CHAPTER 101: DREADFUL LOOKS

Kieran’s POV

"Don’t look!" I snarled, my voice a distorted version of my own. I scrambled back, my hands clamped over the face. "Stay away from me, Keith. You know why."

I couldn’t let them see it. They could never see the face of the man who had scarred us for life, the monster who had broken us, staring back at them from their own brother.

I stumbled to my feet, keeping my head bowed and my face completely covered as I hurried out of the ring.

My shirt was on the bench. I snatched it up, quickly wrapping it around my head, covering the grotesque mask I was now forced to wear. This was my curse. Without a time frame, just like Kayden’s.

And I knew the consequences. If they saw that face, they would be triggered. Keith would lose himself, his body twisting into the hulking, mindless rogue monster.

Kayden would see everyone around him as the master, sending him into a panicked, defensive spiral. If all three of our curses were unleashed at once, there would be no one left to pull us back.

We could break out of this house, into the world, and expose the monstrous secret we worked so hard to contain.

I stood there, trembling, the fabric of my shirt a thin barrier against the horror. I could feel them, Keith and Kayden, standing not too far away.

A silent, tense vigil. They were keeping their distance, just as they knew they must.

"I need to get out of here," I gasped, my voice muffled by the cloth. The walls felt like they were pressing in, the air growing thin and suffocating. Every instinct screamed at me to tear this fabric away and claw the stolen face from my skull. But I knew it was my own flesh I’d be mutilating.

I remember the cold weight of a gun in my hand, pressed against my temple. The desperate, shattered logic that had seemed so clear in that moment. My brothers had gotten to me just in time.

Keith’s voice was firm, an anchor in my swirling panic. "No. You are not leaving our sight."

"I can’t stand this!" The words were a raw plea. "You know I can’t stay locked in here forever! No one knows when this... this torture is going to end. Have you forgotten the times it lasts for days? I can’t go through that again. I won’t."

"You know the curse is amplified by our emotions," Keith countered, his tone brutally calm. "The more agitated you are, the longer it holds you. The worse it feels. You have to fight it, Kieran."

But his words were fading, drowned out by the roaring in my ears. I was zoning out, the present dissolving. I was slipping back.

As if a memory was playing in front of me, the world dissolved into that familiar room. The air was thick with the stench of perfume, sweat, and a disgusting, cloying lust.

I was on the bed, the mattress digging into my back. A woman, all sharp and hungry eyes, was pounding down on me.

"You’re doing so well," she moaned. "I want to hear more of your voice."

I wanted to clamp my mouth shut. To push her off. but the fear was a coil serpent in my gut. If i didn’t perform, if I wasn’t good enough, she would report me. And he would hear of it. The consequences were a familiar, bone-deep terror.

I forced the words out, layering a false, husky tone over my revulsion. "You should keep it up. Keep being the slut you are." the words felt like poison on my tongue. "You’re not allowed to cum until i say so."

The grown woman above me preened. "Yes, Daddy."

A fresh wave of self-loathing washed over me. "I’m going to ruin you for anyone else."

"You can ruin me all you want!" she gasped, bouncing faster.

Despicable. All of them. These people, taking their pleasures from someone who was just a child, even if we didn’t look it. It didn’t matter. In that moment, a switch flipped inside me. The powerlessness didn’t just leave, it was burned away by a cold fire. My hands went to her hips, not to push away, but to make her move faster, harder. I would be the one in control.

I

would make them beg, be the one dictating their pleasure, their humiliation. why? Because they all loved my charm. They were intoxicated by the words i could spin, the way i could make them feel desired and debased all at once. And i would weaponize it.

The memory shattered as something solid and heavy slammed into my side. A grunt was punched from my lung as i crashed to the ground. My mind scrambled, the phantom scent of that room replaced by the steril smell of the gym floor.

It felt like a dumbbell has hit me.

"Snap out of it, Kieran!" Keith’s voice was sharp, cutting through the fog. I felt his hand on my arm, trying to pull me up from the ground.

I shoved him away, hard. "They’re in my head!" I choked out, scrambling to my feet. The cloth was still tight over the monster’s face.

"It’s just your mind messing with you!" Keith insisted, his voice strained.

But I couldn’t hear him anymore. I couldn’t stay. I turned and ran, bursting out of the gym and into the hallway.

I ran blindly, the cloth a suffocating shroud. Please, someone, save me. The desperate thought was a silent scream. Would any of this have been different if we’d known our parents? We only had each other, but our comfort was a fragile thing, always tempered by the fear of triggering one another. We were a triad of mutually assured destruction.

Tears soaked the fabric, hot and shameful. Sixteen years. I had endured this for sixteen years. It kept getting worse, the curse digging deeper into our minds, becoming more potent, more cruel.

It wasn’t something we could fight with willpower. It was a shackle that had to be broken.

"Master Kieran?" A calm, steady voice cut through my panic. Sir Alfred. I must have reached the living room. I felt his presence, a pillar of stability in my crumbling world.

"I’m useless," I sobbed, the words barely audible. "Just a tool. A thing for other people’s pleasure."

I felt his firm hand on my back, guiding me. "Come with me, sir." He led me, my vision obscured, until I felt the plush softness of a mattress beneath me. I wasn’t listening to his words, my mind a whirlpool of despair. But one phrase drifted through: "...hope she can help..."

I didn’t care. Alfred left, closing the door softly behind him. I was alone. Slowly, I reached up and pulled the cloth away from my face, letting it fall to the floor. I dropped my head into my hands.

"I really need help," I whispered to the empty room. "Moon Goddess, if you can hear me... please help us. I can’t do this alone."

As if in answer, a scent filled the air. It was soothing, cutting through the static in my mind. The door opened. I looked up, then immediately dropped my gaze back to the floor, my heart lurching.

What is she doing here? Why is Eleanor here?

And why was her scent somehow making the storm inside me begin to calm?