Page 56 of Last Seen

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Well, well. At last, you’ve finally arrived at the truth. My truth. Are you surprised? You shouldn’t be. You should have known from the beginning. I left you a trail to follow. I gave you everything you needed to discover who I am.

Not enough for you? Fine. Leave. Go find another story. But if you choose to stay, I’ll tell you more.

Ready?

Good.

Let’s get to know one another properly, shall we?

Yes, I am the eldest Brockton, the one who survived the wilderness.

Oh, I know, you thought that was Cameron.

But no. He came soon after we returned. My stepmother was widowed, and my father wasted no time in getting her with child.

The sorrows of a man who lost everything were assuaged by the warm body of a lover who seemed not to mind the circumstance of her own husband’s untimely death.

Did my father kill her husband so he could have her?

Did she help him? Without a doubt, though it would be hard to prove.

Accidents happen in the mountains. People fall. People disappear.

Cameron and I are only ten months apart, the two of us.

His mother called me the vampire child. I needed.

I needed so much. At first I was sickly, and then I was voracious.

I walked early. I talked early. Instead of the circumstances whence I came stunting my growth, I grew into a functional toddler much faster than anyone expected.

My father swore it was the way we lived, natural, hearty, that she was nurturing me so well.

But when she had her own child, I was set aside.

No reason to feel sorry for me. I certainly don’t. Feelings are not something I indulge in. I don’t experience “feelings” the way you do. I have a strict moral compass, my father gave me that, but feelings? Nothing there. An empty well.

I bet Cat told you that, too. What she is and what I am are very different indeed. She tries so hard to be different. I embrace my shadows. I was made to be this. Why fight it? Indulging is so much nicer.

I have no remorse. I have no fear. Things that terrify you are as normal to me as the sun rising in the morning.

I take things as I need or want them. I kill as easily as saying hello.

I am darkness, but I am not dark. I am a rather pleasant fellow, actually.

How else do you think I’ve lived for so long among you?

People like me. Love me, even. They are drawn to me.

Want to please me. They see my father in me, the visionary, the leader, the magnate, and they ascribe those attributes to me as well.

She did. You will, too.

Of all my brothers, I am most like my father. They call me handsome and brooding. They say I can charm the sun from the sky. Maybe that is so. I am my father’s envoy to the world. I am the one who leaves and brings back the worthy to live on the land.

And the others. The ones we need to slake our thirst.

You think me mad. I understand. My story is full of contradictions.

And I admit, I always wanted to be special.

It was hard, with an illustrious, sought-after father, and capable brothers who had a mother who loved them better.

I was alone in a household of people, the lone survivor of a fever that wiped out my father’s flock.

At least, that’s the story the world was told. It wasn’t entirely true.

Perhaps it was the fever that made me who I am.

Perhaps it was him. Many things happened in that dark time.

My father would tell of it sometimes, sharing his truths, his memories.

We would sit under the stars with a fire burning, and he would admit his indiscretions.

The way they died, one after another. The way he couldn’t help himself.

He saw himself in me, and to his credit, he did try to curb my urges—our urges—for a time.

He found keeping himself busy was the best trick—it allowed him to forget, for a time, what he was.

What he’d done. What he needed to become whole.

He built, and built, and built, channeling his shadows into good for others. He evolved.

I couldn’t do that. I could never forget how that first girl made me feel.

From the beginning, my appetites were ravenous.

I had to have more. Addicts are genetically predisposed that way, correct?

The difference between an alcoholic and a social drinker: from that first sip, the alcoholic is lost. They are a bottomless well.

There will never be enough to satiate the urges.

They will destroy everything for their drug.

In the beginning, that’s how it was for me. That first taste, honey sweet, and I was lost.

But you recoil. Interesting.

Then why have you come? Why are you here, if not to discover the truth?

You are shackled, just like them. You are stuck in this life, this world, this town, and you will never be free.

You might escape, yes. But you will never be without me.

I will live in your mind and suckle your soul and drive you utterly mad if you try to leave.

I am the only one with freedom around here.

I am the only one who can escape, who can leave you—this—behind.

Yes, I come back. The nature of my business draws me home again, and again, and again.

It is such a convenient place to hide, when hiding is needed.

Out in the world, it is so easy to pretend, to walk among the people as my father does, to make people happy.

It is also just as easy to sow discord. To trample dreams, to end existences.

My father gave me such cover with those words to his family. “I killed him. He fell and hit his head. It was by my hand, and I alone will bear the responsibility.”

He didn’t, obviously. He hid the nasty little secret away, told the townsfolk that I was gone. He didn’t tell them I’d struck out on my own. That he made rules for me to follow and sent me, a feral wolf, out to the lambs.

Oh, he hit me that day. Beat me to within an inch of my life. Then he gave me the tools to leave. He warned me to never come back. That the world he’d built had no room for my kind of darkness.

Ironic, that. What a hypocrite. He was reacting to seeing his own darkness. I am his mirror, and the reflection was terrifying. The shadow earthquake that would cause fissures in his life’s work.

He created me, clay shaped in his own image. And then he cast me aside.

Shall I tell you what happened in Maine, that dreaded fever?

He was that fever. He drained the life of every person there. Picked them off one by one. Oh, plenty died on their own—living without resources in the woods is difficult.

But the rest. He sent them into the woods ... and followed.

Amazing the lies we can tell ourselves. Amazing the lies we tell those around us.

Certainly, he convinced himself he had changed. That he’d slaked his bloodlust. That Brockville would be his salvation.

Never trust the ones who tell you how pure their hearts, how good their intentions. They insist they are servants to the world. There are lies in their words. They say they are servants to the greater good? They are servants to their own urges alone.

Forgive me. I’ve gotten off track.

When my father forced me to leave, that was the moment. My moment. I died, and I was reborn.

Being cast out of my family, sent into that abyss alone, gave me the freedom to become the monster I am.

And when I returned, when the mirror image of his darkest soul appeared, he caved.

Of course he did. Brought me back to life, back to the fold.

No one could know, naturally. We made a deal.

I stayed in the shadows. I brought him his dessert. Bring, still.

What? You want to know where we first met?

In the wilderness camp, of course. The day she came, I was entranced. She was so young. Delectable. Broken, and so frightened. Arguing with those ridiculous voices. She did not belong in the woods, she belonged in a straitjacket. But she was wily, my little kitten cat. Nine lives and then some.

It was her own fault for coming back. I knew better than to hunt at home, yes. Those rules were inviolate. I broke them once and swore to never do it again.

But it was my Cat. I made her. She was mine. She came back to me. Maybe she thought she could end me. What a mistake.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have work to do.

Oh, stop already. Don’t cry. I know it’s dark. The darkest, emptiest place you will ever experience. The deprivation of senses will drive you mad if you’re not careful. That blackness will overwhelm you and your mind will shatter. It’s not a pleasant thing to experience. I should know.

Now, on with the show.

Do try to hold yourself together.