Between Ties

Intruder

Rhyett's Point of View

I stood with a face of complete terror intertwined with sparks of fear as my mood had dripped with consternation.

I clenched my towel as if I could wrap its material tighter around me than what it already was. My bare feet pointing directly at Nee York's Lucifer before me.

I swallowed as he smiled and then stopped playing the guitar to think for a moment "you know I actually recorded a cover of this song with Lana Del Rey. She's a real talent. Maybe I should release it." He diminished his eyes as he had contemplated that as I stood watching him with eyes of an owl, but I couldn't move and this time not because he had spelled me not to,

Not that he could,

But because I couldn't believe that he was in my f*****g apartment.

"How did you-" I began to say but then he had finished my sentence.

"Get inside?" He laughed and then placed my guitar down beside him on the couch "come on we've been over this, witch equals magic." He said and had then decided to look at me from head to toe, scanning me with his eyes of lust.

I still couldn't speak, my throat was dry and frankly I was scared, but I had to stand up for myself, so I had say something.

"Get the f**k out!" Okay maybe that was a little too brave, but then again I was still wearing the protection necklace that Maverick had given me.

"I get it..." He nodded ignoring my demand as I still stood frozen "why he's so attracted to you. You're gorgeous, love." He smiled, but I felt dirty as he keep staring at me like that.

"In fact. I think you want to kiss me because you find me hot too. Maverick won't mind and you won't tell him." He shrugged and then said words I didn't understand, words I was scared of,

I've heard them before. That spell. What a piece of s**t.

"Come over here and kiss me Rhyett. You want you to, you will not fight it and you will enjoy kissing me." He said instructing me like he did before,

What a sick f**k.

That's practically s****l adult and unfortunately I would know, but I don't want to think about that.

I felt bile run up my throat as if it wanted to be free. I pushed it down.

"Kiss you!? Over my dead body! Get the f**k out before I call Maverick!" I said in a hurry, It was weird how my first instinct was to want Maverick to save me and not anyone else.

He c****d his head back as he was confused and in shock, and then his eyes trailed along my neckline as he stood up with exasperation lingering deep in his eyes.

"Nice necklace. Maverick really does know how to be one step ahead." He nodded "Talia's work I'm assuming."

He stepped closer slowly closing the big gap between us as I stepped back holding up the can and then he laughed "really a can? That's the best you got?"

He now had playfulness in his eyes as he had shut my blinds with the raise of his hand and had snapped to turn on every light in my apartment.

"Didn't you threaten to call Maverick?" He pretended to be confused. "Go ahead get your phone, call him." He said seriously but I didn't try to do this. He stopped dead in his steps and tilted his head to the side.

"Lets be real, Maverick is honestly to drunk to even walk straight at this point, but more importantly even if he could, do you think he still cared enough to come running?" His accent thick in the air as that comment had stung, he knew that Maverick and I were not on speaking terms.

I don't know how he did, but he did. I could tell.

"My brother doesn't care about you anymore, I mean you did smack him...that poor suffering boy, and that's exactly why I'm here." He shrugged "not for the smacking part, more so for the him not caring about you part."

Wait, what. How does he know all of this and what was he talking about.

"What do you mean?" I wanted answers and then he twisted around and walked back towards my couch. "You might want to have a seat love, I'm going to give you a little history lesson." He said plopping himself down, finding his comfortable position.

"Come sit next to me." He smiled darkly.

"f**k off." I shook my head. "I'm staying right here as far away from you as I can." I said with sassy anger, but this only amused him.

"Your loss then." He said and then continued "I'm sure he had caught you up to speed with regards to Tusco and I wanting to bring our father back to life. Tusco has his reasons, I have mine....and let's face it, Kenzo is putty in my hands he'll kill anyone in order to activate his black magic to save his wife and unborn child from dying by my hands." He said with a heart of ice "I would do it, kill them. His wife is human. Humans mean nothing to me."

I glared, because I was indeed a human.

Who hurt this damn boy?

"You see Rhy..." he paused "I can call you that right?"

"No." I said bluntly. "Who cares what you honestly think." He shrugged "Rhy, I have everyone basically on board with bringing my father back except..." he raised a brow waiting for me to finish his sentence. I lamely did. "Maverick." I rolled my eyed.

Nixon is so disgusting.

"Bingo." He cheered "now you see that's the problem I'm facing here. I need all of my brothers to do this spell in order to bring daddy dearest back and at this point I have no control over Maverick because the thing..you.." he had smiling eyes "that I was going to use to dangle over his handsome little head, he now no longer gives a f**k about. Therefore making it harder to convince him to do this spell." He said.

"So this is where you come in. What ever the f**k you did to my brother. Fix it!" He was beginning to show me a glimmer of destructive anger in his eyes "it's a win win, I get my father back and you and Maverick run off into the sunset together...cause let's face it, you have feelings for him and it's what you want, even if you'll never admit it." his dark smile appeared.

I swallowed.

I c****d my head back "I will never make up with Maverick with the intention of helping you. And I would rather let Maverick go then have him live with the guilt of killing someone to save me, in order to bring back the father who didn't care about him." I said strongly.

"Okay Rhyett, but you might want to reconsider once I'm done talking to you. I haven't finished yet." He now had slyness on his face.

"He already killed someone." He boldly and then continued,

"A whole town in fact. Therefore his black magic is already activated." He said and then my heart dropped down to my feet as I began to hold my breath for a moment and then let it out slowly. That's not Maverick, he's a d**k but his not a murderer.

His lying. I shook my head.

"Well to be fair. He doesn't remember any of it. I made sure of that." He shrugged "once...I had cared about my brother, in fact Maverick and I were as thick as thieves. I loved him more than I loved myself and I was willing to give up anything for him." He said and this started to feel too real, like he was being honest,

His eyes had shown this. I swallowed. What the hell is going on. That's not Maverick. I wanted this to be a lie.

"When Maverick was 15, I took him on tour with me in the winter. Maverick...he's smart but back then he was very secretive. He was good at magic, really good I had envied how advanced he was. He had memorized our fathers whole grimoire and could cast any spell that book contained." He nodded shifting himself on the couch "but I think he had more grimoires, I had no clue where he had gotten them from but he knew spells I had never even heard of. It was intimidating." He admitted, and then licked his lips before continuing.

He nodded.

"He knew a lot about black magic and to witches black magic is temping, it's powerful magic without own blood sacrifice. We are born half good and half bad. Who we are as people predicts which magic we would be more drawn too. Black magic is powerful, and any witch who wants power and dominance often chooses the darkness." He nodded "Maverick knew all he could about white magic but it wasn't enough for him, because of the limitation that came with the sacrifice." He shook his head "Maverick had a hard life, he had an alcohol problem at 15 and suffered from depression and I guess taking my brother on a rockstar tour in a bus full of cocaine had started new habits, he was spiraling and soon nothing mattered anymore. He only felt good when he felt powerful and black magic is a high nothing can ever compare to. He wanted that."

I breathed in as if I was taking in all of the air in my apartment as I listened to him.

"He got coked up and killed a junkie on my tour bus." He admitted but kept a straight face.

"It went down hill from there and things got f****d up. When witches choose black magic they still have a white magic conscience, a little voice that tells them they're doing something terrible when they kill. I have it, I ignore it but it's still there and sometimes it makes me do the right thing when I'm about to do the worst."

"Maverick?...He didn't have it." He shook his head "he is different from all of us. The darkness and the light isn't 50 50 with him it's 75 25. When he started to use black magic it had consumed him, he burnt down homes at 15 and walked away from it like it was nothing. No remorse no guilt."

"He was secretive and I knew that he had plans of something big. I knew something big was to come, I could feel it because he had plans of killing his mother on the day of his ascending when he turned 16. I heard him talking to a mysterious person on the phone."

"I blamed myself for not helping my brother out of his darkness. Every death he had caused, I felt was on my hands. I had to do something, he was going to kill his own mother and he needed more power than he already had for his mysteriously big plans and I knew that he would get that power from ascending so I did what I had to. I activated my black magic to make me stronger in order to save him from himself. I needed help because Maverick was born a gifted powerful witch and any spell I was willing to cast over him needed power, a lot of it. I contacted witches from England, old black magic witches. We casted a spell to push his ascension to the age of 18 to prevent him from accomplishing his plans."

"I had to do something, I had to give him a new life and the only way I could do that was if I took his memory away. The witches helped me do that. Kenzo snd Tusco have no clue of Maverick's downfall I don't think they would accept him but I accept my brother for his true form, because I wished I was him. I wanted Maverick's power but I wasn't the one darkness had chosen. It was him." He admitted.

"Maverick doesn't remember that winter. All I made him believe was that he went on tour with me, we fought a lot and we had parted ways, having our bond and love for each other leave too." 

He seemed hurt, but quickly washed his emotions away.

"But now his showing signs of a dark path. He's drinking and I know his doing spells again. He must has access to my fathers grimoire. He's been studying. Rhyett...it's starting again. Stabilize him or the world will end in flames. He isn't a normal witch, he has a darkness that one witch is gifted with every 50 years.

No pressure but the safety of the world is depending on your little fight with my brother to be fixed, because until today I don't know what he had planned but if he was willing to kill his own mother it must have been something big...You better fix this or you'll lose Maverick forever."

He was serious.

"Firstly this is a lot and secondly you're not going to sit here and burden me with the weight of the world on my shoulders. Whatever happens between Maverick an I will be one hundred percent real. I'm not going to make up with him just so that he doesn't fall into a pit of darkness. I respect myself more than that. He was a d**k towards me and fair enough I was an ass towards him but I'm not going to fix things with him if I feel like it isn't an honest thing between us and whatever we feel, and he has to want that too. f**k the world, they can feel Maverick's wrath and that might be selfish  and stupid but I'm not going to fake anything just to save it. And definitely not a f**k to give you what you want.

Plus who knows. You saved Maverick once maybe you can do it again and also if what you're saying about Maverick is true and him and I do decide to fix whatever we have, I wouldn't be so quick to threaten my life if I were you. Maverick would destroy you and your plan for bringing your dad back will go to waste."

"Except you won't tell him about his powerful past because if you do, it will break him and send him over the edge. Maverick is kind and compassionate now and if you tell him he murdered people. He won't be able to live with himself." He had a point. "I'm giving you a chance to convince Maverick that life is beautiful, if you can't I'm going to consider threatening him by harming his mother and that will assure me his cooperation, but the white magic conscience in me is will to make a trade either I threaten to kill you or I threaten to kill his mother. I'm being generous to give you the choice of deciding. I have time I have a few magic artifacts to collect before the resurrection."

"Get the f**k out of apartment. We're done talking." I said confidently. I'm done being pushed around by this piece of s**t.

"I was about to leave you to make your choice anyway. I can sense Maverick's energy, he's in your building, I need to get out of here before he senses mine." He said in a hurry and then added "Seems like Maverick already made your choice for you. His in this building he cares....Remember Rhyett I wasn't here and you know s**t, keep your mouth shut or Maverick will struggle with the guilt of 100 peoples deaths for the rest of his life." He nodded and then then I exhaled and said "I'll keep my mouth shut. I don't really have a choice." accepting defeat as he vanished from my couch into thin air. I was alone now and I couldn't help but try and catch my breath as I walked into my bedroom to change into a pink tank top and pj shorts.

Shit.

I hate Nixon, but in someway I felt bad for him he only started using black magic because he was forced to if he wanted to save Maverick. and that was terrible he was forced to kill someone because of the love he had for his brother and I never thought he cared that much about anything but I guess I was wrong.

I pulled my shorts up my thighs.

But he was still a monster and he chose to be,

And Maverick, what was he? A monster too?

I thought for a minute as I pulled the small towel from my hair and then tied my hair up into a ponytail.

No he's not, Maverick isn't a monster. I know that he's kind and thoughtful and caring. He might be harsh and broken but I knew that darkness wasn't him at his core, no matter who had tried to convince my other wise. He was a murderer but the Maverick I knew wasn't and he would never do that again regardless of his past.

I heard my door unlock as footsteps stepped inside and then I heard his thick, rough voice and honestly I could hear the anger in it but I found comfort in knowing that I could even hear him here, in my apartment...at all.

I was still mad about what he had said at school but I still do care for him. That doesn't just go away because of one fight.

"Why- why the f**k are your blinds closed!?" Yelled a drunk version of him as he double stepped while I saw Token wake up from her nap in the corner of my bedroom and then calmly climbed underneath my bed so that she could sleep in peace, as if she knew Maverick and I were going to be screaming at each other and disturb her from getting proper rest.

I walked into my lounge confused to see his narrow eyes and deconstructed hair. He was a total mess standing there with blazing eyes. He wore a white nike t-shirt and sweat pants.

"Why do you even care!" I yelled back and then he took two clumsy steps forward and then fell to the ground,

Now laying drunk in the middle of my lounge floor.