Four

Let me out; free me, an inner voice whispered in his mind.

Green smoke was blown in the air, billowing out around Sev in the cold night.

            Goose bumps arose on his skin as he sucked down his favorite thing next to sex. An absinthe cigarette. If he had a choice over these or the feel of soft flesh beneath his fingertips, he’d definitely choose his cigarettes. He smiled as he inhaled once more before snuffing out the butt and flicking it across the way in the alley behind Death’s Door.

            He tugged his black duster closer to his body as a chill swept through him. Damn Earthly winters. After almost ten years of his banishment on the human plane, he was just barely beginning to miss Vadrohn, his home. Hell, you might call it, but it was a whole new plane where darkness exists. Where all of the fairy tales and myths came from. He hadn’t been wanted there all his life due to those who despised what he was. A half-breed. Mutt. B*****d.

            He cracked his neck and his knuckles, feeling the two scars that ran along the back of his palm his torturer had given him. From a time when he disobeyed orders and went against them. His left hand had been sliced near to the bone with a dragh claw. The Vadrohn’s king now, the one who’d exiled him for what he was, the one who shared part of his blood, had caused him such anguish. An uncle on his father’s side who had taken Sev under his wing on the premise of fostering a little orphan boy. Instead, he’d tortured and harmed Sev all his life, until he was almost an adult, having missed out on lost opportunities of living.

            And then, just when King Beltha had no more use of Sev, he’d tossed him out of Vadrohn, having declared him an expatriate and sent him straight to Earth with a one-way ticket of never returning. Sev had been Beltha’s plaything, his puppet, controlling every movement Sev had even thought to make. He still was under Beltha’s thumb even after being kicked out of his home land. Forcing him to kill whoever the king wanted dead or hurting those who so much as dared look at Beltha the wrong way. A goon, perhaps, or a hitman. Call him what you will, his hands were dirty and bloodied from the get-go. But now, he tried to keep his slate clean on Earth, for fear of those pathetic holy warriors, Lucentia, lest he board the train to the afterlife early. Speaking of, one just stepped into his bar, her light strangely dim and stature not like most her kind.

            Alas, he did not care.

            He had been after her for quite some time after receiving strict instructions from King Beltha to capture her, for whatever reason. Alexandrina Jael DeLuca, granddaughter of Artemis James DeLuca V. His sworn enemy, other than King Beltha, and the bane of his existence. The reason why his family was slaughtered. The reason he became the daemon he was today: ruthless and cold. He gave zero f***s when it came to others and their needs; he didn’t care because there was no one left to care about him or for him. And if he brought her back alive to Beltha, he’d be granted full reign in Vadrohn and quite possibly a seat on Beltha’s court. Sev couldn’t pass that deal up. Although he wasn’t sure why Beltha wanted this girl but he didn’t care; it was his chance to harm her and gain entry back into his home. What more could he want?

            “She’s here,” one of his men, the name decided to elude him at that very moment, spoke up from behind him in the doorway.

            “Go watch her then.”

            Damn Ocnos. These reapers were the worst when it came to security. All they liked to do was follow orders and had to have orders because, if not, they’d be lost without them. The reapers also feared daemons stronger than they, much like the breed Sev was. Two bloodlines, tainted when mixed, but intertwined to create the stuff of nightmares. He was something never deemed probable yet dangerous at the same time.

            Yet you still refuse to acknowledge me…

            He shook his head to rid the voice and sighed. The treatments weren’t working and his power was becoming too strong, even for the eldest of his kind. He wouldn’t last another five years with the way he was headed. The urge to release his inner being was too dominant and had him crippling with pain most nights.

            Just release me and it will stop.

            He straightened his spine. “No,” he hissed and the rough voice withered away to nothing. He constantly grated against Sev’s nerves every time he wanted to escape but Sev couldn’t let that happen. He would be an unstoppable force, one not even the gods themselves would be able to stop.

            A beep alerted his attention and he looked at his phone. She was on the move and headed his way. He smirked, the scar pulling at his upper lip, as he stepped back into a dark corner to watch his plan unfold. He situated himself into a low squat, knees popping from age, boots smearing grime and oil on the concrete ground. He kept his eyes peeled for any signs of the Shiner, listening for conflict between her and his men. They knew not to harm her but her soul was just too delicious for them to resist and he knew that.

            A beam lit up the alleyway until it died down almost completely when the girl entered, standing not four feet from him. He could smell her pureness, her holy scent sending his senses into overdrive. It was putrid and disgusting however, she smelled distinctly-

            Human? His beast questioned. My, my. She is lovely, the damned dragh commented.

            “Shut up,” he muttered. He could do without a word from the peanut gallery. But he couldn’t deny, she was pretty. Maybe not drop dead gorgeous but she had a certain appeal that would drive most men wild, especially human men. With curves that most women would kill for and an a*s that told him she liked to squat, met his criteria in females. The beast chuckled in his mind and he furrowed his brows. What was he thinking? She was his enemy, the granddaughter of the man who fucked up his life.

            And you still think this is wrong, do you not?

            Sev snarled. One day, I will show you who is the alpha and that is me, he silently told his inner being who only laughed at the statement.

            Please puny daemon. You are nothing compared to me.

            I am you, Sev seethed. Shut the f**k up before you ruin this.

            Ruin your little plan of kidnapping Arty’s granddaughter and handing her over to King Beltha? What sense does that make? Why does he want her? This will not bring them back…

            Having enough, his eyes turned black, the sclera giving away to his true nature. Shadows spread out thickly over the ground creeping up to the group before him. He’d missed the entire scene but did not care as he caught her last question.

            “Who wants to know?”

            Ryn, the smarter out of the three brutes locked eyes with his boss as Sev smiled, releasing his full potential of his mother’s side in the dark alleyway. Shadows engulfed him and all of the light, including that Shiner as he bent low once she fell to the ground, unable to withstand the density of his shadows. He had whipped his coattails out behind him once he stooped to her level and whispered in her ear, under her pretty blonde hair.

            “I do.”

            His beast grew angry and threatened to escape as he wanted to protect the girl. She does not deserve this! He hissed in Sev’s mind. Sev could feel the dragh rummaging around under his hot skin, wanting to be freed from his human cell. Sev only smirked and tilted his head, placing a mental block on Rhosalth, the beast that lived within its human. He had enough of the creature running around inside his mind for the past three decades and it was time to put an end to this.

            He didn’t care what Beltha had in store for her; he only wanted to return to his home and be where he could be free.