Broken (The Captive #5.5)(90)

Due to the technological leaps and bounds the humans had made over the years, I was able to have a series of chains made that will keep the humans enslaved to us for as long as we have a use for them. Which won't be long. I have also established places where the rebellious ones that are not claimed as slaves will be taken to be drained immediately of their blood. There is no reason to keep them alive if no one wants them, but it would be foolish to waste their blood by just killing them outright.

I thought I would feel better after this war ended. I thought somehow winning this war would help to appease this monster inside of me now that you have finally been avenged. I think I feel even more hollow inside now than I ever did before. There is nothing left for me to fight for; I have no reason to continue. Everything, every horrific, unforgiveable thing I have ever done has brought me to this moment of absolute nothingness. What do I do now?

I feel like such a fool. I thought I'd feel you around me more when I finally succeeded, I thought somehow…

I don't know what I thought but I am consumed by the nothingness even more now than when I was working toward avenging your death. I'm unraveling unbelievably fast. I think they can all see the insanity in me now but then I am barely trying to hide it anymore. What is the point? I am the king, my laws will be obeyed, and those that have stood against me will pay.

It's all I have left to live for, there is nothing more. I am no coward though; I will not end my own pathetic existence. I will continue on until everyone that has ever wronged you or I have been punished.

***

"Merle," Atticus greeted.

His cousin looked up at him as Atticus stepped into the room with him. At the far end of the hall sat a massive gold throne he'd had created and positioned on the dais. Merle stood by the table that took up nearly the entire length of a room that was easily half the size of a football field. He had big plans for that table and this sparkling, pristine room.

"Your majesty," Merle greeted with a brief bow of his head.

Atticus closed the doors behind him before moving leisurely into the room. He didn't smile at his cousin; there was no reason for pretenses anymore. "You didn't think I should have my position though, did you?"

Merle's jaw clenched. "I saw no reason for the war and the slaughter just because of a woman. You did not even care for Anna."

"It was the principle of it. Humans have driven us from every land; they've hunted and persecuted us at every turn. They've taken more from us than I am willing to give anymore. They took the only woman I ever did care about from me."

Merle's jaw clenched, his nostrils flared as his gaze ran over him. "Has this always been about Genny then?"

Before the war he would have denied it, he didn't bother to do so now as he walked to the end of the table closest to the throne. He turned back to Merle when he reached the end. "Of course it has. Every move, every action, every thought has been about her. Just as it will be for the rest of my existence."

"You have gone insane over the years," Merle breathed in realization.

Atticus laughed and rested his right hand on the table. "I've been that way since the day she died, cousin. I've just been extremely good at hiding it. Actually, I never bothered to hide it from any of the countless humans and vampires I've slaughtered over the centuries. Those years in the desert, oh those years," he said in a savoring tone of voice as he tilted his head back to stare at the thick wood beams above him. "Some of the best years of my life, after Genny of course. The things I've done, the things I've seen. They'd make even the most hardened of vampires cringe."

"You're admitting to crimes that are punishable by death."

"Not according to my rules," Atticus said with a laugh. "Anna is dead because of me; that was another part of my plan."

This part of the confession rattled Merle enough that he took a cautious step back. "You're heartless."

"Me?" Atticus said with a snort of laughter. His fingers trailed across the smooth surface of the table as he began to approach his cousin. "You allowed Anna to walk out of here with your child and you didn't even offer a word of protest. You sat and voted not to go to war even though you thought it was the humans who attacked your only heir and her mother."

Merle took another step away, he glanced toward the closed doors but they both knew he would never get to them in time. "And let's not pretend you didn't know Melinda was yours," Atticus continued. "Blood knows blood; it's how I knew she was yours. She couldn't possibly have been mine but I sensed a piece of my own blood within her. It didn't take me long to realize that the difference in her blood was a piece of my cousin. My own children wouldn't recognize the difference in her blood unless they were looking for it and they would have no reason to. Not when she has her mother's blood in her too and they share blood with you too, not when I didn't disavow the child like I could have. You allowed your lover's death to go unavenged, and have done nothing to find out if your daughter is still alive. Who is more heartless now?"

Merle stopped retreating when Atticus stopped five feet away from him. "If I had come forward and claimed the child as mine you would have had us all killed."

"So you just let them walk away to save your own hide?"

"To save them," Merle shot back.