Queen of Nothing

Berserk eyed the fourth mug and raised an eyebrow at me suspiciously. Stupid silent bastard could say a million things with just a fucking look and this one screamed “I know what you’re doing”, but even I didn’t know what I was doing anymore.

I was completely enraptured by this siren, I needed more of her, even if it were just those awestruck thankful looks whenever I gave her a fraction of a kind gesture. I was starting to wonder if the opportunity for freedom arose, would I actually allow her to have it? I’d grown so used to time in her presence and looking forward to small moments together that I wasn’t sure what I was doing with myself the other twenty some odd hours left in the day.

They were just the moments in between her.

“She goes back inside the kennels when she wakes up,” he said, lowering his eyes to his mug as he drank his coffee.

“You think she’s gonna be okay locked in there with the other one?” Santo asked him through his sleepy haze.

“She should have thought about that before she…” I stood up pushing the chair back against the marble with a screech and interrupting Zerkos. I grabbed two mugs and turned to head back to my bedroom. I was exhausted with the act he was putting on. If I thought I had it bad, this guy was a million times worse. With good reason of course, the two of them had Harry Potter-size history between them and apparently, they got off on hurting each other, and themselves, at their own expense.

I walked back into my room to find her wrapped in my black sheets, the shirt riding up her thigh promising to reveal more if she were to just move ever so slightly. I grabbed my laptop from my desk and opened up the program for the security footage for my room and searched for the feed from last night. I popped an Air pod in my ear and scrolled to the timestamp right after she beat Anya’s face in.

I wasn’t in the least surprised when her face contorted in anger at Ronan’s words quickly changed to an expression of lust as he began pounding into her against the wall. However, the sounds that came out of her mouth were a symphony I never thought I’d have the fortune of hearing in my entire life. The whole thing was fast, and full of unspoken regret between the two of them and just as it started it ended with them bickering.

How they spent a moment in each other’s company in the past was beyond me, because the two of them were live wires constantly threatening to spark and explode with the slightest contact or friction. And yet neither could stop reaching for the other. I felt for my brother, because even in his hatred for her I could see that, if given the chance, he’d do anything to be able to have her love again. But pride, shame, and a million secrets between them drove them further and further apart the longer she stayed here under his heel.

I closed the laptop and placed the coffee on the bedside table closest to her, and made my way over to the piano bench. I caressed my oldest friend and let my fingers go to work as Beethoven’s ”Moonlight Sonata” moved its way out of me through the keys, the melody taking me to a place only ivory could find. By the time I finished, I noticed she was not only awake but fully sitting up leaning against the headboard, with her coffee in hand.

“That was incredible,” she said in between sips. “I kind of pegged the piano for decoration, but now you make a lot more sense.”

“I didn’t know how you took your coffee, so I just brought it to you black,” I told her. “But I can get cream or sugar if you want.” I offered but she shook her head.

“Black is great,” she said and for some reason, I wasn’t surprised that they even took their coffee the same way.

“I don’t know if I should take the piano comment as an insult or not,” I admitted but she shrugged her shoulders at me.

“It’s hard to imagine you as a three-dimensional person sometimes. Not just someone who’s locked me up,” she said casually, eyes averting me as she looked around the room like she was taking it in for the first time.

“I didn’t lock you in here, Sunshine,” I reminded her again as I stepped closer to the bed at a leisurely pace. “But don’t get that twisted, because I’m starting to see why Berserk won’t let you get away.”

“Then you’re just as bad as him,” she said, the flare building in her eyes again.

“Wrong,” I said, closing the distance between us, “I’m worse.”

Her mouth parts but no sound comes out and I notice out of the corner of my eyes her hands are fisting the bed sheets. “I don’t know if I want to ask…Why?” She betrays herself and asks anyway.

“Zerkos is just a heartbroken fucking idiot, and his pride is what gets in the way of you two, every time. That’s why you clash. But me? I’m doomed to never get to touch, or taste, or feel you. And to never have, is a greater curse than to have and to lose.” I said through my teeth, too close to her already and my anger obviously apparent.

Her breathing was heavy, when she responded to my confession as she stared at me with those wide eyes. “You heard him. We don’t belong to each other anymore.” She sneered at the memory of his words.

She wasn’t just sunshine, she was the whole fucking Sun. So far, so fucking unreachable, and when I thought I was close enough to touch, I would burn instead. She was all my sins coming back to haunt me, to push me over the edge so that I would lose control.

I grabbed a handful of her hair close to the scalp and pulled her up roughly. She let out a soft cry but didn’t protest as I pressed my face to hers and smelled her hair. I dropped her back on the bed and walked over to the dresser where the burlap sack lay and tossed it over her lap, “Put this on.” I said and she was giving me those giant dark eyes once again. That was her tell when she was scared or unsure, no matter how much she pretended to be fearless.

I had learned it well now.

“You’re locking me back in the cage,” she said, half asking, half already sure of the answer.

“Let’s go,” I said, gesturing my chin to the door.

“Please. I-I can’t go back there, I don’t feel like a person there. Please,” she whispered the last bit, and I could see the tears starting to pool in her eyes. This whole thing was really doing a number on her no matter how well she tried to hide it.

“There are two ways I can get you out of that kennel.” I told her, “You can either start telling us the truth…” I stopped for a bit, but she urged me on with a look that told me that option was completely out of the question for her. “Or you go out there and tell Berserk you’re mine.” Zerkos made it clear she wasn’t part of the trials, but at the end of the day she signed paperwork for exactly that, and when she did, she became Black Crow property.

She was mine just as much as she was his, and if she chose me to protect her, I could at least get her out of that kennel. Maybe I could even get her to trust me enough to tell me what she was running from. It would at least keep him from putting her in that box and damaging whatever was left of her any further. The reasons seemed legit enough that they calmed the storm in my head, but I knew the real reason. I wanted her. It was that simple. I had never wanted anything in my life, not for a long time.

But I wanted her.

“I don’t belong to anyone,” she said defiantly, turning her chin away from me.

“We can’t help you if you don’t choose one of us, it’s the only way he’ll let me get you out of there. It’s in the contract.” She didn’t turn back to look at me. I chuckled loud enough for her to hear, and she narrowed her eyes at me with a hating look she normally reserved for Berserk.

“You deserve each other. How perfect you are for one another, just pushing and pushing. Eventually, one of you is gonna fall off the cliff, then what?” I said, unable to hide my frustration. I grabbed her by the wrist, and dragged her out of my room holding the burlap sack as I practically tossed her into the living room.