Eleven o'clock morphs into twelve and then one. The time trickles by, marked only by those changing glowing numerals. Damsel's mind is blank; where there should've been dreams was a heavy blackness. His eyes were as stationary as the silhouette of the bedside lampon the table next to the bed, which is where they rested.
Matthew,
Ereloc,
My mate,
My pack,
Darren,
It was just him in there, staring at the still roof that hung over him, it was just a boring shade of painted grey yet his eyes were wide and open, staring at them as though they were the most interesting thing he's ever seen. After some moments his mind drifted off to memories of his childhood, recalling the times he spent with his dad, the times him and Matthew would sneak out at night,
well it was Damsel pressuring him to sneak out.
Now that he recalled, those memories he thought were blissful childhood memories now made sense to Matthews words, it really was just Matthew putting up with his antics.
Oh how he missed the gentle embrace of the silhoutte in his dream, if he could dream of him again, maybe he could shed himself of all those feelings of guilt and regret, even if it were only just for a second, the scent of his embrace could calm him down immedietly.
Would his mate smell like that?
Would his mate be as warm as him?
Now he'd never know.
He shook his head in a sorrowful manner, he shouldn't think of his mate anymore, now that the idea was as possible as flying pigs.
He recalled an old russian romantic tale that his mother would read him back in his girly dresses days, where the princess got kidnapped and prince came forth to save her from the treacherous villain. He almost laughed at how ironic it was in this situation, maybe his mate would save him from being held 'hostage' by the villain that was Darren knight.
He snickered, imagining Darren with those disney mustaches, similar to Jafaar's, holding a knife.
He let the tale mull around his head. Perhaps this old story can pull his thoughts into the randomness that is a prelude to sleep and dreams.
Damsel was unable to sleep,
again.
-
Damsel's open eyes started stinging from how long he had them open for, the dryness made him tear up a little, after tossing and turning for what seemed like forever, damsel couldn't help but curse at the springy mattress that literally poked needles into his back, it was impossible to sleep on.
Though there were needles poking his brain aswell.
He groaned as he turned to the nighttable, grabbing his phone to check the time, surely it wasn't already morning, right?
5 am, the icon showed.
He screamed into the pillow, when he went to put his phone back down before he noticed something unbelievable in his notification bar.
"Oh my fucking god!" He gasped.
50
fucking
missed calls.
All from the same contact name,
Idiot.
Damsel's eyes almost popped out of his head as he stared in disbelief at the notification,
even his mom didn't call him that many times when he tried running away 3 years ago!
Damsel's palm cupped his mouth as he pondered over the amount of missed calls, Darren was either A. over the top pissed over the whole gay porn link situation before, B. pissed about the marriage. or C. Super worried about him fainting.
Scoffing, Damsel quickly crossed out option C.
But judging from the situation it was 100% about the marriage, and Damsel wanted to drown himself right then and there. This was probably the best time to force Darren to speak out against the marriage tomorrow, and Damsel wasn't one with patience, so he unlocked his phone and practically jabbed his finger on the call button on his contact list.
Damsel squinted his eyes at the screen in impatience, fiddling with his ring as he usually does.
Ringing...
Damsel took in a large inhale, mentally preparing himself for what was about to come, screaming? Yelling?
Hurry up..
Ri-
Picked up.
Damsel flinched at how fast the boy had picked up the phone, given how late it was, the fleeting sense of unanticapation left him in a tune of disbelief for a mere second, leaving his words stuck at his throat, but that second turned out to be too long since the other was quick to fill the silence almost immedietly.
"I hope you fucking die, you piece of fucking shit."
Damsel was left speechless, more so than before, his eyes widened,
Not because of the curses,
but because of Darren's tone.
Darren Knight was crying,
Darren had stopped every mid word to catch his breath as his words broke into sobs, letting the sound reach the phone. Just letting hic's and cries fill the silence.
"You fucking son-of-a-bitch!" He caught his breath as he let out another angry yell from the other side, his voice was deep and hoarse, like his throat had went through hell and came back, for how many hours? Damsel couldn't tell. "It's all your fucking fault!"
Damsel's chin trembled, but he sucked the tears back, his eyes were already sore from crying for hours, and he knew that even if he tried, he had no tears left to cry. He was left so exhausted and numb that he couldn't even falter at the words that were spoken to him, hearing the words that he was beating himself over now coming out of someone's mouth directly left him just,
numb.
He only stayed quiet, not saying anything as the other filled the comforting silence.
Damsel had gotten the news as soon as he awoke, and it was already late by then, Could it be that, Darren had gotten the news earlier?
A sudden thought attacked his brain,
Darren had cried through the day and night,
His heart spasmed in guilt.
The thought shot a guilt-tripped arrow through Damsel's shattering heart, it was like his heart stopped beating for a second, the sense of fear paralyzing his whole body, when in reality his nervous system had to fight his stripping nerves by stopping the rush of adrenaline to lower his paced heartbeat back to normal.
"Knight..-"
"I can't-.." Darren whispered through a broken sob.
"Knight- Calm down for a second, breath," Damsel panicked, not knowing what to do at the presence of his crying rival, not a day in his 17 years of constant hatred had he thought his arch nemesis would be over the line on the phone crying his eyes out.
"I can't do this to my mate-.." Damsel's eyes widened at how Darren's voice trembled, guilt and sorrow dripping from his words as his voice struggled to keep stable.
Damsel's stomach twisted and turned, boiling in anger at his audacity,
on one hand he knew the pain and anger Darren was feeling, but on the other it seemed like the other was placing all the blame on the boy, like was a scapegoat for the actual culprit, Carter. It wasn't like Damsel ever wanted things to turn out this way himself, he wasn't to be blamed, he never blamed Darren for this, so how did he have the balls to come at Damsel with full curses?
"Shut the fuck up!" Damsel's eyes almost faded to black, he had to bite his lip to the point of bleeding to restrain his quench of thirst for anger. "Listen, It's not the best time for me right now so just hang up and put your phone down, I seriously have no energy left to talk about this today, I'm drained, Darren, I'm exhausted to death."
"Don't even start, Prince-"
"You think I seriously gave the idea my marriage to your father, who forced my dad to consent to teen marriage?" Damsel scoffed, his eyes stung for a second as an angry tear tried to seep through, "I'm fucking 17, I have a mate waiting for me, Darren, you think I gave a punch to that faggot brother of yours to woo you of all people? I'm fucking straight for fuck's sake,"
"Don't fucking call my brother that word, don't say that word in general." Darren threatened, "I couldn't care less if you had a fucking crush on me, it's the fact you brought my fucking brother into this, and now my mate-"
"For fuck's sake Darren, I didn't know he was your brother!"
"What does that fucking change, prince? Does that make everything better? Would you have just gone to another poor freshman to make yourself feel better?"
"I can't abandon my mate either, you fucking dumbass, you're not the only one going through a crisis," Damsel rushed his fingers through his hair with a frustrated sigh, he scoffed to the side, he was going to continue scolding him through his teary state until the bastard stopped crying, "You seriously-."
"The other times I didn't say shit, because it wasn't my business so I didn't interfere with your childish tantrums, but now that I'm thinking back on it, maybe somebody should've put you in your place when you first strayed from the right path, when you first broke someone's nose and stole their lunch money." Darren was seething on the other side, spitting, "What did you fucking know? What if that was all they had? Remember Charlie? You broke his nose after stealing his money, I bet you didn't even stop to think about his circumstances, did you think everyone is as rich and privileged as you?, fuck."
"What..?"
"What the fuck? Are you deaf now too? Are you retarded or deaf? Pick a fucking struggle!"
"No- Shut the fuck up! who the fuck is Charlie?"
silence.
"You've got to be fucking joking." Darren let out a bitter, disbeliefing laugh rid of any humor as he scoffed, "Prince, what the fuck?"
"The kid was starved, he hid his skinny body through second-hand hoodies, he barely had enough money to support his only living relative, his sickly mother, who was rotting away in the hospital."
Damsel stayed quiet.
"But no, you're damsel prince, the bad boy who doesn't give a shit about anything."
"But guess what, prince? Now you're finally fucking seeing the consequences, this is a lesson that your goddamn parents never fucking taught you, learn some discipline."
"you're just a fucking asshole, that's it." Darren spat. "A fucking deluded white boy that thinks he's oppressed and that the whole world is against him, even though he's the most privileged kid out there."
Damsel stayed quiet,
"You've got nothing else to say? The fuck did I expect out of you? There are people going through tougher problems, and if you're still acting bitchy about me stealing your girlfriend, then think about Charlie, his nose is still broken because he cant afford surgery, yet the kid still moved on, his mom survived cancer, and he comes to school with a beaming smile everyday.
"But you?"
He scoffed.
"You're still stuck in kindergarten."
.
.
----
Finally, the morning he had been dreading was here and he couldn't halt the dawn ebbing it's gradual way into daylight. As the contents outside of the passenger-side window zoomed past like eco-lights, Damsel could only wish time would freeze at a specific frame, just so that he could look out to whatever pretty picture the car had halted to. But as of the moment he was still propped against his seat whilst his father drove, the only sound shaking through the cracking tension was none other than silence.
The worst flaw a person can have is that of self-deception. Damsel was like that. He acted on impulse and then created the reason for his actions after the fact. If he was feeling good he did good things, if he was feeling negative in any way he did bad things. He felt like his good deeds meant he was a good person and his bad deeds were justified. In truth he never thought before he acted or spoke, he never stopped to ask himself if his response was the right one, or merely the first knee-jerk reaction that sprung to mind. Whatever he said was almost never true, or at least it was only "true" for him. That's what got him into this situation,
He was doing it yet again.
I didn't know Oliver was poor, it couldn't have been my fault.
Nothing was ever Damsel's fault, he had never been punished nor scolded before in his life, even the other times, people should have looked where they were going, it wasn't Damsel's fault that they were the ones pissing him off, it was their fault and they were going to make up for it. But Damsel didn't know if he would've changed his actions even if he knew Samuel was Darren's brother, Actually, he scared himself sometimes, it wouldn't have been surprising if he did the same thing anyways.
Yeah, he thought,
It was Stuart's fault.
Damsel flicked through his messages, the ones he had missed over the day he fainted, there were a few from his far relatives abroad, his friends from school, and- His phone buzzed. It was Kyle again,
'Damsel?'
'Damsel, please answer.'
'Vincent said you called him last night, why didn't you call me?'
'Damsel, please pick up my calls.'
Recent, (45) new messages from: kyle.
He hadn't stopped sending him messages since yesterday, his phone was blowing up with notifications, he hadn't even bothered to think of a good contact name, when he had first gotten his phone as a birthday gift from Kyle, the first thing he did was rename the contact name kyle had saved his number on. He changed it from 'Favorite big brother❤' to just a bland 'Kyle'. If his brother ever saw his contact name he'd probably break down, he loved Damsel, a bit too much for his liking actually.
Anyways, Damsel did what he did with all those other messages,
he left Kyle on seen.
Damsel logged off his social media and set Kyle to a new ring tone. The last thing he needed right now was some anxious mess racking his already ruined day.
He slid his phone back into his pocket, and when Damsel looked at the mid-mirror attached to the roof, he could see Matt sitting at the right back, eyes looking out the window with ear buds in his ear. As the three sat in silence, Matthew glanced over at Damsel's face from the rear mirror, still smoldering underneath his stony expression. His rage seemed pointless to Matthew, although he couldn't dare say anything again, he flinched as he cupped his bruised cheek, squinting at the pulsing pain from all the places he was punched.
Damsel couldn't think straight this morning, all the thoughts were swarming his head, but he had already panicked enough the day prior.
His father placed his foot on the gas paddle, and the car zoomed forward.
He inhaled.
They crossed it,
They crossed the border.
Though nothing was clear yet, when Damsel leaned over to look through the window all he saw were trees, trees, and more trees. His parents had gone to their Packhouse many times over the years but this was the first that Damsel had seen of it, from what he heard from his peers though was that it was huge.
He doubted something masked so easily by the whole forest could be that big.
But oh was he wrong.
Goosebumps danced on Damsel's bare skin, the creeping feeling of disgust etched it's way up his spine and he had never felt so unsafe. They were here, they were on enemy territory.
It took 10 more minutes before the car came to a stop, before Damsel could even lift a finger Matt had slammed the door closed. Damsel flinched at the force, but followed in suite as he also slammed the door with the same strength.
Before them was a long path leading into their ginourmouse pack house, the giant gate loomed over them and even the clouds cowered away from the sight that was the Packhouse- no, villa.
The bars of the fences were black and high, similar to the victorian era, and the gate only revealed so much. A loud, screeching thunder invaded their ears as the guards at the side pushed the fence gate open, revealing a cobblestone path that led to the 10ft entry door.
The rocks had been trucked in from some quarry up north and the builders had to consult with old-fashioned brick layers to get the rock façade right. It was all steel and concrete underneath of course, but from out where Damsel stood it looked like it just grew right out of the ground. On the ledge should have been pigeons, peering down in the way they do, But in the frosted dawn-light the ledge was layered with roses, red, blood-red but the shade seemed closer to black than pure roses.
The colossal building held such an old times feeling to it, but it was generously baked in decorations and the architects seemed highly-paid.
It was huge.
Damsel forgot to swallow the spit forming in his throat.
He held back a gasp.
Never the less, Nick, Damsel, Matthew and a few guards that had come in other cars were guided carefully up the path outlined by the row of Knight guards glaring at them, they didn't even try to hide it. He felt so queesy and uncomfortable on the land, like there was a part of his body itching badly but he couldn't reach it. The crows that stood on the roof line looked right through his soul, he felt eyes everywhere, even in directions no living animal was placed.
It felt wrong.
Damsel followed in suite, staring at the back of Matthew with heavy lidded eyes, how did he seem so aloof and unbothered? like what they were going into didn't faze him at all, Damsel had to clench his fists as he bit back his questions, going along the path. Soon they arrived at the entry of the packhouse, as Nick glanced to the side for the guards to open the door, none of them moved a muscle.
Disrespectful.
Damsel felt the anger build up, but his father only shook his head, pushing the door open himself.
But Damsel being the petty bitch he was, he not-so discreetly spat at their foots.
"Ah, Nick, Good to see you." A disgusting voice spoke, Damsel felt hairs on his arms rise as he struggled to keep his knees from buckling.
"Likewise, Carter." His father's distaste and disgust was apparent in his voice but completely masked on his face, he wore a sick fake smile that even damsel wanted to pull off. His father lifted his arm for a handshake, but Carter merely stared at the hand.
Nick let his hand fall back to his side.
The anger boiled, and Carter glanced next to Nick, where a glaring Damsel stood with clenched fists, his eyes were boring right into Carter in the most hateful way possible.
"This must be Damsel." The man inquired, humming as he brushed his gotee with his index and thumb, "I see the rumors didn't lie."
He laughed, eyes merely glaring though.
Damsel felt his nails digging deeper into his palms as his jaw clenched, on the side, Matthew gripped Damsel's arm from behind, which left the brunette caught off guard, he looked up at Matthew only to find out he was looking straight forward, as though he was doing nothing. He shoved his arm off of him.
Then Matthew smiled,
"The rumors about you seem to be a complete hoax though, Mr. Carter,"
This comment left Carter flustered.
Though that would seem like a compliment since rumours were nothing but entertaining gossip, the only rumours about the Moon Knight pack were about how wise and intelligent their alpha was, he had brought back the knight pack from shambles completely within his own records and hands, there were small praises from all sides towards Darren aswell, having such an influential figure as a father only booted his reputation and influence, some said he'd follow the footsteps of his father and expand territory over the state, and soon, the whole country.
What Matthew was mentioning though, were the rumours that stated he spoke with upmost respect to even the homeless, and that he was only the most open-minded alpha within the state.
"Aha..." Carter made way, his eyes showing apparent disgust and distaste at the remark, presenting an arm to the side to guide them to the direction. "Shall we get going then?"
"Of course." Nick cleared his throat, sending a glare at Matthew.
Damsel only snickered as they started walking again.
It felt like they had been walking in circles, the amount of turns and doors they went through made Damsel dizzy, the halls all looked identical with wax candles instead of lights, It was so old-fashioned that Damsel understood the Luna's atrocious fashion choice. The more they went, the darker it got, an unfamiliar feeling grew in Damsel's stomach as he fiddled with the ring on his index finger, looking around quite noticeably anxious,
"SHIT!"
he felt someone elbow him in the kidney that made him let out a whisper yell.
He frantically looked to the side, only to make eye contact with an unimpressed looking Matthew glaring knives into him, then he scoffed and turned to the side.
Screw you.
Okay so maybe he was very visibly being fidgety.
Damsel was so distracted glaring Matthew down that he didn't even notice where he was going,
"Agh!"
immediately bumping into a brick wall,
Well, it seemed like a brick wall, anyway.
He groaned as he rubbed his nose in agony, thank god he didn't break it, it was all Matthew's fault.
When he looked up to curse at the unbreathing wall as petty revenge, he was met with familiar deep chestnut eyes,
Darren.