"I really think I am in love with my best friend. I am sitting in the back simply admiring her. She is singing her songs, doing her cute lil dances, getting us where we need to go safely. I look up to her. She is such a smart, strong individual. She is confident. She is kind. Not only does she stand up for herself, she stands up for me. She knows my every need. She gives the best advice. She is my biggest cheerleader. She keeps me grounded yet will be absolutely bat shit insane with me. She never fails to amaze me. I am so, so proud to have this woman by my side at all times. I think everyone needs a Vivy in their life because I don't know what I would do without mine."
Mark read the letter slowly, his gloved fingers brushed over the fading ink.
It was torn from an old diary, pages yellowed with time, the spine broken like every memory it held. The writing was his…slanted, rushed, hopeful…Pathetic!
A version of himself that no longer existed. With a scowl twisting his lips, he crumbled the page and tossed it into the fire crackling before him. The flames curled greedily around the paper, turning his confession…that love into ash.
He sat on a splintered wooden chair in the very room he had grown up in. The wallpaper had peeled, the floorboards creaked with rot, and the air was heavy with ghosts…but nothing haunted it more than Mark himself.
The fire danced in his stormy grey eyes.
They weren't always grey.
Once upon a time, they were ocean blue…Vivy's favourite colour.The feature she liked best in him. She used to say they reminded her of freedom...Of waves and skies and hope.
Now they were ashen. Cold. Colourless, like his world without her.
A sharp, terrified scream shattered the stillness.
"Mark, have mercy on me! I am your mother. This is your brother! Spare us…for God's sake!"
He blinked. Slowly. Dragged out of the silence of those memories into the cacophony of the present.
Mrs. Woods was on the floor, her silk robe in tatters, her pristine face smudged with soot and terror. Two of Mark's shadowed minions pinned her down, forcibly. Behind them, more minions…tall, faceless silhouettes of smoke…dragged her son towards the pyre that devoured everything in its path.
"Stepmother,Mrs. Woods," Mark corrected her. His voice too calm. Too smooth. Almost amused. "And step brother. Don't forget how many times you told me to remember that. You made sure I never forgot."
He tilted his head and smiled.
A slow, cruel smile.
"See? I remembered."
His red mullet caught the firelight, casting blood like hues across his angular face. A silver chain hung loosely around his throat, matching the glint of his ear piercings. His skin was darker now…weathered and tanned, not from sunlight but from time spent in realms no mortal should tread.
He was a shell of the boy Vivy once loved. If she saw him now…
"She would faint," he muttered under his breath, with a hint of dry humour, swatting the air like the idea itself annoyed him. "No. She would not. Because she is never coming back. She is gone."
He stood up all of a sudden, the chair scraping violently against the floor.
"She is gone," he repeated, as if he could force the world ( aka himself) to believe it…to accept it, by saying it twice. "And so is the boy she once knew. He died with her."
He turned his back and walked towards the door, his dark coat billowing slightly behind him…not from wind, but from something darker that clung to him. Smoke. Power. Hell itself.
"Please, Mark! Not the boy! He is your family!"
He paused at the threshold.
The fire behind him roared as the boy was flung into it.
His stepbrother's scream pierced the air, too painful for any human ear to bear.
Mark closed his eyes. Inhaled.
Like music?!!
"Family?" he scoffed, eyes still shut. "Funny. You never called me that. Not even once."
"You killed him," Mrs. Woods gasped. "He was innocent! Just a child! He admired you! You should have taken it out on me, not him…not him!!!! You mother fucking devil!!!"
Mark turned slowly, almost lazily. His eyes opened again…almost dead.Uninterested.
"Innocent?" he whispered, and then he laughed...a sharp, echoing, empty laugh. "There is no innocence in that bloodline. None."
He walked back towards her, boots heavy against the floor. The air grew hotter. Thicker.
"Did you ever hear him cry when he was locked in that attic because he covered for you?" Mrs.Woods shouted suddenly, eyes blazing even as tears streamed down her face. "He worshipped you.That fool!!!And you burned him?!!"
His grin cracked.
"Worship is a dangerous thing," he said. "Especially when it's misplaced."
Mrs. Woods stopped crying.
She started laughing.
It was hideous…broken.
And then,to the horror of the minions,she yanked herself free and ran…not towards the door but towards the pyre. Then jumped.Flames licked at her hem immediately engulfing the rest of her bottom.
The woman stood in the flames, skin sizzling, flesh burning. Hair turning to smoke. But her gaze never left Mark's.
And then she uttered those words…words that echoed and reverberated like it was a chorus.
"You think you have nothing left to lose, don't you?"
The flames blazed higher.
"One day, Mark Sebastian Woods…you will. You will know this pain. You will love someone again…deeply…You will have a family…you will be blessed with the love of a child…see its first smiles…its first giggles…first walk and then…"She let out another chilling roar. " I curse you Mark Sebastian Woods…you will become a father but then you will know the pain of losing your child. You will howl and beg and cry and rip your own skin off just to feel something other than grief."
Mark stood frozen. His face was unreadable.
The flames coiled towards the ceiling now, illuminating every shadow.It thumped with the tempo of her voice.
"You will beg for death," she hissed, voice burning with her. "But death will not come for you."
And then the fire whooshed forward.
Mark flinched, just once, as the heat kissed his skin.
And then…silence.
The room dimmed.
The fire died.The woman was gone.
All that remained were ashes.
And the echo of a curse.
Mark turned back towards the door again.Slowly. With the calm of a man who had seen worse.
"Finish clearing this place," he told his minions coldly. "Burn it all. We are leaving."