I call him the devil because he makes me want to sin
(and every time he knocks, I can't help but let him in)
Bruise grows impatient in waiting.
His patience, thin as it is, grows increasingly frayed on the edges, mood turning dark as the time passes. He wonders, for a moment, if the boy had been stupider than he had expected. If he had thought to run away instead of obey and Bruise’s mood lifts momentarily, thinking of all the ways he will punish the boy—all of the ways he will take apart his spirit, letting it fall apart before him, peeling inch by inch.
But he does not get to have such pleasures, at least not now.
Bruise lifts his gaze slowly when the boy returns (the man really, but a boy nonetheless), another on his heels. The smile that curves the edges of Bruise’s face is terrible and cruel, his shark eyes burning bright. Still, his patience is thin and when Rapt insists on talking, on touching the new possession that is clearly Bruise’s, he lashes out, moving with alien speed and snapping his dull teeth at the boy. “Quiet,” he snarls.
Still, the boy has been useful and he feels a certain pride in his chest when Rapt hits his knees.
“You took too long,” he reprimands but leans down all the same, gracing him with a brush of his lips against the other’s unworthy forehead. “But you did well. You will be rewarded.”
He steps back, turning his attention to the mare in question, the one he had ignored entirely until now.
“Watch, Rapt,” he commands, ensuring the boy lifts his eyes from the ground where they belong.
Bruise’s beautiful sooty face washes clean, baptized in this raw material placed at his lap, and he steps toward her, appraising her like an artist, wondering if she is clay or wood or steel. Would she respond to the pressure of his palms? Would she require something stronger? He plucks the edge of Fear, thrumming his fingers over it, wondering how she will respond to it. “You are beautiful,” he lies, although he does think there is something beautiful in the way that she will come apart. “My name is Bruise.”
