The Devil Child

Chapter Thirty Three

 Gryphon Gypsy did not sleep. Perhaps because of the nightmares that awaited him every time he shut eyes, or perhaps it was because he didn't know how to turn his mind off when it was time to go to bed.

Instead, Gryphon Gypsy enjoyed his women like he enjoyed his cigarettes; short lived and incredibly frequent.

His back laid uncomfortably against fruity smelling sheets that did not belong to him, and the room that stared back at him was foreign. The girl beside him was just as strange, and when he closed his eyes, he could picture her black hair and button nose, but couldn't think of her name. It came with sleeping around, no strings attached.

He looked down at the girl beside him, who was curled up to his side. She had been a good lay, if anything, she had been entertaining for a bit of time. But while she slept, Gryphon couldn't turn off his brain. He couldn't chase away the nightmares that crept on the edge of his consciousness.

He rolled out the bed, landing with a thump on the floor. The girl in the bed didn't stir, and Gryphon began to gather his clothes. The clock on the side table blinked at him, angry and red, the numbers that told him it was well into the night, verging on early morning.

He crept out of the house and into the night, running a hand through his hair. He wondered often why he did this to himself. Why he wasn't normal. Why he couldn't get a drop of sleep.

Of course, he knew exactly why. That didn't mean he wanted to admit it.

The night air was cold and sharp, but the night sky was soft and welcoming. He felt at home in the darkness, remembering a time when his life was complete darkness with no hope of living, of escaping the darkness of the world.

Gryphon fished for a cigarette in his pocket, lighting it up in the night. The flicker of the lighter brightened the space in front of him, and he welcomed the warm glow of the burning cigarette, enjoying the feeling of the nicotine working its way into his system.

He shut his eyes for a moment, relishing in the quiet of the night. Enjoying a cigarette in the crisp autumn air. He was incredibly thankful for the hoodie over his head and the thick pants on his legs, keeping him warm against the considerably colder temperatures.

As he headed back home, which was regrettably a town over, Gryphon froze in the night, hiding behind the shade of a tree when he heard the voices. Immediately, he regretted staying the night with the girl. He regretted even going to the party, which was out of town, and he hadn't even brought his own vehicle. His friend had brought him, and now he was alone in the darkness.

The voices sounded agitated and tense. There was a desperate tone to the voices that sent him on edge, reminding him of how his mother had sounded on the phone all those years ago.

"Please!" the woman was saying, hushed and pleading. "I need my Elliott back. I need you to do this for me. It's a job, Keith, and I think you're forgetting that. I also think you're forgetting that Elliott is your child too."

Gryphon's heart pounded in his chest. The words spoken sounded to him like a custody battle. He imagined the woman was a worried mother, on the verge of losing her child, and the man was once a lover of hers, given the job of getting their child back.

"I can't do this anymore, Mary. I've been around Elliott, and I just, I can't. She's better off now where she is. All of them are, and I think you need to leave them alone. It's a miracle that Elliott hasn't called the police on you. Take that miracle and leave them all alone. Including those children you have."

Gryphon went rigid by the tree. First, the conversation had seemed normal and sane, but after hearing those hints, he felt like he was unsafe around the people talking. Fear worked itself into his chest, especially at the idea that the woman had two children, perhaps kidnapped. He felt terror in his veins. Eighteen years old, and still afraid of the dark and those that inhabited it.

"I will call the police on you, Keith! All those years ago, it was you who kept me in that basement. And now what do you do? Kill people for a living! Don't you dare lecture me on how to be a good samaritan, and do your fucking job. I want Elliott back - that was the plan. Tomorrow you will go get everyone involved, and you will bring them here. Including Elliott. It all ends tomorrow."

"All involved? You know that includes my daughter, and I refuse to bring her into this you absolute maniac."

Gryphon stumbled back, deciding he had heard enough. He had names. He had a town. He even had an address. All he had to do was make it out alive and tell the police of the things he was hearing. A killer, taking children to a house with an insane woman. Gryphon could very well connect the dots and figure out that people would be killed.

The thought brought back painful memories.

"You will do it Keith, or else I will destroy you and your two perfect children. I will take everything and everyone you love and destroy them. And don't you dare think I won't, after what happened to your sweet brother. You will bring everyone here by noon, and all will be well. We will dispose of the bodies, and I will have my sweet sweet Elliott."

There was a lull in conversation, and Gryphon took this as his escape as he took note of the address. He knew the way home, but now it was dark and his heart was pounding and he knew that people were in danger and he held their safety in his hands.

He crushed the cigarette and took off, the words ringing in his head. A killer man forced to do something he never wanted to do. An insane woman after her child. And an unknown list of people involved that would meet an insightly fate.

Gryphon was no stranger to this type of dark in the world, but every time he found it, found the darkness so potent it affected

that of the people around it, Gryphon truly felt as though the world was doomed.

Madness comes to those who suffer, and Gryphon knew all too well what madness looked like. He knew what it tasted like. He knew what it felt like to be blinded by madness, consumed by it, and destroyed by it. He'd seen madness take those before him. He'd felt madness creeping in his own veins, sucking him dry of everything he once knew to be true.

Madness was an illness. And Gryphon had just found the source of the madness in the lives of the Cole children, and all who got involved. He didn't know it then, and he didn't know of Elliott and Adrian and Mat and the suffering they had gone through. He didn't know of Natasha's fate, nor did he know of Wes and Keith and the twisted love they had for Elliott who was a child spread too thin when it came to love.

Madness was a specialty of Gryphon's, for he knew what it felt like to scream until his lungs bled, and he knew what it felt to be so alone that four walls become friends and white became the color of trees and skies and grass and houses and rain storms and clouds and everything inbetween.

Gryphon Gypsy did not sleep. He preferred his women like his cigarettes. And he had tamed madness until it was at his beck and call. 

* * *

New character! How thrilling and exciting!

My laptop's been broken, which is why updates have been nonexistent. But also, this story will be slower now because of Camp Nanowrimo and the new story I'm writing. It's a surprise (;

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