The Brass Mask

Sins of the father.

"Are we going to do this all day? Why the hell would you drag this out? Answer me, Aedan!"

Aedan topples over in an old wooden chair as he is struck in the face again for what feels like the hundredth time. He lays his head on the cold stone floor and slowly draws in a shaky breath, choking on the dust that took flight upon his unprotected impact on the floor. His right eye was swollen shut and his cheek was split open from the continued assault he was being forced to endure. He flinches hard when two hands fist into his clothes and snatch him and the chair back into an upright position. Aedan hangs his head and his jaw rests open, blood and saliva spilling freely from his mouth. Tears well up in his left eye that he clenches tightly, he would not grant them the pleasure of seeing him cry. His breath catches in his throat as a hand snatches his head back by his hair, forcing him to look at a large man standing before him, wrapping his hands back up, for what must have been the third time.

Aedan closes his left eye quickly, in anticipation of being struck on either side of his face. He coughs and leans forward in the chair, his wrists bound to it by a thick rope, stained red by his blood. He finds himself snatched upright by his hair once more as his tormentors fist buries itself into his stomach. He heaves hard and coughs, all the air gone from his lungs. Veins in his head and neck bulge and throb beneath his skin as he gasps for air, fighting through constant pain. Aedan leans forward once more when his hair is released, gasping. His lungs fill with air, but each breath is labored and raspy. Aedan slowly raises his head to look at the large man once more who has turned his back to him. The man pulls a red hot strip of iron from a bed of burning coals.

"Why did you do it, Aedan? Why turn on us? We were family." The large man looks to Aedan briefly as he lifts a metal hammer from the tool rack on the wall. He begins hammering the thin strip of iron, curving it into a semi-circle.

Each fall of the hammer creates a loud ring that echoes throughout the cell and the hall outside. Each strike like a nail into the nerves of his now loosened teeth. Aedan groans and his eyes fixate on the hammer, rising and falling into a symphony of ominous tones, he would give anything for it to stop.

"You killed Nathan. You killed Victor. Insanity!" The man strikes the curved iron strip once more as the large cell door is opened. A wounded woman slowly enters the cell, clutching bloody bandages that adorn her left shoulder.

Aedan's gaze rests on the face of the injured woman. Tears were welling up in her eyes, the right corner of her mouth tugs slightly as she attempts to stifle whatever feelings were bubbling up inside her. "Do you have nothing to say? Not even one damn excuse?" Maria shouts at Aedan, eyeing him with a pained and angered gaze. "All we have done for you. We took you in. We taught you and trained you. We saved you from a life without aim, an existence of disease and early death! You repay us with nothing but the mindless slaughter of our people! People who called you brother! You are no better than the demons you swore to banish. In fact, you are worse! You are a monster in it's purest form!"

Aedan scoffs and slides his tongue across the upper row of his teeth, cleaning them of his blood. He spits at Maria, only slightly missing her. "I do not need you. I never needed to be saved." Aedan wheezes "I never needed you. I don't need anyone!" Aedan pulls against his bindings and leans forward in the old chair, craning his neck. "I was nothing to you, or to this order. You were even less to me!"

Maria's eyes widen in shock, the fact that Aedan could speak such words to her, they were like poison. Her lips draw in and then relax when she clenches her jaw, gritting her teeth in an attempt to numb the whirlwind of pain she feels inside . "Marcus." Maria's voice trembles as she calls out. "Shut him up. I...do not want to hear his voice. Never again. "

"Yes ma'am." Marcus nods to his partner, Gavin, who had been controlling Aedan through the duration of his extended torture. Gavin places his left hand on Aedan's head and shoves him back, forcing Aedan and the chair to topple over backward. Gavin joins Marcus and gathers two pairs of tongs, handing one to Marcus and keeping one for himself. They each grab a side of the hot iron with the tongs and slowly move over to Aedan, kneeling on either side of him and leaving the hot iron hanging overhead as a blazing omen.