to me. The tiny garden shed felt too small to contain his energy, as if he might burst, ripping everything apart. “Shall I demonstrate?”
“Please do.”
My demon moved, and it was beautiful indeed. The screaming, the cracking bones, the tearing flesh. It wasn’t all that different from butchering a deer, really. Even in the moment, with the rush of it all, it scared me just how numb I felt to what I saw. It didn’t feel like I was watching a human being in pain.
This was just one of the monsters from my nightmares, screaming in defeat.
The scent of iron hung heavy in the air. Blood splattered across the stone wall, and the screams reached such a pitch they didn’t even sound human anymore. It was an animal’s scream, wretched in its primality, pathetically desperate, perfectly agonized.
Beautiful.
“Stop.”
Zane stopped, immediately, Kent’s leg gripped in his hands. The man was weeping, his shoulder torn from its socket, his other leg snapped at the ankle, the bone protruding through the skin. “Oh, come on,” Zane said, glancing back at me with starving eyes. “Just let me snap the femur.”
I sighed. “How can I say no to that face? Go on.”
Kent tried to scream — the sound of his own bone snapping cut him off. He seemed to choke, the sounds that emerged from his throat little more than garbled cries before he vomited all over himself.
“Ugh, come on, Kent,” I said, as Zane rose up, licking the flecks of blood from his lips. “At least try to maintain some dignity.”
“Please,” the man’s voice trembled, whimpering. “Please, please, just — just kill me…just kill me —”
“Suffering is beautiful, Kent!” I reached down, grabbing his jaw so he was forced to turn his reddened, bloody, tear-and-vomit stained face up to mine. I laughed. “Don’t you see, Kent? Don’t you understand? Suffer for your God!”
I’d waited so long for this. I’d waited so goddamn long. Every inch of me was tingling; I felt giddy. Every long night I’d laid awake, shaking in the cold, not daring to let my guard down for even a moment because I knew the monsters would close in — they’d led me to this. Every day when I’d walked until my feet bled, with no food, with nowhere to go — they had led me to this. Every intrusive memory, every time I’d curled up shaking, every time I’d looked in the mirror and wept at the ugliness he’d carved into me — it had led me to this.
I slammed my foot down on Kent’s injured leg, eliciting a cry that made Zane laugh. Kent Hadleigh had taken a child and made her a monster. And I had no doubt now: I was a monster, as much as Zane was, as much as Leon was. I was all jagged edges and broken pieces, scraped together into something sharp and ugly.
Zane took my wrist and kissed it. He kissed my palm, bloodying his lips, and then ran his tongue across my skin, his barbells caressing me.
“It’s so good to see you smile,” he said, looking up at me as he licked his lips. “It’s goddamn sexy.”
I pulled myself closer to him. All my senses were heightened, every nerve on fire. I was hungry — hungry for him, for how hot and hard his body felt as I ran my hands over his chest and around his neck. I traced my fingers over his lips, over the silver rings of his piercings, and he caught my finger in his mouth and sucked, his tongue moving around me so deliciously that I moaned.
“You’re hard,” I said, grinning up at him as he popped my finger from his mouth. Kent, moaning weakly on the floor, just had to watch. He had to watch me smile, watch me feel good, watch me live.
I hoped it killed him in a way physical death never could.
Zane looked truly monstrous in the dim light, with his painted face spattered with blood and his teeth stained with it. “How could I not be hard watching you like this, love? You look so fucking good with blood on you.”
He ran his claws over my cheek, down to my throat, which he gripped before he kissed me. The taste of blood mingled between us, our tongues moving together. I wanted him, right there in front of Kent. I wanted the vile old man to die knowing he’d failed, utterly and in every way. He’d wanted me to suffer for his God, he’d wanted to take my life away.
But he didn’t get my life, and he wouldn’t get my suffering for even another moment.
Before he died, he’d only see me in joy. He’d only see me in pleasure. I’d given his God enough of my pain.
I turned back to his bleeding and broken form on the floor. Zane held me from behind, his lips on my neck, his body moving eagerly against mine. I held up my knife, so it caught the dim yellow light.
“Your God likes blood, doesn’t It, Kent?” I said, as the man sniveled and Zane ground his cock against my ass, too eager to control himself. “If you truly want to be a good and loyal servant, I think you’d bleed for your God.”
I didn’t know if Kent even understood what I said. He was weeping and sniffling, snot and blood running down his face, shaking his head. “No…no…this isn’t — this isn’t how it’s meant to be. You wretched…wretched bitch!” Spittle flew from his lips as he looked up at me, adrenaline forcing one final fight out of him. “You can’t stop this! You…you’ll never…never stop this!” He was breathing hard, panting as he squirmed uselessly. “The God will have you! You can’t stop it —”
“I want to fuck you over his corpse,” Zane groaned against my neck, claws digging into my hips as Kent carried on. “He’s too loud. Bleed him like a fucking pig.”
I leaned down. Kent babbled on, cursing me, his voice breaking and weakening. He looked at me with hatred, with disdain — with terror. Finally, after so long, he looked at me and was afraid. It was the expression I’d always dreamed of seeing on his face. I let the sight brand itself into my mind, covering the memory of his smile as he cut me so many years ago.
I leaned down closer, closer, until I could whisper in his ear. “All is as it should be.”
I slit his throat. I wrenched the knife deep, slicing through his skin, blood spurting out over my hand, staining my white shirt and streaking down my chest. Kent gurgled, his body jerking, his strength sapping away. He kept staring up at me, like he couldn’t look away, his curses dying on his tongue.
Zane gripped me, wrenching open the button on my trousers. He tugged them down as I stood over Kent, watching him with cold curiosity. I wasn’t sure where my mind went in those moments. It was surreal. It was beyond joy; it couldn’t be described as happiness. I wasn’t sad. I didn’t regret what I’d done.
It was satisfaction: pure, unadulterated satisfaction.
It was revenge. Cold, callous, unfeeling revenge.
And God, it felt so good.
Zane’s fingers stroked over my clit as the life in Kent’s eyes dimmed. “You failed, Kent,” I whispered. “You failed, and your children will fail, and your followers will fail.” Zane’s cock stroked between my cheeks, his movements rough and eager, and I grinned. “You should have fucking made sure I died, Kent.”
Zane entered me in one long, hard stroke, and I moaned at the stretch. I was already wet as hell and ready for him, and I arched my hips back, taking him deep. Kent’s eyes had gone dull. The pulse of blood from his neck was slowing. Zane pressed against my back, biting my neck, then kissing the tender marks he left behind, fucking into me with primal need. I was already so on edge that every stroke had me shuddering, my breath coming in gasps.
He gripped my jaw, kissed my neck, and whispered, “I love to see my little wolf with blood on her teeth.”
I leaned my head against the stone wall, gasping as he quickened his pace. Kent lay dead beneath me, his blood going cold, but my heat was only increasing. This was what I’d waited for. This was the reason I’d lived. This was why I breathed.
To destroy those who dared to fuck with me. To reclaim my life over their cold, dead bodies.
My muscles tightened, and I gasped as Zane dragged his claws down my back, leaving stinging scratches across my skin. He bit down on my shoulder, jerking my hips back against his cock. My eyes fluttered closed, my cunt throbbing on his cock as I got closer…closer…
“Fuck, you feel so good,” Zane murmured against my ear, his body warm on mine, my moans heightening as he continued to rub my clit and fuck into me with hard, rough strokes. “My beautiful killer. Sick little fuck.”
His words pushed me over the edge. I cried out, not caring how loud I was. If no one had heard Kent scream, then they wouldn’t hear me moan. I came, and Zane followed soon after, his cock throbbing inside me and filling me with his cum. It dripped down my legs, into the pool of Kent’s blood as I murmured, “Fuck your God, Kent. It can’t kill me.”
