Beneath Us! (BL)

Chapter 7

        "I'm sorry about Maria," Axel whispered when the convoy stopped for a break. It took almost the whole day to travel 20 miles. The men constantly shouted at them, snapping whips at the backs of the people. They'd finally gotten a reprieve for the night. "She sent you away so you wouldn't have to see that."

       "Only half of our village made it. They slaughtered the youngest of children and the mothers. They killed all the elders. There's only 39 of us now, including you. Since Maria's gone... Tian, you are now the village chief and the leader of a new patriarch," Miss Smith stated quietly, cradling one of her youngest sons. He'd just turned 7 last week and now he watched his own siblings and father die.

       "There's nothing left," Tian answered quietly with tears in his eyes. "They burned our home down, killed our people. They killed Maria."

       "We all lost someone, kid. You have to step up to the plate and figure this s**t out, or we'll all be dead once they find out what you are!" Darrick Grand spat.

       Everyone shushed the man angrily and a sudden silence settled over them all. All their shoulders were burdened with their own grief, and Tian's addled mind hadn't been able to remember that. Darrick had never liked Tian or his blood, and now Tian was to take Maria's spot, he couldn't bear it. The others were just as quiet, unable to meet Tian's eyes.

      "We can't let them find out about either," Jocelyne whispered. "It's what Maria would've wanted."

       "Get some sleep then. I'll figure something out. We need our strength," Tian commented quietly. He didn't want the burden of leadership falling on his shoulders, especially right now. He hadn't even been able to bury Maria much less say final rights so she could pass into the afterlife easily. Now, the future Maria had feared, had come to pass.

       "Whatever freak," Darrick scoffed, shaking his head. "Not all of us are in f*****g love with you."

       "Say it again you ignorant f**k!" Axel spat, rising up to ring the man's neck. "Don't you f*****g dare call him that ever again or I'll wrap your jugular around your f*****g ears you ignorant piece of shit."

       "Axel!" His mother hissed, slapping the boy against the back of the head. "Watch your mouth you little s**t. I taught you to never f*****g cuss."

      "You're cursing mom," Axel argued before turning to Tian. "Don't listen to that little b***h. He's not man enough to admit he's got a small dick."

      "The f**k you say you t**t? You f*****g ass licker!"

      Axel crossed his hands over his chest. The muscles in his neck tightened against the man's pale skin. "I don't think you're using that word correctly. So shut your damn mouth."

       "SHUT THE f**k UP!" One of the men screamed as he emerged from his tent. "For f**k's sake, who knew you even know how to make intelligent conversations? f*****g savages, shut your f*****g mouths before I rip all your tongues out!"

       The group turned solemn once again. Darrick shook his head once more before laying down and attempting to close his eyes against the cold, barren ground. Axel pressed his forehead against Tian's shoulder before sighing.

       "You can't fight with each other, Axel. We're all that we have left," Tian reprimanded. "I know Darrick is hard to get along with, but you both have to be civil. Even if it's hard for him. We have to stay together. We're all stressed guys."

       "Bullshit," Darrick mumbled, rolling over to face away from the group. The rest followed suit, trying to stay together to stay warm against the ground. Tian was pulled down against Axel's chest.

       For a while, they were quiet, listening to each other's breathing. He was too wired to sleep, fear still coursing through his body. He couldn't get the image of Maria dying out of his head. After everything she'd done for him, he'd let her die. The tears came faster than what he expected and he could barely keep his breaths quiet.

       "It's ok," Axel whispered, running a hand through Tian's blonde hair. "It's ok to cry now. Everyone else is asleep."

       Arms tightened around him as he buried his face into the elder's chest. A lousy attempt to muffle his tears. He balled the fabric of Axel's shirt in his fist, but it didn't stop the pain burning its way through his heart. It felt like he was being ripped apart, and now all that pain was catching up.

       "She loved you more than anything," Axel whispered and Tian could only nod. "She knew they'd kill you and she wanted to protect you. She knew you were special, but she wanted to keep you safe more than her duty as village chief."

       "Those wolves.... They killed Moth," Tian paused, swallowing a louder sob down in his chest. "And they followed me back... and helped kill some of the guys... so at least I got... I got some justice for her."

       "Your father would be proud of you, for defending your people the only way you knew how. You controlled those wolves Tian. You're stronger than what you ever thought."

        "I just want Maria here. I'm not ready to be on my own, much less follow in her footsteps. She was trying to get me ready to take after her but I couldn't... I can't. I just want her back."

       "I know. I lost my two youngest siblings. Remember Alexander and Marissa? I watched those horrid men slit their throats. I'm sure wherever we go after death, Maria is there waiting and taking care of our people that have already gone. The burden on you is so much heavier now, and I truly am sorry Tian. As long as you and I stay together, whatever awaits us... I'll be here to protect you."

       Tian nodded but didn't say anything. He eventually felt Axel slip into a deep sleep, but he still struggled to. He was tucked against the elder, arms thrown limply over his side, but sleep still eluded him.

       He eventually wiggled out of Axel's grasp and sat up. His shoulders were hunched over as he looked down. One of his wounds was still bleeding slowly, trickling purple blood down to his palm. His heart broke as he remembered every time he had seen his own blood being different than everyone else's. And how Maria had simply patched him up and told him to be more careful. His original mother had always been distant. She'd loved him, but she'd seemed so far away. She was so bent on keeping Tian away from the humans, that it had often gotten in the way of her being a mother. There had been rules, terrible, painful rules. If he ventured too close to the surface, he was punished horrendously. If he got hurt and was bleeding, he had to immediately clean and bandage it. Even if they were the only ones underneath the surface, his mother still panicked. His mother panicked at the mere thought of him existing. Every night, his mother stayed up and drew on the walls of a life she'd known and Tian had never been a part of. He wasn't allowed to look at her then, nor talk. When she went out looking for food, though, he'd study the drawings. He wasn't allowed to ask about his siblings, he wasn't allowed to ask about his father. His mother blew up whenever he asked about her own past, so he'd just learned to... not ask. There were a hundred more rules that he'd had to live by and it'd always felt like he wasn't even her son. Like he was her curse and her burden, he was what was standing in her way from joining Tiantok and their family. And it hurt every time he wanted to get his mother's attention and she was too far away mentally to even see him standing in front of her.

       As he got older, he understood. He understood why he could never truly call her his mother. Why she wasn't around, like parents should have been. He'd never confronted her about it, because he'd known no different under the ground. He found more comfort in the drawings on the wall then his own mother. He'd been angry back then, a young child in desperate need of affection that wasn't given freely. How much had she loved his father, only to lose him the way she did and shut everyone out? How afraid was she that the world would discover Tian's existence? Why wasn't she there when he needed someone? Did she feel like this when Tiantok died? Or when her children died? Like her entire world had come to a stop and there was no way out? When his original mother had died, he hadn't felt the same immense sadness like he was with losing Maria. This pain, though, was enough to make him want to stop living. Even as he looked at his people, the same people he'd grown up with and came to love.

       Maria was everything to him. She taught him what his mother could not. Love. He looked at his mother, and she was still above ground a hundred miles away mentally. But to Maria, Tian was there. He was there and he existed, and that was something Tian had wanted for so long. He took up space, and Maria made sure he knew he was real. That's the only thing he'd wished for since he was young. For someone to say his name and acknowledge that he truly was there. He wanted someone to talk to when things were hard, when he messed up. Not to sit back and watch his mother find comfort in drawings on the cave walls instead of her own son. It ripped the heart out of his chest to watch his mother do that, to watch her descend so far into madness that fake pictures on a wall were better company. So he'd prayed, and he'd wished for someone to look at him and tell him he existed.

       Maria was real, when his own. Every night, they'd sit around the table and talk about whatever was going on. Maria called it the nightly check in. Tian called it the start of his healing process. For the first time, Tian felt like it was ok to not be perfect. It was ok to not be ok. He felt more human than he had ever before.

       Maria wasn't perfect, though. He didn't see much of her during the day. She was a village matriarch, after all, and had hundreds more people to take care of then just Tian. But her absences tore Tian up, made him feel sick and scared. His mother's absence didn't. They were like strangers in the night, passing by without acknowledgement, a hundred miles away from each other.

       When his mother died, he'd cried. Of course he did. It'd hurt, because she was all he'd known. In their own twisted ways, they'd loved each other. His mother knew what would happen if she went below the surface, but she did it for Tian, and in her own way, that was how she showed Tian how much she'd loved him. And by calling her mother, even after her death, that was how Tian showed his appreciation.

       Maria, though, she'd always been brash and loud about how much she cared for Tian. She gave him things for his birthdays, made him sweets and let him be in the forest where he loved it most, whenever he wanted. She didn't try to change him, she just let him be him. She made sure he knew it was ok to be different. And for that, Tian will never thank Maria enough. Even after death. There were so many times he'd wanted to call her mother but couldn't. Now he'd never have the chance.

       He was torn up over her death, but if he showed it to the others... he didn't know what would happen. His people had lost their loved ones too, and they wailed and they spat at the men around them. They'd fought the men up close and been injured. They had a right to feel the same pains, to suffer. Tian couldn't show it. Maria had taught him well. With his emotions locked away, the people would have the courage to keep going. And a good leader didn't show their weaknesses when the rest of their people were nothing but weakness. A good leader had to carry the burdens that the people couldn't and walk them back into the light. But all Tian wanted to do was rip the smile off the men's face and pull their heads from their shoulders. He wanted to gut them all. How unfair it was for Maria, who was the best leader he'd ever met, to have died at their hands. Despite his anger, he knew deep down that she would want him to carry on her legacy.

       She would want him to store his pains and his worries away and take his place as the patriarch of their village. It was his duty and she'd trusted him with it, and in doing so, Tian couldn't let her down. He had to become his people's strengths. He had no choice but to do what she had always done, stare death in the face with a grin. His chest ached and the tears that wanted to spill felt heavy on his lashes. But Tian bit his lip and clenched his fists tight. He locked every miserable feeling away and replaced it with the will to survive. It was different then the time with his birth mom.

       His thoughts were abruptly interrupted when something brushed against his back and Tian turned to come face to face with one of the warriors, the one who'd been on the horse. He stared down at the boy's wound and the smear of purple blood through the fabric of his jacket. He'd forgotten to cover it up while he was thinking! Oh god, he was an i***t and he was going to die for it. Tian gulped and expected a gun put to his head. His muscles tensed up, ready to break from the chains and choke the man to death. If he could. Tian's eyes shrank from the blue towards the ethereal gold color.

       The man was quiet for a few seconds, transfixed. He couldn't help but feel small as the man towered over him once more. A feeling he wasn't used to. The man squatted down beside Tian, pulling his injured arm towards him. He pushed Tian's jacket sleeve up to reveal the wound more thoroughly. The warrior peered down at the magenta blood. A warm cloth was pressed to the inflamed skin, cleaning the wound thoroughly. Then the warrior brought out a knife and cut along the long side of his own arm. Blood started seeping immediately and he used it to smear onto Tian's wound. The boy almost gagged but the blood covered up the purple tint inside the wound almost perfectly. The angry tint of scarlet glared back at him, wrong in his own eyes. But the others would see it and move on, none the wiser.

      "I can't help you if they found out what you are," the warrior commented before standing up once more. "Come to me if you need more blood."

      Then he disappeared into the night like he'd come and Tian didn't know if he'd just imagined the encounter or not. But the blood lightened up his wounds so it looked almost human. Even he knew it was the only protection for now. Once the lines were visible again, there'd be no helping him. He wasn't afraid, per se, but worried for the inevitable. Tian stared after the man, where he once stood. Anger and hatred burned its way through his gut, but a sense of familiarity settled like a protective shell around his heart.

       "Who are you?" He whispered.

      When the sun was peeking just over the horizon the next morning, a bitter wind cut through the camp. It carried the smell of snow and chilly temperatures along with it. His people rubbed the sleep from their eyes and huddled close to each other. The warrior that had helped Tian emerged from his own tent with a bandage over his arm. The men around him commented on it, but the warrior dismissed it simply.

       Make friends with your enemy if you have to survive.

       Maria had told him that when he was younger, just in case Tian was discovered. The warrior that had helped Tian seemed to have different intentions for him, and Tian would use him to survive.