There were plenty of things Circe wished to have asked Elven as the car treaded along the winding wet road. Cold dew was already starting to form on the frozen windows, a testament to Avalium's gray dismal weather. The cold dew circulated into Circe's heart as he tried to figure out who Elven was, where he came from, and what he know regarding Avalium University. So many questions rang in his head but none of them came through. His lips appeared to be magically sealed. By the time he had tried to open it, they had already arrived at the building.

The residency of the Brixons was a tall, gothic architecture that looked as if it belonged in the Victorian era. The building was sculpted in fancy baroque fashion and it stood lavishly grim. An ebony bat that had been perched on the home screeched angrily and flew away.

Circe harrowingly followed Elven to the front door and waited eagerly as he knocked. It was a pretty fruitless endeavor, Circe thought, knowing the Brixons. They probably wouldn't pick up. Silent cool breaths filled the frigid air. Circe's heart was pounding, but he didn't really know why, he lived there.

"Did the Brixons know you were leaving?" Elven asked. His elfish ears were wriggling. Circe tried not to stare at it for too long.

Circe nodded curtly. "Something like that." It probably would've been less troublesome to have gone quietly. But that unfateful morning hadn't been planned, it had just…happened.

"Did you say anything to them before you left—anything at all?"

Circe froze for a moment. "I-I don't remember." He did of course. He had flung two middle fingers at Mr. Brixon and told him to stick it in. That impetuous act would've surely awarded him two days with no food had he been leashed into the house. But it wouldn't have made a difference, it's not like they fed him anyway.

There was another fidgeting silence that credited the air. Circe was hoping the Brixons wouldn't open the door, but at the same time didn't really have any other option as to where he would stay. A fuming indignation swirled in Circe's head.

"What you did today won't be left unchecked by the media. People will know who you are and what you did Circe. Some people…well, just bear in mind that some people out there don't really like monsters," Elven froze, as if carefully swallowing the next words to say. Circe tried not to bare his teeth, the elf wasn't making him feel any better. "Even if you are a hero. As many times you save their butts over and over again they won't ever really appreciate it because people tend to not be around things that make them uneasy. Especially if it's something as unnatural as a monster."

"Fuck off!" Circe folded his hands. "I didn't ask to be who I am, ok?"  He hated having to stand there, interrogated. Castigated for something he had no control over and for something that haunted his every waking hour. It wasn't fair.

Elven frowned, a flash of anger flew past his face. "I'm not saying this to scold you, Circe. It's just a warning. When you get to school, some of the people there won't be very welcoming towards you. Not because of who you are personally, but what you are. I beg you, please, don't let them get to you. Keep your chin up and be yourself. Will you promise me that?"

Circe looked away sullenly. "Whatever."

The carved black door swung open. A tall paperwhite man with lines on his face and shadows behind his eyes stood before them. He was dressed in a slim dark suit, and just like Elven, appeared rather grim by his stature alone. Everything about this man was thematically consistent except for his large mannish hands. He was the best excuse for a zombie with a suit that Circe had ever seen.

Mr. Brixon moved aside to allow the other Brixons to step into the gray light. Mrs. Brixon, a tall spiderlike woman with oddly flat red lips stood beside her husband, pursing her lips disapprovingly as if she was looking at dung. She had the same ghostly pallor as Mr. Brixon but seemed a tad bit more emotionless and gaunt than Mr. Brixon, if that was even possible.

Cassandra Brixon, the oldest of the four, was somewhat short and curvy with really round protruding breasts. She was in her teens and she carried the same white screening complexion and oily black hair as the Brixons. Her eyes were gleaming, her arms folded, and she was leaning against the wall scowling at Circe.

The next two children were two black-haired twins, Ryland and Roland, who were pale as well but had a rosy red tinge smeared up their cheeks and buck teeth. If you had met them for the first time, you would've assumed they had gotten slapped. A look of utter indifference was glued to their faces. They stood lumber still, blinking unemotionally.

The final child, Damian, a chubby black kid who wore a striped black shirt, was staring back and forth between the Brixons and Elven, hopelessly confused. He was thirteen, a year younger than the twins, and second in line to being the youngest. Circe, the smallest and youngest, of the four, stared back defiantly.

"What is this invasion? What do you want?" Mr. Brixon asked. His steely gray eyes landed bitterly over Circe and then moved back to Elven.

"I'm David Elvengaard, former Shadower from Avalium University and assistant to the Avalium Police Department." Elven pompously flashed the silver-plated Alma Mater badge into the gray-white light. "I believe twelve years ago I sent this boy to be taken under your wings. But as my discoveries have turned out, you weren't as faithful as I thought you'd be in nurturing this boy. The sheer disappointment..." Circe waited. There was a razor-sharp silence. Elven flashed a curly grin and rubbed his chin. "Boy oh boy, do I smell trouble."

Cassandra shuddered, her dark oily eyebrows raised. Mr. and Mrs. Brixon stood strangely rigid, like gaping shadowy ravens on a cold night. Mr. Brixon wiped his nose.

"To find this boy fending for himself on the streets, unfed and unprotected. Now, that's just foul behavior, really. I didn't expect you guys to be nice to him, but some human decency, a note of unbridled charity would've been enough. Now listen, here's what's—"

"I don't want that demon dwelling in my house! And I don't appreciate some elfish fool telling me so either! " Mr. Brixon spat. "Yes, I know what he is, we saw the news, and I've heard the things he's said in his sleep. You've got another damn thing coming if-if–that insidious monstrosity is going to come crawling into my–" Mr. Brixon couldn't find his words. Something had happened. He appeared to be rasping, choking. He was now grabbing his neck, strenuously tugging. Cassandra shrieked and Mrs. Brixon shook him and pounded him on his back.

Mrs. Brixon instantly let go as Mr. Brixon was raised into the air and slammed against the wall. He struggled more and more, vainly trying to choke out some words as his rectangular face tinged in pink. Blood spluttered out of his thin gray lips and his eyes appeared to be popping out of his socket, it almost appeared like they were going to fall out. Veins inched out from his neck and wormed all the way to his face. Circe grinned.

Elven, who had his hands splayed out, golden ring trembling on his finger, shouted, "You will take this boy in under the provision of time he has left. You will do as you're told or you and your pathetic family will die right here and now. Nod if you understand—you don't have long."

Mr. Brixon strained for a nod, veins popping out of his temple. For a moment he thought he was gonna be blind, he thought his head was going to pop, but then an invisible force relinquished its wrath.

"I'm glad we could see eye to eye on this. And if you fail to uphold your promise, just remember that I'll be watching you. My eyes never rest. This boy—" Elven poked his long-nailed finger at Circe, "—this boy won't be seeing you for some quite time, so you better respect him. Mark my word, Brixon, there will come a time when you and this family will need him and he won't be there."

Like an elfish bat, he turned swiftly at Circe. "I'll be seeing you on the fifteenth. Keep an eye out for that mail…It's very important that you read it, don't be negligent." The blonde, elfish man whipped around and vanished into the cold thin air.

As soon as Elven left, Circe had somewhat anticipated that the Brixon's rancorous opinion of him would somewhat begin to soften. But things had taken a whole different direction.

The walls inside the Brixons were velvety red with tiny embellishments of bats for decor. Plush sofas in blood red and midnight black sat in the living room. A massive plasma screen tv clung to the walls. The house had a spiral staircase that snailed up to the three rooms where the children and the Brixons slept. A tiny closet stood in reserve in the narrow hallway between the kitchen and the bathroom. It had a tiny dim light crackling inside and mangy spiders were crawling out of it. This was where Circe slept.

When they had scrambled inside, Circe felt two mannish hands grapple him by his chest and slam him against the wall. A sharp punch stabbed him through his ribs. Two more buffeted his face.

"Eugh!" Circe sputtered. Snot and spit were dribbling from his nose and black patches were beginning to emerge from his weak vision. Beneath his eye, a purple ring began to crescent.

"Who do you think you are, humiliating me like that? Do you think I would just stand there like an imbecile while he abused me like that—does he not know who I am? You thought that was funny, huh?"

"No!" Circe pleaded. A metallic taste was encroaching on his tongue. His thin knobbly knees were shaking.

"Vi—Cassandra, grab him behind the arms. Send him to the bathroom."

Mrs. Brixon automatically rose to the occasion but Cassandra hesitated for a moment before swooping behind the trembling kid's arm and dragging him to the bathroom. The boys followed eagerly, sinking behind the shadows. Mr. Brixon grabbed Circe's snowy hair and slammed his head onto the kitchen sink four times. Scarlet blood leaked down Circe's head and a huge purple wart earthed up.

Circe vomited. The twins' satisfied howls of laughter echoed through the bathroom, Cassandra chipped in. It seemed nobody was coming to rescue Circe this time. He felt extremely weak.

He could just turn, but he knew he shouldn't. Something in the back of his mind forced him not to. Perhaps it was Elven. Or those doggish cops.

The sink water gushed in and Circe's head was plunged into the basin, wetting his deformed face. The angry hands pulled his head back up—

"If I ever see you laugh at me or disrespect me in my own house again, I'll be sure to kill you—you got that night creature?" Mr. Brixon growled.

"What did I ever do to you?" Circe panted nervously.

Mr. Brixon's steely gray eyes furrowed.

Circe often wondered why Mr. Brixon was such a hateful creature. But of course, if he knew the truth, it wouldn't be so simple. Mr. Brixon had his reasons, just as anyone did, and his began forty years ago at the age of thirteen.

When he was young, his father was quite strict and severe. He expected Vyron Brixon to get the best marks in his classes, to do as he was told, to clean around the house every day of every waking hour, to speak properly, to dress properly, and to learn how to cook meals from five star restaurants. He was restricted from having any friends because he wanted his son to serve him and be someone important. He was restricted from smiling and laughing because Wendell Brixon himself was a tainted bitter man. If he came home from school with bad marks, an attitude, or any sign of a budding friendship, Vyron Brixon would get a severe beating in the bathroom and then he would be thrown in the shower where he would be beaten some more.

Vyron was beaten so many times that his nose started to become dysfunctional. It would always drool snot and Vyron would always be sneezing in class a lot. Because of his repulsive nose, a lot of kids strayed away from him and took him as a clown. No girls ever spoke to him from seventh grade and on and he never made any friends.

His mother never did anything to remedy any of his sufferings. It seemed that life in Avalium had gotten insidiously darker the older he got. In those times there were rising crime rates in the city and a thousand whispers of occultic, mythological creatures sneaking into the city to ensure diabolical havoc. Not a lot of people survived in the days of Vyron Brixon, including his own father, who died from a severe sickness caused by The Green Eel. It wasn't until Vyron had gotten out of college that he could truly appreciate his death. It was truly the happiest moment of his life.

Mr. Brixon never attended his father's funeral, and whenever he did visit his graveyard, he spat on it. After the death of Wendell Brixon, Vyron's mother had gone insane and had to be institutionalized. He hasn't visited her since that day. Brixon eventually found a decent accounting job and married Violet Brixon. Over the years, together, they promised to form a foster home where they would bully and harass adopted children as capital for their own shortcomings. Once every three months, a child care agent would come to inspect the place and Mr. Brixon would force everyone to act normal or somebody would get severely beaten.

Mr. Brixon's raven-like countenance hardened. "Send him to his closet." He snapped. "Nobody will speak to this boy or feed him. If you do, you won't be eating for a whole week. Do I make myself clear? Good, now buck up!"

Circe was vigorously dragged into the tiny narrow closet near the kitchen. The door slammed shut and he was back alone with the crinkly spiders and the dampened luminance of the golden lamp. A slice of a moth-bitten slice of bread reeked beside him. A meal that he hadn't bothered to touch for nine days.