Page 1 of The Reaper
Prologue
THE BIRTH OF THE REAPER
Fifteen years ago…
Ialways thought there was something truly hypnotic about fire. The way the flames danced around, seductively spreading and consuming everything in its path without a thought for the destruction it caused. How it crackled and spat like a beautiful, venomous demon––so pretty to look at, and yet, so deadly to touch. The ethereal, other-worldly smoke that whirled and curved in elegant waves, escaping up the chimney as if it’d already done its bidding and was off to find new adventures, new victims.
It was the perfect contradiction.
And right now, as I sat on the floor of my living room, chained to the radiator on the wall, I wished I could be like the fire I was staring at. I wanted to have the capacity to control my surroundings just like those flames. The ability to rise up and be free of this room and everything in it, like the smoke that billowed in plumes and danced away. To possess the ultimate power to destroy whatever came near me without thought, without care. People had a respectful fear of fire and all that it encompassed. I wanted them to feel the same way about me, and they would, eventually, when I was older. My day of reckoning would come.
But that day wasn’t today.
It was always the same when my mum was working nights. The same battle to survive to see the morning, both physically and emotionally. She wasn’t a bad mother, my mum. I never blamed her for one second for everything that had happened to me. I was eight years old, and she had to leave me with someone so she could go to work. I just wished it didn’t have to be him and his fucked-up friends. I respected her though because she did everything she could to keep a roof over our heads and pay the bills, all while she was heavily pregnant. Her multiple jobs helped to put food in our mouths and clothes on our backs. But it also put beer in my stepfather’s already bulging, sagging gut. Beer that gave him the fuel to carry out his sick and twisted games. God forbid he should get off his fat ass and earn an honest day’s wage.
Why would he?
I once heard him say to one of his sick friends, “Why would I have a dog and bark myself?” That’s how he saw my mother––a free ride, an easy option.
It’d always been my dream that one day we’d escape. I’d take care of my mum so much better than he ever had, and there’d be no fear, no reason to watch my back. I’d make sure of that. But now that my mum was having another baby, my dream was fading fast. She would never leave him, and he would never let her go. She was his golden ticket. The key to maintaining his lazy lifestyle. But on nights like tonight, he wasn’t lazy, he was energised. He had purpose to his existence.
Tormenting me.
He’d used his old handcuffs to chain me to the pipe at the bottom of the radiator. I’d learnt early on that it was pointless to struggle against the restraints and try to break free. All it did was make my wrists hurt and give me welts that’d last for days, making it even more painful the next time he chained me up. So, instead, I curled into a ball, making myself as small as I possibly could. The more of my body I protected, the less likely I was to sustain an injury that’d make him bristle with pride. He wanted to hurt me as much as he could, but more than that, he wanted to live off the fear he created.
My fear.
That was something I’d never give him.
I’d never cry or scream no matter how much it hurt. I wouldn’t beg or plead either. I’d take his abuse and file it away in my brain, ready to be recalled at a later date. Like a macabre catalogue for revenge, I’d never forget, and when I was ready, I’d use the memory of these nights to pay him and his friends back ten-fold for what they’d done to me.
I’d decided early on, when he started playing these games, that my purpose in life would be revenge. I would live to see death brought to fuckers like my stepfather and his vile, sadistic friends. I also wanted to protect my mum as best I could, and that’s why I’d become a master at hiding the marks and scars. It would devastate her to know what was going on, and I didn’t want her to feel any shame because of me. Better that he took his anger out on me than my mother, or God forbid, my baby sister that was growing in her tummy. I’d rather die than let him hurt them. Every time he rubbed my mum’s bump and called them his girls, I seethed inside with anger. They weren’t his, they were mine. Mine to protect from people like him.
Tonight, the game was darts. My stepfather, Vinnie, prided himself on the ideas he thought up each week. Last week, it’d been noughts and crosses. There was only Vinnie and Ray here that night. Ray had been crosses, and he’d grinned as he scratched his x’s with his penknife into their chosen canvas––my thighs. The x’s weren’t the worst of it though. Vinnie was noughts, and he’d used his cigar to scorch my skin with the burning end, sizzling it deep into me as he chuckled and twisted the nub for full effect. I’d clenched my jaw and stiffened every muscle in my body with every burn, but I never made a sound. Even when the sweat trickled down my back at the searing hiss of pain that I’d had to endure over and over again, I never gave him the satisfaction that he craved.
He wanted to break me.
But how could you break something that didn’t exist?
You see, in those moments, I was able to check myself out of this life. I wasn’t Devon, the little shit, like he used to call me. I was just a vessel. A body of blood, bones, muscles, and nerves. I’d learnt to reinvent myself from the boy I’d been to a ghost, an echo of myself.
Empty.
No feeling, no fear.
I was devoid.
But my soul?
That was somewhere else, floating over the scene playing out below. Lying in wait until the time came to show everyone how tainted and twisted I truly was. How vengeful they’d made me. Once I had the power to back it up, of course. My soul was a darkness that I kept caged, but it fed off events like these. Vinnie’s games only served to feed the demons inside of me. I would get my revenge.
I watched out of the corner of my eye as Nigel, one of Vinnie’s mates, took a swig from his bottle of beer and then dropped it on the floor by his feet. I was glad they were drinking heavily tonight because it weakened their aim. Nigel ran the back of his hand over his mouth and then squinted at me as he aimed his dart.
“What’s the score for getting his shrivelled little dick?” he asked, turning to look at Vinnie, who sat next to him on our threadbare sofa.
Vinnie shook his head and gave a grunt, rolling his eyes as if he was fed up already and wanted to up the stakes. The suffering and brutality obviously wasn’t going fast enough for him tonight.
“Your aim is shit anyway, why do you wanna know?” Vinnie scowled in irritation, desperate for it to be his turn so he could inflict more pain on me.
