Celt. (Den of Mercenaries #2)(6)

Chapter Two





The leader of the pack of men raised his hand to silence the others, his wild gaze on the boy, never straying. Sweat stuck the man’s shirt to his chest, dried blood on his hands. If there was one thing that would remain branded in the boy’s memory, it was the cool detachment in the man’s eyes—as though the circumstances they found themselves in were an everyday occurrence for him.

But they were, the boy remembered, thinking back on his own time spent in the hell that was this place.

It wasn’t often that someone tried to escape, not when the consequences were so dire, but when they did, the man’s punishment was swift and severe, a reminder to anyone that thought to make the same mistake.

The glint of something metal grabbed the boy’s attention, forcing his eyes down to the man’s hand and what he held in it. A knife, one that was as much the man’s companion as his dogs carried—a knife he often kept on hand should he ever need to use it.

If the boy hadn’t felt fear before, he felt it then, staring at the blade. Shaking his head hard, his struggles renewed as he tried to twist his way free of his restraints, hoping to avoid the inevitable.

But there was nowhere for him to go … and now that he was trapped back in this place, he couldn't remember why he had ever thought he could have gotten away.

Gripping the boy’s hair in a fist, the man pulled, forcing his eyes up to his face. Very carefully—or deliberately—the man brought the knife to the boy’s mouth, dragging the blade across though he didn’t break skin.

“It’s not so bad here, right?” the man asked as he frowned. “I take care of everything, don’t I? You need only fight. Is that so hard?”

With the blade in his mouth, the boy was unable to speak, unable to do anything but stare in the face of insanity.

“How’s about you give me a smile and I’ll leave you be, eh? We’ll put this day behind us.”

That request seemed so simple. The boy had smiled even in the worst of pain, surely he could manage this, but fear had seized hold of him, freezing him in place.

“Come on then, give us a smile,” the man said, offering one of his own. “I just want to see you smile.”

But when he couldn’t, the man lost his, his humor replaced with an emotion dark enough to make the boy’s blood run cold.

But more than the way he just looked at him, it was the words he spoke next.

Reaching into his pocket, the man shook his head at him. “I thought you had learned by now. You do not fear death, you embrace it.” His voice was strong and clear, carrying through the room, silencing the hushed conversations. “And know that should you make it out of this room alive, pain is inevitable. Learn to love it.”

Striking without warning, the man ripped through the boy’s face with the knife, slicing open the other side as well before the boy had even felt the pain of the first wound.

But as that slow agony came, drowning him in it, the boy tried his hardest not to scream, wanting to keep his lips pressed together, thinking that would help staunch the blood dripping from his face.

It didn’t.

And before long, the pain became too much for him to bear, and the vocalization of it couldn’t be contained.

As he screamed, the agony grew worse as his face felt like it was being split open.

As he screamed, he pleaded for his da, his brothers, his mam to help him.

As he screamed, he learned to embrace the pain …

Jolting awake with a start, Kyrnon Murphy’s chest heaved with the force of his breaths, trying to calm his racing heart. Running a hand over his bearded face, briefly feeling the scars of pain long gone, he laid back with a groan, pushing the sweaty strands of his hair back out of his face.

Night terrors plagued him, forcing him to relive his past in his dreams when he was at his weakest, and each time he sat in that chair, he could still feel the slice of metal like he was there all over again.

He had wanted to stop sleeping because of them—used to force himself to stay up for days at a time until he passed out from exhaustion. Going days without sleep wasn’t good for him, especially when his occupation required him to be sharp at all times, but if it meant avoiding his memories for forty-eight hours at least, he would continue to do it until he couldn’t anymore.

Swinging his legs over the side of the bed, Kyrnon got to his feet, stretching his limbs with a crack as he headed for the bathroom to take a long, and much needed shower.

He had been restless the night before, not ready to come home to his empty loft, but not in the mood to deal with the politics of seeking out a job—even though that plan had been shot to shite when he got the phone call in the middle of the night informing him of the meeting he would need to attend the next morning.

So in the meantime, he had lost himself in O’halla, the fighting ring he ran every couple of weeks when he was in the mood for a little bloodshed. No one—with the exception of Red—knew about his hobby, and he preferred it that way.

Especially with just how close O’halla was to who Kyrnon was as a person.

Though he was usually a loner by trade, Kyrnon much preferred to be surrounded by other people, hearing the chatter of incessant voices, or the screams of men in pain.

But after his ‘death’ nearly seven years ago, he didn’t have much of a choice.