Valon: What Once Was (Volkov Bratva Novella)(16)

He could only imagine what he must look like. Covered in blood. His face and body battered after the fight. But as quickly as that thought formed, he remembered what the other boy looked like…at least before he’d died beneath his fists.

Not once, in his entire life, had Valon felt such power.

When they finally reached a room at the end of the hall, Valon was shoved inside and instructed to ‘clean himself up.’ It was a bedroom, but there was not much inside beside an old mattress on the floor and two dressers against the walls. Heading into the bathroom, he turned on the faucet at the sink, splashing water on his face before he gazed at his reflection in the cracked, hanging mirror.

Red tinted water dripping into the basin, but still blood lingered in his hair and on his neck. Now he understood the revulsion he’d seen in their eyes as he was dragged through this place. He looked like a monster. And worse, he felt like one. Looking away, he grabbed one of the towels hanging nearby, scrubbing his face and chest as best he could to rid himself of the blood, wincing as he got around to his side. Now that the bloodlust was wearing off, the pain and fatigue was settling in.

Finished, he left the towel on the edge of the sink, hitting the light as he left back out again.

Not knowing what else was expected of him, Valon went to the mattress and dropped down onto it, stifling a groan as he stretched out. He couldn’t remember the last time he had been this comfortable. No…he did. The night he had walked in on Bastian and the girl.

He almost wanted to get on the floor instead, not wanting to get used to this luxury when it was more than likely that he would be back in the barn before the sun came up. There was no point in enjoying it when it would just be taken away.

Just as he was sitting up, the door swung open. Gjarper and Bastian walked inside, but it was the person who was trailing behind them that got Valon’s attention.

Fatos.

He hadn’t seen his friend since the day they walked home together, and seeing him now was like stepping into the past. And that only made him ashamed of who he was now.

Fatos still looked the same, lanky with shaggy hair, but here Valon was, a brawler who Bastian had commissioned. And after this night, a killer.

But while he was lost in thought about how much he had changed, Fatos had similar musings, except he didn’t look nearly as surprised to find Valon there as he thought he should. In fact, he looked rather annoyed to be standing there.

Valon didn’t have time to consider this before Bastian began speaking.

“You did well tonight. You have finally earned your keep for once.”

More than, Valon assumed. Before he’d been tossed in the Pit, he’d thought he’d heard someone offer two-thousand dollars on his opponent. Considering Valon didn’t really have anything of his own in this place, took the occasional shower, and ate only when he was allowed to, it cost very little to care for him.

“For tonight, this room is yours. Relax. Enjoy it. I’ll even have my men bring you something to eat. After tonight, you have earned this.”

Meaning, after he killed someone. He put that reminder out of his mind for the time being.

“And I even brought your friend. See? I am good to those who are good to me.”

Clapping Gjarper on the shoulder, who merely nodded in acknowledgment to Valon, the pair left the room, leaving Fatos standing in their wake.

What did he say to someone he hadn’t seen in what felt like a lifetime? Was he meant to explain how he got here? Or did he already know?

“How did you know I was here?” Valon asked, keeping his voice down in case anyone lingered out in the hall. He didn’t want them to think Fatos meant something to him. Otherwise, they would just take that away as well.

“My father told me the day after you got here,” Fatos said as he looked around the room. “Bastian wanted to have you killed, but I told my father you were too important to die.”

Valon prided himself on not reacting to that revelation. He remembered getting here, being forced to sleep out in the barn like an animal, but he had never thought it was because he was going to die. He’d just assumed it was the way things were done.

“But I’m no one.”

He wasn’t saying that for pity because it was true. As Gjarper had told him once, he was born of a drunk and a…no, he couldn’t bring himself to call her that, not even now.

Fatos looked surprised for a second before his brows knitted together as he looked at Valon in confusion. “Are we not friends?”

He spoke as though nothing had changed, but Valon knew that he had to know what happened to his mother and Ahmeti. They all did.

“Of course we are, but—”

“Then if you’re important to me, you’re important to them. Don’t forget that.”

Not important enough to actually sleep in a bed for the last eight months…

But Valon didn’t voice this thought, shoving it back down into the recesses of his mind instead. Fatos couldn’t have done anything about this. He was only a boy of twelve, though neither acted their age.

“Good for you though,” Fatos went on. “My father is letting me join the family business, so I’ll be here with you more often.”

Truthfully, Valon didn’t know exactly what the family business was. Of course, he knew the rumors, even Ahmeti had gloated about the things he had done in a distant past, but he still didn’t know what, exactly, they all did.