Page 28 of Daddy’s Muse (Bloody Desires #12)

Bodin

Bryan’s muffled screams faded into background noise, like the cawing of distant crows. My focus was on the arrangement, the order, the care that something like this demanded.

The circle was already chalked onto the shed floor, perfect and precise.

Each line was measured three times before I was satisfied with the result.

At the points of the circle, I set the bones one by one.

Eight trophies from past kills, all laid around the perimeter.

They were clean now, beautiful, polished down to their essence through hours of scrubbing with my own hands. Soon, Bryan would be joining them.

Not as a bone, but as something more .

And at the center of the circle would be the guest of honor: Colby.

That’s where he belonged. He would not be bound or broken, but cherished. He would be the axis around which this sacrifice turned. The books I had studied, the fragments of ritual passed down through fractured sources, all agreed on one thing—purity mattered.

Virginity.

The act of consummation not as defilement, but as binding, the joining of two bodies into one current that the sacrifice would anchor.

Colby wouldn’t understand any of this, but he didn’t need to.

I wouldn’t let him carry the weight of it.

All he would feel was warmth and closeness, the caress of my hands, and the haze of something sweet that would let him drift into the rhythm without fear.

I had already set aside what I needed—powdered extract from a flower that dulled fear and softened pain.

Dissolved into water, it would leave him pliant, eyes heavy, with his lips parted.

The knife in my hand cut another careful line across Bryan’s back, carving wings that would never lift him anywhere. His cries rattled the boards, but I only thought of Colby—small and luminous in his innocence, curled up on the blanket in our cabin, cradling that rabbit against his chest.

That light in him would be preserved here, bound to me not just by my word, not just by my need, but by something older, darker, permanent .

The sacrifice of nine souls and the virgin’s bloodless offering.

Bryan was nothing but fuel—a tool. His death would purchase eternity.

When the time came, I would carry a blindfolded Colby into the circle, lay him down gently, and pour the doctored water down his throat.

I would whisper to him until his body relaxed, until he gave himself to me the way he always did.

And then I would claim him, in flesh and spirit, while Bryan’s broken body bled out into the circle, sealing us in ways Colby could never walk away from.

He would be bound to me through the nine realms.

And that needed to happen today, because I wouldn’t survive him trying to leave me. He had been so pale when I found him in the dirt outside earlier.

For one terrible instant, I even thought his heart had given out, that the sight of me and Bryan together had broken something inside him that I couldn’t repair.

I’d dropped to my knees, hands shaking as I pressed two fingers hard against his throat, then again against his wrist. I had to triple-check his pulse before my own began to steady.

The relief had been so violent that it nearly made me sick. I gathered him into my arms, clutching him to me with a desperation that bordered on savage. Butter wriggled against us, soft and harmless, and I wanted to tear the world apart for letting either of them feel fear.

Even if I had been the one to scare them.

Returning my focus to the task at hand, I parted the flesh of Bryan’s back with deliberate precision, pushing the blade deeper, carving downward to expose what I needed. Blood welled and ran across the floorboards, dark rivers feeding the circle I’d drawn.

My hands did not tremble.

Each cut had meaning, each motion an offering.

The lungs were next. I worked carefully, cracking ribs with methodical pressure, bending bone outward until it groaned like splintering wood. The stench of iron filled the shed, sticky and raw, but I only thought of how the dripping red threads seeped across the ground.

Bryan’s body shook violently, and I pressed a hand flat between his shoulder blades to keep him still, not out of mercy, but to keep my work clean.

The only mercy I had was for my boy.

And, well, I guess now his bunny.

I opened him wide, wings of bone and muscle splayed to either side. A grotesque parody of flight—the blood eagle. The old rite of breaking a man into divinity.

It was no simple kill. It was deliberate, ceremonial—a carving apart of flesh and bone to display the wings of death. Bryan would not just die—he would become something greater. For once in his life, he would be useful for something.

I leaned close, whispering words from the fragments I’d memorized—an old tongue, half-destroyed in the margins of crumbling texts.

My breath brushed against Bryan’s skin as I spoke, but my mind was far away, already inside the circle, already picturing Colby beneath me, eyes glazed with trust, lips slack from the flower’s touch.

The ninth soul was nearly finished. Soon we’d be able to begin.

This ritual was a necessity. It meant his safety, his life would be bound to mine, protected by me in ways he could never understand. And even if he ran, even if he tried to leave me, he wouldn’t get far.

His soul would know where it belonged.

My hands covered in gore, I stood back to admire the ruin I’d made of the man who had dared to hurt my boy. His body sagged, breath faint, heart fighting its final war.

It wouldn’t be long now.

And when the last beat left his chest, when his soul slipped into the circle, I would carry Colby here—blindfolded, docile, wrapped in my arms. I would place him at the center and guide him into the rite that would make him mine forever.

* * *

The cabin was hushed when I slipped inside, the floorboards creaking under my weight. The bedroom door stood closed, locked from the outside. I turned the key and pushed it open.

Colby was still curled up in bed where I’d left him, pale against the sheets, chest rising and falling in a soft, fragile rhythm. Butter nestled beside him, her beady little eyes locked on me as I quietly walked closer.

I scooped him into my arms, careful not to wake him too abruptly. His head lolled against my shoulder, hair tickling my neck. I kissed the top of it before I carried him out back into the forest.

The shed was warm with blood and candle flame when I entered again, closing the door behind us. I laid him gently at the center of the circle, on the furs I’d spread earlier. His lashes fluttered, a faint stir of waking.

“Shh,” I murmured, tying the blindfold across his eyes. “Don’t be afraid, little one. You’re safe. You’re with me.”

He shifted, a faint whimper in his throat. His lips parted when I lifted the cup to them. The water was bitter with the flower’s powder, but I tilted it slowly, coaxing him to swallow. He did, instinctively, though his head shook a little as though confused at the taste.

“Pappa?” He asked shakily, his small hands rising to remove the source of his blindness. I caught them in mine before he got to it.

“Yes.” My hand cupped his jaw, thumb brushing his cheek. “And you’re going to be a good boy and keep your eyes covered, ja? Pappa’s perfect, precious boy.”

He swallowed again, his breathing uneven. “What’s… happening?”

I leaned close, lips brushing his ear as I spoke.

“Do you know what my name means, Colby? It has a few different meanings—a strong warrior, a messenger—but my favorite is ‘shelter’. It wasn’t until you that I realized how fitting it is.

Shelter.” My fingers threaded through his hair, cradling his head.

“The gods knew what they were doing when they gave you to me. You were hidden, sleeping in the dark, and they led me to you. You needed me to shelter you from the bad of the world.”

He shifted under me, weak, trying to understand through the fog. “Gods…?”

“Yes,” I whispered, kissing his temple. “I’ve spoken with them. I’ve honored them all my life. And they’ve answered, rewarded my devotion. They gave me you, Colby. You are my gift, created just for me.”

His lips trembled, and I stroked them with my thumb, shushing him softly.

“Tonight, I will bind us together. Not just in flesh, but in spirit—eternally. Through nine souls, through nine realms, through the gods who chose you for me. You’ll never have to fear, never have to be alone.

You’ll be mine, always. And I’ll be yours. ”

The drug was starting to pull him under, relaxing his mind and body. His breath came shallow as he became pliant in my hands.

I laid him back, arranging his body with care at the very heart of the circle. Around us, the bones gleamed pale in the candlelight, and Bryan’s ruin spread like wings on the edge of the rite.

But Colby would never see any of that. Not the gore or the horror. He would only hear the praises I whispered and the warmth of my hands as I began what would make him mine forever.

I brushed the back of my hand along his cheek, then let my lips linger there, tasting the saltiness of his skin.

“You’re perfect,” I murmured, fingertips sliding down to trace his throat, where I’d pressed for his pulse not so long ago. “The gods don’t make mistakes. They chose you to be my other half, and tonight we’ll honor them with our coupling.”

My hands moved with deliberate care, tugging at the buttons of his shirt.

Each one came loose with the patience of a prayer, my knuckles grazing his chest as I bared him inch by inch.

I kissed the hollow of his throat, then lower.

His skin was warm beneath my lips, alive, and I pressed my mouth to it as if to anchor him to me.