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Silas

S ilas’s head jerked back at the force of the impact.

Positioned on his knees in a pile of grits as his foster father wailed on him. The grains dug into his skin in a painful way that he was not unaccustomed to.

They were in his “bedroom.” It was a small room that he shared with his three other foster siblings, Hawk, Ace, and Ashmine. His siblings were all on their knees too, but they were just on the grits. They were not being beaten senselessly, not like he was.

“You stole”–punch–“my fucking”–punch–“beer.” His father spit vitriol at him. His beady eyes unfocused, his wiry hair hanging in a greasy curtain, his belly bouncing with each impact.

Silas didn’t argue. He didn’t disagree. He didn’t tell the asshole that he most likely drank it in a drunken stupor.

It wouldn’t change anything, except maybe distract the man. Maybe shift his attention to the three Silas was trying to protect.

Instead, Silas focused on the floor below. On the uneven wooden panels that were peeling back. On the way, the grits had shifted and were now spreading across the rest of the room.

I have to clean this up again. Don’t want Ashmine to step on it in the middle of the night.

To his left, Ashmine sniffled.

Silas stiffened as the blows paused.

“What’s that child ? You don’t like me beating on him? Are you volunteering?”

“She’s sick,” his foster brother, Hawk, cut in, “with a cold.”

“Oh, are you saying I don’t take good enough care of you kids? That I got her sick?”

Silas didn’t react, that was all this man wanted. A reaction .

“Jerald! Get down here!” Their foster mother’s voice pierced the uncomfortable silence and saved Hawk from misspeaking.

“Clean this shit up!” Jerald, their foster father, sneered, shoving Silas roughly onto his back before staggering towards the door.

From this position, Silas could see when Jerald paused close to Ashmine, too close.

“You won’t be a child forever, will you?” Jerald bent down licking the side of her face before stomping the rest of the way out of the room.

They all remained still as he thudded down the steps, and none of them moved until he made it the two floors down to his wife.

“It’s fucking time,” Ace snarled.

Silas didn’t move as Ace shifted haphazardly to his feet, pulling Ashmine with him and wiping her face with the back of his hand. All it served to do was dirty her cheek, but even still, Ashmine leaned into his touch. Wrapping her small arms around him as he tugged them to the bed.

Jealousy prickled along Silas’s nerves.

She was their latest foster sibling. She had been with them for two years.

But it only took three days for her to become one of them, right after she had taken her first beating.

He moved a fist to his chest, applying as much pressure as he could manage. But his joints were stiff, his body sore. Jerald had put more energy into this beating than normal. Silas felt as if he were tethered together by willpower alone at this point.

Not much longer, and then we can leave. Escape this life. But what if it’s too late?

Silas lifted his other arm up, the puzzle piece around his wrist jostling. Ashmine made one for each of them, and she wore one as well.

Friendship bracelets, she had explained.

Except, all of the boys wanted more than that from her. That’s why none of them could have her. They wouldn’t fight over her. They may not be blood, but Hawk and Ace were his brothers.

He wouldn’t do anything to threaten his make-shift family.

His head pounded a beat to his heart, his body ached in ways it shouldn’t, and he was sure his ribs were either broken or at least bruised.

But Silas didn’t care.

Ashmine brought hope into all of their hearts. Wrapped them all around her fingers.

She was the kindness they had forgotten existed. She was the solace they all fell into, broken and bruised after their encounters with Jerald. She was beautiful, sweet, innocent .

Young.

Hawk stepped carefully to him, maneuvering around the grits and offering a hand up. Silas took it gratefully. He smothered the groan that threatened to leave him, not wanting to worry Ashmine.

“It’s time,” Ace stated again, this time much softer.

Silas turned to him, Ace laid against the back wall on the bottom of their bunk beds, Ashmine still in his embrace.

Ashmine breathed evenly in his arms, her eyes shut.

She had fallen asleep, and Silas didn’t blame her. It was the middle of the night.

“Tonight,” Ace hissed out between his teeth.

“It’s too soon,” Hawk murmured, taking up post against their bedroom door.

Ace reached into the shirt Ashmine fell asleep in, carefully unwrapping the bandage that bound her chest down. “He’s going to notice that she’s not as young as he thinks, she’s fucking sixteen! He’s going to see her one day like this and he’s not going to stop until he gets what he wants.”

With her breasts freed from their confines it was easy to tell that Ashmine was maturing. That she wasn’t a child anymore. They couldn’t keep hiding her appearance. Soon the baggy clothes, the hunching, the banding–none of it would be enough.

Ace wasn’t wrong, but Silas had hoped they could push it off just a bit longer.

“You’ll be eighteen in a week. We can hide out until then, say we were lost in the woods. Just like we planned to do anyways. Something, anything . She can’t stay here; she’s going to be hurt. Irreparably broken. ” Ace’s voice broke as he tightened his hold on Ashmine, shifting her further into his embrace. “We all have money set aside. William said he would help us. We can finish school and then live the rest of our lives away from this hell. If that man touches her, I won’t think, I will act. And then I will go to jail and Ashmine will be a broken ghost of who she is. Do you want that?”

William was a kind, lonely man that had lost his wife a decade back and owned a dozen cabins in the woods near them. When they were younger, the boys had wound up on his land while trying to escape Jerald’s wrath. They expected William to turn them into the man. Instead, he had taken them all under his wing. William had given the boys work when no one else would, odd jobs here and there, and they had been going to him for years. Besides his foster siblings, William was the closest thing they had to family at this point and Silas didn’t doubt that William would watch over them—the man had promised as much—but he was old, frail .

Ace was right though, Silas wouldn’t be okay if anyone touched his Ashmine. Because that’s what she was. His .

He wouldn’t admit it out loud. Would deny it if asked. But he couldn’t lie to himself, no matter how much he tried to.

Silas had done his best to temper his urges, to not pursue her, but he knew how he felt. That he was obsessed with her. That she would never escape him. Even if that meant they spent their lives as friends . Silas would take it.

Silas heaved a sigh, rubbing his temples and glancing towards Hawk. Hawk had stayed silent through the entire interaction.

Hawk was nearing eighteen too, only a month behind Silas, but his countenance was that of a much older man. He was the quietest of their group but also the one that Silas would always listen to.

Hawk’s piercing glacier eyes were a stark contrast to his charcoal hair. It was long but pulled back in a greasy knot.

None of them had been allowed to shower this week. They were all covered in filth, half-starved, littered with bruises and broken bones.

“It’s time,” Hawk agreed.

Silas didn’t argue as he cast a glance around their room. They had been in this hell for years . Silas was first and the other boys joined shortly thereafter.

Silas examined Ashmine as she slept. Every breath of hers shifted her long dark hair, her small nose pointed up, her long eyelashes ghosting across her cheeks. She was small, too small .

Malnourished.

Hawk and Ace were right. If only for Ashmine, they needed to leave.

Tonight .

“We’re sticking to the original plan?” Silas whispered, continuing to stare at Ashmine.

“Gas stove and light the candles downstairs? I have the camping gear set aside so we can go into the woods, we’ll just stay a bit longer, for the whole week. Say that Jerald sent us there to better ourselves. Winter break doesn’t end for over a week. We can have our own Christmas out there.” Hawk shrugged.

“It’ll be cold for her. Bring extra bedding,” Silas declared gruffly, clenching and unclenching his hands.

This wouldn’t be the first person in his orbit to end up mysteriously dead. It was important that it looked as close to an accident as they could manage.

Jerald was a drunk asshole, but he occasionally had prominent guests over that might care if he were murdered.

Including the headmaster of the nearby St. Valentines University and several of their professors as well.

Silas rolled his head from shoulder to shoulder, stretching out his stiff neck, releasing the anxiety and tension stored there. “Ace, you take her and get us set up in the woods.”

“Wait, no, I want to help,” Ace argued, but he didn’t move or raise his voice. Still careful to not wake her.

“You will stay with Ashmine, isn’t that more important?” Hawk questioned.

Ace glanced down at Ashmine with an expression Silas didn’t want to see.

Adoration. Devotion. Obsession .

He would have to split the two of them up, but first he needed to focus on the task at hand.

“It’s settled. Let’s wait a little bit longer tonight, until they both fall asleep, and then we’ll act.” Silas was anxious at this rapid turn of events, but he was ready. They had been planning this for months, years . Waiting for him to turn eighteen, for the clock to run out. Working odd jobs, setting money aside, staying alive .

He recognized that they needed to move the schedule up, he understood what was at risk if they didn’t.

Even so, it did not ease his anxiety that they were forgetting something , that it was too soon, but he squashed the feeling down.

His pounding head was a stark reminder of what was at stake. The beatings had steadily intensified in the last few months.

How long until Jerald hits us too hard? Kills one of us?

Mind made up, he jerked his head in agreement.

It was now or never.

***

A few hours later Silas and Hawk walked together, away from the house they had lived in for too long. He felt the heat of the fire brush against his back. Instead of taking the driveway up to the main road, the boys marched in the opposite direction towards the woods. A specific destination in mind. A clearing they had found years ago that they often used to escape Jerald’s cruelties.

Silas staggered a bit as he walked, his left leg splintering in pain—Jerald had taken a baseball bat to it less than a week ago—but he did his best to ignore it. This would be the end of it. He wouldn’t be a victim any longer.

His bones would heal, his bruises would fade, and this would all be a nightmare. One made of ash.

Silas took in his surroundings as they moved as silently as they could towards the woods. The sky was dark, lit only by the waning moon, snow covered the ground, but to his left along the forest line, a single beacon of color shone through.

A group of flowers that Ashmine had planted when she first arrived. They had grown much taller now, nearing three or four feet, and their striking purple-blue color was a contrast to the otherwise dark night.

Silas wanted to go to the flowers, to grab them and bring her a few, but then a loud cracking from behind had Hawk grabbing his hand and jerking Silas the last few feet into the woods.

Later, they would all learn that Jerald was already dead before the house went up into flames. Heart failure.

Police would find evidence of another person, a guest, in the house when the fire started. But the visitor was never found nor did they come forward with any information.

And so eventually the case was closed.