Sorcery (Louis Tomlinson)

xxxii. Dark Clouds

I watched as my much younger father walked through a dark corridor, a black coat with golden embellishments and embroidered swirls adorning his torso and black pants making him seem like a shadow moving in the night. His usually friendly eyes were hard and cold, trained on a bolted door at the end of the hall. I followed him as he unbolted the heavy door and went inside of a small room with half of it covered in metal bars.

A single person sat behind the bars in his prison cell, a blindfold over his eyes and a smirk on his face. His posture straightened out when the door was closed behind my father. He had to be close to Dad's age, about mid-twenties, and I realized with a start why when he spoke.

"My my, this is quite the treat. I didn't think my only brother would ever pay me a visit here." The man said, his voice raspy. Dad kept a straight face, refusing to allow the man to get any kind of rouse out of him.

But...if the man said his only brother...was this man my uncle?

The man grinned behind his blindfold.

"Has Amelie had the baby yet?"

Dad crossed his arms over his chest, his face still a hard mask of no emotion. "No."

"Liar. You can't lie to a healer. She has, hasn't she? I could sense Amelie's pain and the baby's fragile little heartbeat even this far away from the healing center. If I focused hard enough, I could hear my niece's soft breathing." The man smirked again, Dad's face still stoic.

My uncle's smirk vanished as he sat up straighter, moving closer to the barred cage of his jail cell. His hands reached to grip the bars, but a sudden spark of electricity shocked his fingertips when they touched them. He pulled away quickly, wincing.

"The way I see it, you've come here for one of two reasons: first, you came to tell me that I'll get a miraculous pardon for my crimes to see my new niece..."

"You're right, it would be a miracle that you even saw the light of day outside this cell. But it most definitely won't happen." Dad asserted.

"That's why I said one of two reasons, listen to me when I talk to you!" My uncle yelled, Dad unflinching as he took his screams. The mysterious smile appeared on my uncle's face again as he explained his other reason.

"The other reason is to tell me my execution day has been moved."

"You're right again. It's been moved up to the end of the week." Dad informed the man, whose smirk vanished in record time when he heard the grim news.

"Moved...up?" The man's face suddenly turned pale white with fear.

Dad looked at his own poor brother who began to shake with fear.

"I was the one who requested the move." I watched as my father remained cold, unfeeling and having absolutely no sympathy for my uncle.

"Y-you did this to me? Why M-Mark?" My uncle whispered, making my heart lurch with hurt. Why would Dad move his own brother's execution day up?

"You know very well why." Dad glared at his brother.

Just then, my uncle became angry, his jaw set and a certain vein popping out in his neck.

"You'll take everything from Marissa. You know that?" My uncle spat at Dad. Dad was once again unfazed, but didn't say anything. "You'll take absolutely everything from her...maybe I should do the same to your picture-perfect family."

Emotion suddenly made an appearance on Dad's face, worry and anger mixing into a strange expression on his face. My uncle sinisterly smiled when he heard no response.