Charlotte stood over Hawk, staring down at the pathetic form that was the King she served, even now all these centuries later. The King that rejected her, that trained her, that elevated her in rank because he knew her value. This same King was in torment not just because he was starving, but because he had hurt someone. Never, over the thousands of years she had known him, had Hawk, the Blood King of Hell, ever shed a tear over his victims, no matter what he had done to them.
In the last week or so, he had nearly raped and beaten his own husband, taken too much blood, and pinned him down on the ground of this dirty cellar in an effort to consume him. Toji had been right, Hawk should have been in chains. Hero wouldn’t have then suffered at the hands of such a loathsome creature as the Blood King.
Yet, here he was, Hawk Grace Helman, a broken man, suffering from starvation and heartache, true heartache for what he had done to the man he loved, the man he was created for, that he was eternally bound to. Charlotte had to admit she was impressed that Hawk was still abiding by the contract and not going out looking for a hunt on his own. He knew what he would be risking by doing that and even Sumi knew that.
“He’s going to need to feed, Sumi,” she had said. “You can’t starve him just to prove a point.”
“No?” the scum demon contractor had chuckled. “And what point would I be proving, Ms. Graves? That I hold his balls in a jar on my shelf?”
“That you hold the keys to his freedom, asshole,” she had snapped back. “If he doesn’t eat, he’ll starve and go feral. If he does that, then—”
“Then he ends up in chains in my basement.” The smug look on his face had made even Charlotte Graves, master torturer and executioner of the Fourth Realm of Hell, want to vomit. “Yes, that is precisely my point that I want him to prove. I will not be providing him any more ‘rewards’, nor will he be able to simply go out and hunt for whatever he wants whenever he wants. So then, what is a demon to do? Especially such a unique one as he?”
Sumi had threatened to take Hero away from him if Hawk screwed up one more time. At the time she had told Hawk about that, she had felt happy and arrogant, even a little smug herself. He didn’t deserve true happiness. Not him. Now, seeing him suffer this way, she began to regret that smugness. She loved watching her victims suffer and squirm, including Hawk. But this? This was too much, even for her. And she wasn’t even the one putting the hot spikes to his chest…he was doing it to himself.
She frowned and folded her hands into fists, Hawk’s pitiful moaning and crying tearing a hole in her chest. She swallowed back the bile that rose in her throat as the pain intensified. She shut her eyes and breathed in deeply, letting it out slowly.
“I met with Hero,” she said calmly. The noises instantly stopped. “He told me what’s been going on with you lately. I’m sorry…I should have come sooner. He wouldn’t have gotten hurt if I had.”
Hawk said nothing.
“I also let him know that your union has been made known and acknowledged throughout the entirety of the Divine. So, congratulations, Your Majesty. You and High King Hero are now lords above us all. Whoopie and huzzah. I’ll make the arrangements for your coronation with Lucifer in the next few months and—”
“Are you done?” Hawk’s voice was weak and cracked, but his attitude was still as strong as ever.
What surprised Charlotte, however, was that instead of telling her to stop calling him a King or making any references to a station he never wanted, he just sounded…annoyed.
“Is he safe?” His tone was softer, telling her in every way possible where his true concerns lay.
She relaxed her shoulders. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, Your Majesty, the King is safe. He’s with Toji.”
Hawk slowly pushed himself up on shaky arms, so he was sitting with his back to her, his hands on either side of him, his blood-red hair a tangled, matted mess, his head hanging down. “I didn’t…” he cleared his throat. “I didn’t mean to…hurt him.”
“He knows.”
He turned his head slightly so she could see his tear streaked face and she felt another tear rip through her chest. She put a hand under her ribs as she took in a sharp intake of breath. She had never, in over ten thousand years, ever seen him this way. He looked so broken, so defeated.
“Why didn’t you come sooner, Charlotte?”
She swallowed. “Because I knew it was you asking for me.”
Hawk struggled to his feet and turned to face her, his eyes hooded, his body weak and abused. He swallowed and his chin quivered once before he bit his lip, turning his head slightly to the side, his hands clenched at his sides.
“Don’t—” he took a deep shuddering breath. “Don’t refuse my calls again. Do you understand me, Captain Graves?”
Charlotte’s eyes widened and she took a step back. She nodded before remembering exactly who she was talking to. She bowed slightly, placing a fist over her heart. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
Hawk stood there silently for a minute, Charlotte wisely making no move to stand straight until he said or did something that would indicate she could. Apparently, he and Hero had talked this position acceptance over more than once in the last few weeks.
“We didn’t ask for this.”
“No, Your Majesty.”
“What does it mean, exactly?”
“It means exactly as you stated it to mean when you set the law down in the beginning. Hero Grace Helman has won the heart of an upper rank demon, and therefore he, and you, are recognized as the High Kings of Hell and will be acknowledged as such, no matter where you are or what your exile status may be.”
“Which is permanent.”
“Yes, my lord, it is. That will not change unless Lucifer sees fit to revoke it since he’s the one who sentenced you.”
“I don’t want him to.”
“Yes, my lord.”
“And Hero?”
“His word is law and supersedes your own, Majesty.”
“He isn’t a demon, Charlotte.” The tone in his voice left no room for argument, not that any could really be made.
“No, sir, he isn’t. Nor will he ever be. He only possesses an extreme amount of demon energy comparable to Your Majesty’s own.”
“Positive or dark?”
“Both…” she flinched as she said it. Fuck. “My lord…”
She could feel his heat rise.
“My lord, his positive demon energy is far greater than his dark…for what it’s worth.”
Hawk’s anger receded immediately. He said nothing for several beats, weighing her words and wondering if he should even bother asking about the door she made Hero create in their link. He thought better of it and walked past her to the stairs.
She stood straight and turned to face him, his back to her.
“I’m hungry, Captain.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I nearly violated and could have killed my husband because of my hunger.”
Charlotte gulped. This was on her and she knew it. Wisely, she said nothing.
“How many are out there?”
“Three, sir.”
Hawk nodded, impressed. He’d expected only one. That Charlotte could come through with triple that showed him she still had some sense of loyalty to him, even after all she’d done and put him through. “Hero’s going to be suffering while I’m out there,” he said, his voice shaking.
“Toji is with him,” she said again. “I trust him with no other being right now.”
“Jordan and Elaine—”
“Can’t be here with him right now, Hawk, I’m sorry. You’ve gone too long and once you’re in full form, you will be unpredictable until you’ve fully fed.”
“Hence the three.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“Charlotte.”
“Sir?”
“The number of formal conversations we will have like this will be minimal and will be the only time I’ll accept being called by any of these stupid fucking titles. Otherwise, dispense with all of it and just talk to me like you normally would. Same goes with Hero, is that clear?”
Charlotte nodded. “Yes, sir.”
He was beginning to change before he even had his foot on the first step. Charlotte began to change along with him, both of them eager to begin their hunt. By the time they hit the treeline, Hawk was in his full demon form, as was Charlotte, and this time he could feel the connection break between himself and Hero. He put one clawed hand to his chest and gripped his shirt tightly as he felt the sharpness cut deep within him.
They ran into the woods, Hawk a red flame of supercharged energy, Charlotte almost flying above him, a black streak darting between the trees. Charlotte directed him where they needed to go, picking up speed as they went. Hawk’s mountain was vast and largely unpopulated, something he had made sure of when he had selected it as the place where he would build his home. There had been plenty of reasons to select such a location, separation from civilization being one of them. But also for hunts like this. They may have to be arranged, but at least there wouldn’t be a scene and no one would ever think to look in this area for missing people.
Especially the types of people they were hunting.
As they drew closer, Hawk’s instincts took over and his mouth opened wide in a maniacal grin, saliva pouring from his fangs. Above him, Charlotte tittered gleefully.
They could smell them; that undeniable odor of trauma and sin that coated any good meal like a fine sauce. Charlotte had picked three really good ones, too. One was a child trafficker, another a serial killer, the final one a pedophile from a neighboring town. Not a single one of these bastards would be missed. Hawk narrowed in on the trafficker first, laughing with unrestrained pleasure.
“That one is mine!” he yelled up to Charlotte.
“Fine by me!” she replied, going to the right. “I wanted him first, anyway.”
“We’ll split up the third,” Hawk said. “She’ll make a nice dessert.” With a laugh and a growl, he closed in on his prey, using the trees and boulders as leverage, he leapt from one to the next over the woman’s head, before landing on his feet in front of her. She skidded to a halt, screaming as she fell to the ground. Hawk closed in on her slowly, his eyes completely yellow with black narrow slits, his body completely covered in blue tinted black marks, his shirt already torn off.
“Nice to see you again,” he snarled. The woman scooted back, trying to get away, trying to hide, her terror soaking into her very bones. “Mm,” he breathed, closing his eyes. “Damn, you smell good.” He crouched down, grabbed her ankle and squeezed, crushing it and making her scream out in pain. “Normally, I would savor this moment, make it last, ya know?” He yanked her forward, pulling her under him. He slammed a hand into the ground by her head, pinning her arm down with the other. “Unfortunately, I hurt someone I love and I need to get back to him pretty quick. So, you’ll have to forgive the mess.”
He loomed over her, his hand moving to her throat. He jerked her head to the side. Before he tore her throat open, he snarled, “Don’t worry about that little girl you brought with you to the bowling alley last week. She’s going to be well taken care of once I’m done here.”
The woman’s eyes went wide with panic. “No…no, you can't, that's my daughter!”
Hawk threw back his head and roared with laughter. “Nice one!” He jerked her head back straight, forcing her to look into his demonic eyes. “Even if she was, that just makes you even more of a fucking sicko. And that’s why I’m going to enjoy every last bite of you.”
Off in the distance, they could hear the screams of the man Charlotte had caught and was playing with before she ate him, too. Hawk smiled.
“Oh, nice! Looks like my subordinate caught a mouse!” He brought his face closer to the woman’s and sneered, his saliva dripping onto her cheeks and nose. “While I get to enjoy me a nice, big, juicy rat.”
“Wait…no!”
Hawk bit into her throat and ripped, blood flying everywhere as he tore her head off completely and tossed it to the side. “Can’t bribe me, bitch, I already have everything I want.”
As he enjoyed the first real meal he’d had in months, made even more exciting by the actual hunt and seasoned with his taunts to increase her fear, Hawk smiled to himself. He really did have everything he could ever want or need waiting for him back at home. He just needed to do everything he could to make things right with him.
He’d lost too much of himself, gone too far, and had deeply hurt Hero to a point where Hawk wasn’t sure he could ever earn his entire trust back again. He wouldn’t give up, though. He would do whatever it took to make Hero feel safe with him again.
That would start by not going so long without eating. Ripping into the woman’s chest, he pulled out her heart and took a big bite out of it, getting the finer details of what a shit human being she had been.
That little girl she had brought to the bowling alley would be going to a good home very soon, he would make sure of that. Retaining all the information on the girl as he could from the trafficker’s heart and memories, he continued his meal, once again appreciating Charlotte’s choice in prey. He hadn’t been lying to Hero when he had said she had come through for him time and again.
As much as he hated her at times, he really did respect her. And right now, he couldn’t thank her enough for providing him with what he had now. Thanks to her, he could return home and begin the healing process with his husband.
-*-
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