Young Writers Society

Chapter Sixteen

968

Bao-Zhi Lee was used to watching.

His body had gotten accommodated to crouching, or standing straight for hours -yet as fluid as water- and his eyes to moving around by itself and taking in details, informations and visuals. Nobody ever saw him -if they somehow did, they would pass it off as a hallucination or get themselves treated in a mental hospital- and he was sure that his unwanted offspring couldn’t sight him. After all, cow blood did a cowload of things to a fox.

He watched as Abel’s face twisted once, then abruptly relaxed in the grip of mortal sedatives. Bao-Zhi wondered if Abel would ever awake after the long sleep; whether or not the medicine would send him off into an eternal slumber or bid him less pain, still providing the thin rope of life.

Something more was wrong with his offspring, yet even he didn’t know what. Those who had been poisoned by cow blood always died within a few hours. Abel’s body had contained the powerful, deadly poison for a long time, a few days at least, and Bao-Zhi simply didn’t understand. Abel Snow was supposed to have died. He was supposed to be suffering even worse than how he was suffering now; the effect had to be stronger, the suffering shorter.

The old fox simply couldn’t understand.

As the mortals left, although temporarily, he feared- he stepped forward and out into the poor hospital lights. Deciding that a suspicious man would be better than a suspicious fox, he willed his body to change into that of a mortal’s, although containing much more power inside.

He looked down at his son, and closed his eyes to inhale deeply. Abel reeked of sickness, death and cow blood. He was suffering greatly, and the mortals wouldn’t know what to do at all. Bao-Zhi decided, against his own thoughts and the possible aftermath, that he would have to end this. He could practically hear Abel’s bitter remark, if he was awake at the moment; “Father, I understand, of course you have nothing better to do than kill your own son who you just met after nearly a thousand and five hundred years.”

Abel’s eyes fluttered, yet didn’t open. He is so much like his mother, Bao-Zhi mused, the hair, the eyes, the attitude. The annoying attitude. As much as he hated to admit one of his only possible weaknesses, his dead mate had been the only one he had truly loved romantically.

Would he miss Abel? No, I probably won’t. Would his miss what was left of his mate’s looks and personality? He probably would.

He had to do this, he told himself, this was needed, this was mandatory.

Closing his eyes, he raised a hand over his offspring’s chest, fully ready to tear the heart out. Quick as lightning, Bao-Zhi’s hand raced down.

Right at the last second, Abel gasped, sucking in air greedily, and coughed, silver eyes wide with confusion, then comprehension; then mild shock; then anger; then uncontrolled hatred.

Bao-Zhi stopped himself before his claws managed to tear into soft flesh. “Why?” Abel hissed, venom in his ragged voice. “Why don’t you continue? Why stop?”

“You woke up.” The enraged fox’s father stated. Abel snorted harshly, never taking his eyes off of his father warily.

“Of course I am, sire, does it look like I’m asleep when you’re trying to murder me?” He spat.

Footsteps approached from the hallway, and Bao-Zhi hesitated, yet did it gracefully; seeming that even hesitation had been a part of his plan all along. “You’re alive.” He murmured.

“Of course I’m alive, can’t you see it? Just go. Leave me alone. I don’t want anybody to kill me while I’m asleep, you retarded asshat.” Abel snarled, and his fangs lengthened. Bao-Zhi gave him a cold smirk.

“The usage of such a vulgar vocabulary suggests that you have learned nothing over the past years and have wasted your age, Abel.”

Something flashed in his son’s eyes, and Bao-Zhi, almost amused, awaited for the response. “Don’t, call me, by, my, first name. You don’t deserve it. You aren’t even worth talking to, nor looking at.” Abel ground out. “Just get the hell out. Whatever you might have anticipated, know that I’m still alive, and I will hold myself against you unlike the other stupid foxes.”

The footsteps were getting closer.

“You were weak,” Bao-Zhi started, just to drive the point home. “And you are still weak. I have no idea how you are still alive, Snow, but I will make sure that the cow blood kills you, or it shall be me.”

Abel smiled at him mirthlessly. “You’re the greatest father in the whole fucking world, you know that?”

Bao-Zhi smiled back, just as hollow and frigid. “I beg to disagree, Snow. I never have thought of myself as your father. Blood relations do not mean mental relations. It should well apply to a situation like ours.”

Unexpectedly, the corners of Abel’s eyes tingled and burned. No, he swore to himself, no, I’m not crying in front of him. I’m not. “You and mother never thought of me as a son. Just a tool. Just an experiment to see how a kid would turn out between you two.” Abel stated, rather a fact than a question.

His stomach froze and dropped even farther in a queer sense of despair when Bao-Zhi raised an eyebrow in mutual agreement. “Correct for once, Abel Snow. We never meant to raise you. I do always think that I should have gotten rid of you since birth.”

Bao-Zhi was lightly surprised, for Abel’s face was blank like a doll’s, looking as if something he loved with all his life had been borrowed and never put back.

Now, the owner of the footsteps seemed to be a couple meters away at most from Abel’s room. Abel dug his claws into his palms; his vision started to tinge red, and his canines pierced his bottom lips. The blinding, burning pain started up again, this time from his very core, somewhere beside his beating heart.

He said, “Get out.” while curling into himself, feeling pathetic but unable to press down some of the pain without the body motion.

Bao-Zhi Lee stared down at his offspring, contemplating what options were left to him, then turned and walked into the shadows just as a woman, a doctor, probably, walked through the door. The old fox took a step back to conceal himself farther. It was strange, the way the shadows were reacting to his offspring’s mood. A shadow had even grown red eyes and was slowly twisting itself into a grotesque creature with a humped back and a long muzzle, filled with shark-like teeth. It snapped its jaws, desperate to get to the gold fox who was now being questioned and prodded gently by the woman.

As silent as a ghost, Bao-Zhi slid over to the shadow who was probably going to cause a problem if seen, and lay a hand on it. Oh, he recognized the power, the creatures, the shadows. He knew it very, very well. He also knew what to do with it.

Another hand joined its pair, and together, they grabbed at the monstrous shadow, left and right, then tore it in half swiftly. At the unexpected assault, the shadow released a soundless shriek, and Bao-Zhi became sadistically curious when his offspring unleashed a bloodcurdling scream behind him. Dragging the shadow with him, Bao-Zhi slid into an open closet in the room. The woman didn’t see him - she was busy trying to figure out what was wrong with her patient.

Bao-Zhi watched as the torn shadow tried to regroup, and when it did, shredded it again, this time into even more pieces. Another high-pitched, shuddering and gasping roar of pain came from Abel’s hospital bed. Outside the closet, Bao-Zhi heard the bed creaking in protest as his offspring presumably struggled and thrashed.

The shadow beast snapped at the assaulting fox desperately, red eyes wide and body reforming again. Bao-Zhi’s passive face morphed into something akin to glee as he grabbed each of the shadow’s jaws and slowly ripped it, from the tip of the muzzle to the end of the body.

Hysterically, Abel wailed, sobbed, cried, and spasmed. The woman tried to subdue him to no avail.

So, the shadows react to your moods, so they are alive, just as your mother told me. They also share your pain and you share theirs. An unfortunate bond indeed. Bao-Zhi cocked his head and then, brought his face down low onto the floor and bit down on the shadow. He wasn’t entirely sure if the fangs would work like the hands.

The shadow didn’t taste like anything in his mouth, nothing solid, nothing to taste; except for the raw, dark, living energy that thrashed and jumped. It was power, nothing bright, but darkness; it was a shadow of a soul.

For another short amount of time, Bao-Zhi ripped the shadow beast apart with both his hands and teeth, albeit not daring to consume the shadow again, for he had felt it eating away at his life energy before it blinked out, joining the fox’s vast store of power.

Abel sounded like his eyeballs were brutally being pulled out of its sockets, but Bao-Zhi didn’t falter. His offspring had to learn respect, had to know the consequences; had to be punished. Bao-Zhi wanted to make it a trauma, when he finally had the chance to; he would use the new knowledge to his advantage, just like always. He wanted to make Abel Snow, the only fox who didn’t quiver before a Hayaku Kitsune and didn’t lower his eyes in respect, fear him. Even sons had to fear their fathers in the right circumstances.

Bao-Zhi guessed that this was what the mortals called ‘learning your place’.

At last, the shadow slowly disintegrated into a thing like a black mist, then slithered off to join another shadow. Bao-Zhi stood up, a slow smirk contorting his lips. His offspring still yowled in pain and distress, his voice breaking, weeping in apparently unbearable pain; the cow blood probably wasn’t making anything better. In a slug’s pace, the cries and sobs subsided into small grunts and whimpers of agony.

It was a job well done, Bao-Zhi praised himself; if his offspring was not going to be dying, he didn’t want him in his way. Sensing nobody outside except for Abel and the woman, Bao-Zhi slipped out of the closet. Satisfied at seeing the shadows in their normal shapes and the woman still ignorant of his presence, he walked out into the hallway.

Face now hard as a statue’s, no expression harbored on his features, slowly inhaling the last bits of his offspring’s torment deeply, Bao-Zhi walked in a leisured, fluid pace out of the old hospital.

☪

The shadows were aggravated and afraid.

Abel tried to calm them down, abandoning himself for the moment; when his father -a son of a bitch of a father, Abel reminded himself again- had torn his friend apart, it was as if a part of his very own soul had suffered the very same fate. The unexpected pain came from everywhere, and assaulted every single nerves in his body. He had tried to contain the sounds of agony, he truly had; but it was impossible.

He hadn’t known that a Hayaku Kitsune could touch a shadow, but now he did; yet he was unsure if he could stop it from happening again.

The woman seemed visibly relieved that her patient was now relatively fine, and rushed off to find something that would “make you better”. When she was out of sight, he shot up on the old bed, grunted in pain as his whole body protested, and then ripped the needles out of his body, one by one. Without the morphine that had been dripping into his veins, the tormenting sensation of being torn apart returned.

“I’ll make sure that he never touches you again.” Abel promised the shadows with a strained voice. Two of them transformed into wolf-like creatures and blinked at Abel, snarling an unspoken question. “It’s okay. Even he will never be able to kill you, nobody can. But I need you to leave me for now. I don’t need any life energy being stolen from me anymore. I apologize. I don’t want this to happen…”

The wolves dissolved into two legs of a desk that was standing in the room. “I apologize.” Abel told them again, numbly. “I apologize.”

Sometimes, he wished that they were able to answer him back.

The hospital was a small, one-story building, and therefore there was no real distance between the window and the ground below. Staggering, Abel walked over to the only window in the room, pulled it open, and then draped one leg over the windowsill. He hissed in pain as his clothed thigh made contact but continued. Slowly, but surely, he forced the other leg through the window, then his torso. A number of cursing and wincing followed.

When he was finally out, he was on the ground and on his back, looking up at the darkening sky, panting from sheer effort. “I blame you.” He said to nobody in particular.

Walkerville was small. There were perhaps thirty houses in total, and surrounding the town were a vast amount of fields, mountains and forests. Not many people lived in the area, but those who did didn’t come out of their houses for a reason Abel couldn’t figure out. Most of them weren’t even in their houses. Abel saw a number of mortals out in the fields, playing or working or just walking.

Therefore, nobody stopped Abel as he staggered through the streets, wishing that he could stop, lie down next to someone and rest. A warm stream of something flowed into his mouth, and he tasted it gingerly. It was blood. Abel raised his hand to wipe away at the space beneath his nose and it came away bloody. The blood was black again.

Abel hoped that the nosebleed would stop soon, and walked on.

It was nearly funny, how he could remember the song again in the particular moment. He would have hummed it, if it didn’t make his torn throat hurt and his nose close up with blood again. His groggy head didn’t do a very good job of imagining the simple notes.

Embarrassingly, when he was finally free of Walkerville, it was when the sun hung on the horizon and nearly two hours since he had set out from the hospital. At some point, he had noted a gigantic beast with gently sparkling translucent fur, long, curling nine tails and shockingly wintery eyes stalking him, obviously not attempting to hide its presence. Abel first croaked at it to go to hell, then when his father kept on following him, to please go to hell. The received result was just the same.

As his throat filled with blood yet again, Abel bitterly recalled the fact that nobody listened to him anymore nowadays as he spat out the iron-tasting, black liquid.

One second it was terrifying -the fact that he was going to die- but then he could accept it just fine, and then it suffocated him with heavy fear. What would happen once he did die? Would he just disappear? Or would he remain on the earth as a ghost of some sort? Would he be dissolved into the shadows to join his friends -which was just want he wanted-? Or maybe, someone would make him a small grave and he would rot in there forever.

Abel came across a river that was vaguely familiar to him, which he remembered was from the chase with Dominic, and splashed right through it just to see if the almighty and proud Bao-Zhi Lee would follow suit. To Abel’s great distaste, the giant fox simply jumped over the river and looked at him with a mocking smirk, if a fox could smirk. Oh, hey, the smirk seemed to say, why don’t you jump like me? It’s so much easier than what you just did! Oh, right! You can’t do it because you’re so weak! The fact that Abel knew that his father would never say the words infuriated him even more.

Shivering in his now wet clothes, Abel walked, unthinking and unblinking, too pained and tired to jog. He didn’t have a destination in mind. He never did have a destination. He once tripped over a rock, and he paused, looked down at it, and briefly considered throwing it at his father. Then he shook his head, resigned, having decided that the small rock wasn’t going to fly very far if he threw it.

Instead, just because the rock seemed to laugh at him mockingly, Abel stomped on it, missed, and fell flat on his face, blood immediately rushing into his nose and mouth. He didn’t get up for a few minutes, and at the same time, tried to ignore the snort that his father gave him from afar, watching.

☪

“—and Beverly is dead.” Dominic finished updating Mason, whose face was ashen gray from grief. The dusk was falling rapidly, and it created deep shadows on both foxes’ face, making them look aggravated, or terrified, which they weren’t. Jia had told them to talk things out and make plans, for she was going hunting; this time, it was very obvious that she didn’t want to be in the middle of anything the two foxes might do. She hadn't returned yet.

Mason sighed, fell on his back, and studied the sky and the clouds. At the last second, his gaze was on the stump that had healed over. But he still didn’t have the hand, and he was too exhausted to switch into another human form. Also, what he had learned hours ago still nagged at his mind. He knew that it would only distract him from the present, so he pushed it back forcefully.

“So she’s dead too.” He muttered.

Dominic shrugged. “Sacrifices, victims, accidents. Happens.” Somehow, the uncaring statement made a defiant fire flare up inside Mason, but he quenched it forcefully. Beverly… a thought jumped into his mind suddenly.

“Dominic. Beverly said that Abel killed her best friend.” Mason told Dominic, sitting up straight as if he had received an electric shock. He had tried to mention it to Abel, had forgotten it, then had forgotten to mention it to Dominic after it. Now was the right moment before he forgot it… Again.

Dominic’s eyes narrowed, and his expression took on more of a serious hue. “He killed another fox?” He hissed, making Mason frown.

Unknown to him, Dominic tried his hardest to appear that he hadn’t known the information at all. He had been hiding it so well…

Mason said, “Well, according to Beverly, yes… Oh.” His eyes went comically wide. “It’s his strike three, isn’t it.” It was more of a statement than a question.

“Well, if you put it like that.” Dominic answered him, his face even more grave than usual. It was a mutual, often demonstrated law -at least in the past- to never, never kill a fox, if you were a fox also. If a fox killed a fox, then killed two more, it would be killed, for nobody could afford their own kind getting killed. The many-tailed foxes were few in number as they were.

Although, something had always nagged at Mason’s mind. “A Hayaku Kitsune carries out the execution.” He said. Dominic nodded, his mind visibly drifting far away. A cold breeze blew his hair into his face, yet he made no move to get it out of the way.

“Yes, they do.” He said, as if in a trance.

In reply, Mason frowned. "Wait, the Hayaku Kitsune are foxes too, so doesn't that count as killing a fox?" He asked, raising an eyebrow in confusion. Dominic shrugged at him.

"Hey, they're the Hayaku Kitsune, after all... And they don't directly kill the traitor.”

Mason exhaled in confusion. "Well, then how?"

Suddenly serious, Dominic leveled his gaze to the other fox's and lowered his voice, as if telling him a great, life-threatening secret; "The Hayaku Kitsune give them to the Hunters."

For a moment, Mason blinked, then a second later, blanched. "The Hayaku Kitsune... excuse me?” This time, it was Dominic who fell flat on his back with an exaggerated sigh.

“It’s true. The lawbreaker’s legs and arms are cut off, their fangs and eyeballs are pulled out, and the nose chopped off, all done by the Hayaku Kitsune; and when they are unable to do anything to retaliate, they’re dumped in the midst of the Hunters.” Dominic eyed Mason carefully; the eight-tailed fox was getting pale-faced at the secret of the foxes that he obviously hadn’t know. “The Hayaku Kitsune can do that, Mason. It’s isn’t just a clean kill, because, well, they don’t want to kill a fox, either. They’re strong, and they still exist, so if Abel did kill Beverly’s best friend…”

He let the ominous threat trail off into silence.

Mason shook his head wildly. “I can’t let that happen. Besides….” He glanced at Dominic in desperate hope, giving the nine-tailed fox an impression of a mortal clinging onto a cliff’s edge with only a finger. “The Hayaku Kitsune aren’t even around here, are they? They don’t know.”

Dominic thought about it. “Maybe.” Slowly, he told Mason; “But there is one around.” He knew that the great fox had forbidden him from telling a soul of his return, but he had to tell Mason. If Abel did kill Beverly’s best friend, he did deserve to die, but if he didn’t, Dominic was going to find out the truth.

“Who is it?” Mason breathed. Dominic stared at him blankly.

“I am forbidden to—“He began, just as hollowly, yet fearfully.

Mason cut him off, much to his gratitude; he was beginning to feel like a marionette. “Bullshit!” The eight-tailed fox seethed. “Complete, total, bullshit! I won’t let Abel die, Dominic, so just tell me.”

Dominic glowered at him, straight in the eyes, silently telling him to back down. “Mason…” He warned. Mason was breathing heavily with anger, golden eyes flaming. When Dominic was starting to consider dealing with the angry fox physically, Mason magically calmed down in a single breath.

“Witness!” The silver fox exclaimed.

“Witness?” Dominic repeated, looking slightly lost. “What witness?” Mason got up and started to pace, something that Dominic noticed that he tended to do if he was extremely nervous: he also was fingering his necklace, another sign of nervousness.

“It’s a long story.” Mason began, obviously not intending to let Dominic answer or object. “I went to get Beverly, you know? Before the Hunters attacked the forest? So, I went to get her, and then she panicked when she saw me, saying that Abel killed Annabelle.”

He turned swiftly on his heels and paced in the other direction.

“But I completely forgot about it when I did meet Abel, then forgot to mention it to you again… The point is, Dominic, a mortal was with Beverly. She said that she was at the funeral, her brother’s funeral, where Annabelle had went to last! She did say to me that when she got there, it was over…”

Dominic finally seemed to get what Mason was trying to say, and smoothly took over. “But she could be lying. A funeral, especially her brother’s, is a personal business. She wouldn’t have told you the truth, because you were just a stranger. She could have seen the evidence that Abel didn’t kill Annabelle…”

Mason turned again from the right and paced to the left. “I-we-need to talk to her. I’ll force it out of her if it’s needed. Hayaku Kitsune or not, it’s my family business now that I know, and she isn’t going to get in my way.”

“Mason, you don’t know what you’re saying. They’re old, they’re powerful, and there’s probably only three of them left, so they’re more alert than ever than the other way around.”

Turning again, Mason fixated a cold, angry glare on Dominic’s face. A flaxen color was creeping into his gold orbs. “Family. Business.”

Dominic blinked, saw Lewis in Mason —saying, “This is family business.”— then blinked, and saw Mason again, determined to save his worst enemy in the world; somehow willing to save the fox that had murdered his parents.

“Mason—“ He started, but then something overcame him; something that urged himself to tell Mason the truth, to help him in every way he could. “The Hayaku Kitsune is Abel’s father and that is going to be a problem in the situation.” He blurted out, and immediately began to twist his head from left to right, looking for any sign of transparent fur in the darkness or pale, angry eyes.

Bao-Zhi Lee could easily kill Dominic, could kill Jia too if he wanted to, and Dominic couldn’t lose her. She was his mate. She was his perfect half that he had met after centuries of searching. He was afraid; he would never admit it but he was terrified like a mouse in front of a cat.

“A father… Who is willing to kill Abel as well?” Mason guessed calmly, as if sensing Dominic’s panic. Dominic’s eyes widened and he blinked in surprise. The younger fox was learning.

“Yes.”

In a relatively relaxed state, Mason paused his pacing and came to Dominic’s side and lay down with a tired sigh. “You weren’t supposed to tell me that, were you?” Mason finally asked in a silent, breeze-like whisper, and Dominic nodded mutely, sensing fear surging inside him again. Oh, Jia, what have I done? He could have heard. He is going to kill me. Gods, he’s going to rip me from limb to limb and then chase me to the end of hell just to do it again.

For one, terrifying moment, Mason was silent and still as a rock. Then, he said, “I heard nothing.” and Dominic felt his inner walls crumble, and both gratitude and relief -yet fear- rushed over him like tidal waves; and, because he knew that he owed it to Mason, he forced himself to not walk away and hide his weakness as he put a forearm against his closed eyes and released a dry, genuine weep.

Jia, what have I done?

Unlike Abel, he had a physical person that he loved, who he cared for, more than his own life—and it was so hard sometimes; to protect Jia, to stand up against one of his greatest fears to protect another one of his greatest fears.