He laid himself down on a cross made of another man’s sin and let it carve him open. A sin I understand intimately—because of him. Because, in that mine, he took from me what no one else ever had the right to touch. A violation, yes, but not a desecration. Not like his past demon. Not like mine.
Raphael didn’t leave me on that cross. He didn’t seal me in a tomb. He waited for me. He watched. Just like that night. He prepared for my ascension, my resurrection: one I claimed when I rose out of that bone pit.
Yes, it’s twisted and fucked up. There is no denying the abuse. But there is no shame in reclaiming it, re-framing it.
I can stay a victim trapped in the black hole of that desolate mine. Or I can take it back. It’s not surrender anymore. It’s seizing, claiming, crowning. It’s embracing what rightfully belongs to me.
And every last one of these damned men—gods and monsters—belongs to me.
They didn’t destroy me. Together, we built a kingdom around my ruins. Around my healing. Aroundme.
This is our home. This is where I stopped running.
This is where they did not fix my broken pieces. Theycrownedthem.
They are not my captors anymore.
I am not their victim. I am theirQueen.
Raphael bows his head just slightly, like he’s always known this truth. Like the monster in him has been waiting for mine to wake up.
Not all monsters deserve redemption.
Not all monsters can be saved.
But some?
They can bechosen.
“I’m here now,” I finally say, softly, while I gaze at my soul-slayer and resurrector. I won’t ask him about his past before the group home. Or about how he saved their lives from that grouphome. Or…the cap. Not yet. He’s already given me what I need tonight. Later, he can give me what I want.
“I’m not just someone to break,” I tell him. “But I’m not fighting anymore. I’m just me. Raw. Real. I’ll feel it. Everything. If I’m your Queen, then I can take him. I’m strong enough for your scar. I’m strong enough for your soul.” I straighten and speak my truth so they may all hear, “I choose you. I chooseallof you.”
I lift my hands and take his face between them. A muscle bounces in his jaw. I level him with my gaze—my soul standing on the battlefield where we went bare-bones, twin storms, and came out still standing amid scorched earth and dead stars.
Weighing every word, holding my crown, and forging my chain, I touch my lips to his ear and whisper, “So, let the monster out, Raphael. I’ll give him everything. And I swear I’ll still be here in the morning. Your Queen.”
Raphael doesn’t wait.
He lets himself off the chain. He fucks me in every single hole while the others watch. He takes me outside and fucks me in the snow, his teeth scraping over the raw, angry arrow-scar bearing his name. He covers me in his semen, his piss, his blood.
The monster fucks me down to my soul.
And then?
He gives me to the healer to treat me,
The warrior to shield me,
The butcher to feed me,
And the fixer to lighten my load with laughter.
I wake up in the morning wrapped in all their warmth, their weight, and their chains—still holding me,keepingme in a five-linked vow that I will never escape.
60
Vincent
