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The cobwebs clung to his cloak as he passed through the dirty hallways to find his old room. A torch revealed the ugly weathering of wallpaper and scurrying roaches across the woodwork. He pushed open the last door to left and was taken back to a distant world.
Black boots clomped, slowly approaching the boy in the corner reading sheet music. His brother was studying on the opposite side of the room in front of a large window with the view of an apple tree. Young Erik visualized the notes in his head, coming to life. He made revisions to his composition, not quitting until his work was perfect. His ink pen skid crazily against the sheet on the floor.
"What in the devil are you doing boy?! The startled child jumped at the thundering voice above him.
"Music, again? Who do you believe your self to be? Mozart? No, you're no musician!" The ugly and disgustingly thin old man grabbed the sheet music from Erik's already expecting grip.
"Let me see that!" Erik let go and was surprised when Marius seemed to be approving of his arrangement, yet was all to quickly disappointed as he realized it was just a cruel performance before he shredded the music to bits with his spider veined hands. Erik looked to his brother, and as expected he was just as horrified.
"Don't waste your precious ink on this trivial pursuit of emptiness, son, " The rugged gaffer said kicking the shredded paper with his poorly polished shoes. "Be like your brother there, " he said as he pointed towards the corner.
"Focus on your education, it will send you much further, especially for someone like your self with such a hideous impediment, only money will earn you respect. And that can only be achieved through the most vigilant study." Little Eriks face scrunched together in a painfully tight guise. He kept any emotion other than anger from expressing itself, not allowing the decrepit shell of a man to will him to tears. At least not until he exited the room.
He was silent waiting for Marius's next move. Erik's quietness seemed to enrage the sullen being waiting for what one could only assume was an unwarranted thank you. "Do you hear me, boy?!" Erik stayed hushed. He looked his brothers way once again, searching for assistance or at least sympathy. Again he found that his brother was just as helpless as he and that their mother's ignorant bau upset him just as much.
Erik followed the slow outward reaching of Marius's hand towards a thesaurus to the right of his leg sitting on a chair. His cold preying eyes never left Eriks as time seemed to speed up suddenly and in an instant, a fiery trail of excruciating pain was planted against Erik's cheek, which was already aggravated by his existing skin condition.
He shrieked out of aggression and affliction. He could see his brother trying to run towards him to help through the gaps of his fingers that covered his face. A thud indicated he too knew Marius's wrath. Their combined screams had been enough to cause their mother to run quickly up the stairs.
"What is the matter? " She questioned alarmed, witnessing the two boys laying against the floor and Marius pretending to tend to himself across the room. Marguerite pressed Marius for an explanation when none of them spoke up.
"Your sons, they attacked me!" he said raising an arm bloody with scratches that he had evidently produced himself within the allotted time before she had come upstairs. His sagging skin was surely easy to draw blood from as he was fragile with old age.
Despite Erik and Charles's looks of pure betrayal and vexation, they were overlooked as their mother proceeded to evaluate Marius. She turned around then screaming at them both, demanding apologies at once.
With no option other than obedience under Marius's overt manipulation, they made their way to the wicked old man. They bore contemptfuly at him as they spoke falsities and blessed him with a kiss upon each of his sullen cheeks. She sent them both downstairs to bed with no promise of lunch or dinner. Erik spat once he reached the stairwell. And the boys slept in the same bed together that night snacking on their remembered stash of treats, and laughing as they drew his face on a Donkeys ass. "How's this for using my "precious ink".
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