Bound by Blood

Chapter 102- learning new things

(Y/N) POV:

Suddenly the normalcy of life seems unsettling, unsettling to have to pass the next few days waiting for Chul's file in a series of lessons and spending days at the nest or at the Ims. It feels unsettling because it feels awfully like the calm before the storm, a storm I feared would be too strong and too turbulent for any of us to endure and come out unscathed.

It's unsettling and so it makes it harder to sleep at night, makes me feel restless, feel the buzz and itch to do something, anything to expel the energy. Sometimes that's dealt with at nights by some of my mates who seek out my awake figure to curl up with me, talking to each other softly as we cuddle, sometimes my body feels restless lying down so I get up, heading off to my personal room to try and paint, failing and ending up in the kitchen- investing that energy into baking, mass producing batches of cookies and cupcakes and traybakes. And it's usually in the kitchen that one of the others find me, tugging me away from starting another batch.

And my spare moments between work, lessons and being with my mates is spent pouring over the case files of the victims, and finally getting to the second half of the file on my parents.

All of us gather up on the third night after Jinnie oppa contacted his mother to finally read the second half, and though I knew what I was heading to- it still wasn't enough, was nowhere near enough to prepare me for the gruesome photos of that night, I flinch turning away from the crimson stained photographs- fingers skimming the edge of it and feeling a phantom wetness against my fingers, checking them in a panicked state that they weren't stained red. It's Hobi oppa who catches my fingers, who easily pulls me into him- arms scooping around me and tucking my head into his neck, protecting me from the sight, head over mine.

There's a tightness in his arms as he holds me, looking at the photos and it seems that the others are in a haste to finish the second half, a promising murmur from Joonie oppa that the photos are gone. And when I turn slowly, hesitantly to peer at the final pages of the case- that summarise the attack, the laws broken, the fact that Chul had never been caught or apprehended for it- despite the sketch of him that lies there, it makes me feel wronged. Horribly and unfairly wronged. As if the universe conspired against me to bring me this state of never-ending misery. And more than that it makes me feel that my parents' deaths are to be avenged, that their souls have been wronged, their lives have been torn away and that there needs to be a punishment, a recompense for it.

And when the file lies shut on the table, silently screaming, and pleading for me to make amends- I vow to avenge my parents, as well as to avenge the wrongs done to Yoongi oppa, done to the victims, done to my covens, to my family and to me. Chul has got to pay for a long list of crime, so he has to suffer equally as much.

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"It's here." Is how Jinnie oppa greets me and Kookie when we reach the nest after lessons, the light teasing ambience we'd come home in quickly vanishing and it's Kookie who's eyes burn red and his hand captures mine to tug me into the living room, sweet soft features now transformed with a tightness, a clenching to his jaw and a sharpness to his eyes.

And it's with courage and resolve and determination that we all gather around the thick pile of files waiting for us- centuries of his existence documented on an endless stream of papers.

It looks like it'll be a long night. We all pull a file into our laps, everyone silently and immediately pouring over the contents, the long stretch of silence broken by disgusted sounds, scoffs and sounds of disbelief.

And it's Tae who breaks the silence first, holding a file up incredulously.

"Did you know Chul wasn't initially a vampire?" he asks.