Hidden Truths - Ethan

36 - The Caretaker

Silence surrounds me. Pain. Where am I? What am I doing here? I feel numb and my limbs are heavy against the fur I lay on. At least it smells like fur; and earth. It's foreign and yet I remember something familiar. The moist air is filled with a hint of someone. Where do I know that from? The dungeons? My face hurts and I want to open my mouth to take a deep breath. I can't.

The frown on my face gives me a sting in my cheek and I can't deny it. This time I'm definitely not in Tristan's room and nobody will wait for me to wake up. Quite the opposite, I guess. Slowly parting my eyelids the first thing I see is darkness as my eyes slowly start to remember how to compensate the little light to still see clearly. What happened? Another fight? Another victim, right?

The ceiling is muddy. Leaning on my lower arms and trying to get rid of the stiff feeling I sit up and look around. I remember, but my head spins. I didn't kill, not really; but I lost. I didn't lose enough though. Tristan still holds onto me. How did I manage to stop drinking from Maria? I think I never stopped once I started killing that way. Tristan... Why are you so stubborn? What do I have to do, to make you see that I'm not good for you? I sigh through my nostrils.

There isn't a lot around me besides the fur I lay on and the doorless entrance from the barely lit cave. A little wooden box and a bowl for blood, but it's empty. The entrance leads into a tunnel. I guess I'm underneath the earth; somewhere deep in the guts of the beast's cave system. The walls are supported by wooden beams and the small room I'm in seems to be new. Why is the entrance not watched? I could step out of here and just run – or go on a killing spree.

I roll around and get to all fours before trying to finally get up. I need a few moments to stop my head from spinning faster than my body is moving. Oh, I feel so elegant, when I nearly crawl up the wall to get on my wonky feet. I hope nobody has seen that. The only thing I'm wearing is ragged trousers. My uniform is gone but my wounds got treated. Looking at my hand I see that my fingers didn't make too much of a progress in healing though, so I guess the timeframe I was knocked out was rather small. At least I have some stumps now. I can work with that.

The fact that I'm still here also tells me that we obviously didn't get attacked by the strangers we were waiting for. Carefully, I start to inspect my face and why it hurts like hell. My cheek got stitched up but is still a bit swollen. I remember a fist coming my way when I was fighting with all that was left in me. It dawns on me why I did that. My fingers run down to prove why I'm not able to open my mouth.

It also got stitched up – but not the pleasant way. I can open it but not even a cigarette would fit in the little space of my parted lips. The leather straps are running through the skin above my lips and connect with the ones underneath my lower lip. Some simple knots tie them together on the outside. Inspecting my mouth cavity with my tongue I miss something very important to me.

Those freaking savages! They took my fangs. Just torn out as if... as if...

I let my arms sink again and close my eyes for a moment. I've presumed to find myself in shackles, somewhere good visible to everybody; to be a subject for their general amusement. The bender, and lapdog of Lord Blackwood, who managed to get himself banned after being unable to control his bloodlust. Someone, who is not even able to decide about his own death, but has to beg for mercy, because of the inability he shows to heal like every other vampire would be able to do.

Instead of the anger that is about to boil within me, I should feel grateful, I guess. Pulling the biting's dog teeth seems legit and fair. I wouldn't have done anything differently. Especially when I have to consider that they do not even tolerate to lay a hand on a human in any way; and I nearly took the soul of Maria. I'm still angry. They took my best weapon, the one thing I could always rely on. On the other hand, I already killed before I got my fangs.