The Haunted ships and one-shots!

Daniel (G x L story part 2)

Over the next few days, leading into a week, Daniel had become an outcast amongst everyone. Those on the streets and even at the palace began to shun him, children and teachers alike at the school only made matters worse, either avoiding him or taunting him with hurtful comments.

  "Freak"

  "Monster"

  "Demon born of sin"

And  the insults...tossing his things across the room or knocking them out of his arms, telling him to go fetch. Calling him flea infested, mocking him with barking. Almost everyday he would arrive home crying until Luke and Grayson had no other choice but to pull him from public school and homeschool him instead. The boy was learning a lot under the wings of his parents, Grayson teaching hm much about geography and Luke teaching about politics and the way the imperial government was run. It was all confusing to his young mind but eventually he got it down. They took him camping and hunting, teaching him how to survive on his own. It was nice, but...his dad's fought often and it was almost always about him.
He missed Rufus, but as time past, he decided to embrace his animal half. After all, he had no other choice. He had searched and searched but nothing he found offered any reliable solutions that would not possibly result in his death or the complete scrambling of his brain and memories. He would rather keep his memories with all of his hardships and pain so that he could also remember all of the happy moments he had shared with his family, then to forget everything and watch his parents completely fall apart, only knowing them in their depressed, guilt filled states. He could not put his parents through more pain.
He sat on his bed, looking down at Rufus's color. Some of his fur was still on the leather. His thumb ran along the silver, looking at his reflection. For a moment, it was like he could hear two heartbeats beating inside of his chest.

  This is who you are now, Daniel. Now and forever, and that's okay.

The boy put the collar firmly around his neck, being sure that it would not choke him as he moved his head. Once secured, he held onto the tag, apologizing to his doggie best friend, wondering if his soul was unconscious inside of his own body or if he had passed on into another, better life. Daniel knew better than to keep his mind tangled with such insoluble questions. A sliver of a smile came to his cheeks.
Suddenly, he gasped and straightened his back as his dad raised his voice, Luke beginning to once again become angered with Grayson. Daniel stood, making his way to his door. He cracked it open, listening in silence to his parents argument.

  "Stop saying that everything is okay! It's not!" Luke shouted, tears running down his red hot cheeks. "Our son is never going to be normal again because of you!"

Grayson growled, his chest rising and falling with quickened breaths that burned as it rushed out from his flaring nostrils. "Me? And how could you say that?! That is still our little boy! It doesn't matter what he looks like! How many times have we gone over this?!"

Luke snapped back. "I know that, Grayson! No matter what, I still love him! Don't you ever think that I don't!...If you would have just listened and watched over him and kept him away from that magic sh*t, he'd be fine! He would have friends, he'd still have his best friend and we wouldn't be like this!"

  "This isn't my fault! If anything it's both of our faults! We should have been watching him and-and teaching him..." Grayson's tears were plummeting to the floor drop after drop. "And we didn't."

They became silent for a brief moment, hiccuping and taking in sharp breaths. They both felt guilty for what had happened. Even so, Luke could not set aside his fears. He could not put out that burning anger.

  "What sort of life is he going to live? People are treating him like an animal and once he's an adult, what do you think they'll do to him? Huh?"