Evan never thought he’d fall in love. That never really seemed to be in the cards for him, and Pandora checked. She always had an affinity for that kind of thing. Evan had never really believed in it, but he had no doubt that his fate wouldn’t leave room for affection. Especially not the type he craved, soft and sweet. No, he was always fated to marry some soft, gentle girl, with money in her pockets, and he wouldn’t love her. That was his fate, his destiny, and he had readily accepted it. If he didn’t, his father… he would hurt him, beat him until he couldn’t move. And so he resigned himself to the fate he was left to.
Until he realized he could make his own destiny.
It all started with Regulus, really. The day he turned eighteen, his parents mysteriously disappeared, and wasn’t that such a tragedy? Regulus didn’t seem to think so. He got his family’s fortune, their estate, their power. He was free.
Two weeks after his parents disappeared, Regulus invited Barty, Evan, Pandora and Dorcas to live with him in the family estate. Evan and Pandora of course accepted, followed by Barty, and, surprisingly, Dorcas. She had nothing to gain by living with them. Her family was kind, loving. Still, they accepted her.
It didn’t take long for the putrid, metallic scent of blood to reveal the truth. Dorcas was scared at first. Pandora was rather calm about it. Barty was almost… exhilarated by the implications, but Evan? Evan was determined.
He confronted Regulus about the blood, and Regulus smiled. So this was why he was here. Regulus was going to free him, just as he had freed himself. Regulus handed him a knife, and Evan grinned. Evan grinned as he strolled home. Evan grinned as he cornered his parents in their bedroom, where he was never allowed to go as a child. Evan grinned as he saw his father’s eyes widen, just before he plunged the knife into the side of his neck, feeling skin break open under the blade. He stepped away after, letting him bleed out, reveling in the pain he could see in his father’s eyes. It couldn’t be worse than the countless beatings he had received at his father’s hand.
And then he turned to his mother. He let silent tears spill from his eyes as he looked at her, shaking and crying. She hadn’t been loving, but she hadn’t been cruel like his father had. She didn’t deserve the gruesome, painful death he had granted his father. He knelt down and wrapped his arms around her small, shaking form.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered into her ear, pressing a kiss to her forehead, before stabbing her neck, just as he had his father. At least she would die quickly. He held her as she bled out. He didn’t care if the blood would never come out of his shirt. It was disgusting, but at least it was her. Evan waited until he felt her still before closing her eyes, and gently laying her body down on the floor to rest eternally. He kissed her forehead one last time before standing. He was drenched in blood. It clung to his skin, to his clothes, to strands of his blonde hair.
He heard a knocking at the doorway, the patter of footsteps, and he lunged forward. He couldn’t have witnesses, loose-ends. He was finally free. He couldn’t lose that now. He caught Barty by the neck, pinning him to a newly blood-stained wall with the knife pressed to his neck, and the motherfucker had the audacity to smirk at him, light glinting off the silver of his septum piercing.
“Hey, Rosie,” Barty said, still smirking, even as Evan’s knife was pressed to his neck, threatening to draw blood. “Did you have fun?”
“What the fuck are you doing here, Barty?” Evan seethed. Barty tilted his head, giving him a lopsided grin that made crazy things happen in Evan’s gut. It always did.
“Reggie told me where you were,” Barty said. God, Evan could lose himself forever in the lilt of his voice, the darkness of his eyes. “And I’m so glad he did. I wouldn’t want to miss this.”
“You wouldn’t want to miss your best friend murdering his parents?” Evan asked sarcastically, glaring at him. Barty leaned forward, pressing his skin onto the knife. Evan saw a pearl of crimson on the blade, fresh, leaking from a pale neck. “Barty-”
Barty ran a hand through bloody locks of blonde hair. “Red is your color, baby.” And Barty fisted his hair, pulling him closer and kissing him. It wasn’t soft and sweet. It was sharp and biting, teeth and there was the metallic taste of blood on his tongue.
That was the start of… everything, really. It was like life hadn’t started until there was blood in the crevices of Evan’s palms, and Barty at his side. With his parents dead, Evan received plenty of inheritance money, and even more when he sold the manor that he had grown up in. He neither needed it nor wanted it, too many painful memories written on the walls. Barty had helped him clean it up, burying his parents and bleaching blood out from every surface in the room. Barty spit on his father’s grave in solidarity, and helped him plant flowers over his mother’s.
Evan split the inheritance with Pandora. She had gone through the same painful childhood, and she deserved something in return. He still had plenty of money, which he used to get a nice, high-class apartment for him and Barty. He couldn’t quite put a name on what they were. They kissed that day, Evan drenched in blood, but they hadn’t since, not without the adrenaline rush of ended life in their hands, which might not say all that much when they almost always did.
It hadn’t taken very long until they craved the adrenaline rush of blood and death at their hands, both Barty, who seemed to revel in the crimson and the power, and Evan, who seemed to have stitched the scent of blood into his very being. Barty, Pandora and Dorcas had fallen into the same stream of murders as Evan and Regulus had, and they had continued their affinity for death. Pandora’s first victim had been a greasy little man who had sexually assaulted a friend of hers. Dorcas’s had been a man who hadn’t been able to take ‘no’ for an answer, bloodying the pocket knife concealed in her boot. Barty’s, much live Evan and Regulus, had killed his father, coming back to Regulus’s manor one night covered in crimson. Now, murder was their every day, rich men on the streets, drunk irritants behind bars, anyone they pleased, really.
Evan did not regret the blood on his hands. Death did not scare him, and the blood did not cause him any mind. He had even upgraded from the knife Regulus gave him, though he still kept it in the bottom of his sock drawer. Now, he wielded a silver dagger that he kept sheathed on the inside of his boot. He wore those boots everywhere, just in case he felt the need to taste blood on his tongue.
“I’m going out,” Evan said one evening, grabbing his jacket from the coat rack by their door. Barty was on the couch, flipping through channels on the television. Barty turned to him so suddenly, intensity in his eyes.
“Where are you going?” Evan could almost hear him grinding his teeth. It brought him an odd satisfaction to know he could make Barty like this, almost animalistic. His, and Evan would be his if he asked for it, but he never did.
“To a bar. I might be home late,” Evan said, letting his voice lilt nonchalantly. He slipped on his jacket, and into his boots. He could feel the cold metal of his dagger through his socks.
“You’re wearing the boots,” Barty said. Evan grinned, though Barty couldn’t see it. Of course he knew these boots. They shined from the amount of time Evan spent cleaning blood off of them. He was practically giddy with Barty’s attention.
“And?” Evan said, opening the door, letting it slowly creak open. He wanted to drive Barty crazy.
“Are you going to kill someone tonight?” Barty asked, his voice low and stiff. Evan smiled.
“Maybe, maybe not,” Evan replied, almost sing-song. “Goodbye, Barty.” Evan slipped out of his apartment, cheery as he walked away.
The bar was dull, the company lacking. There was a man at his side who he was watching with false attention. He had tan skin, and green eyes, and dark wavy hair. He was bulky, with an arm thrown over Evan’s shoulder. He was chatting animatedly about his vacation, and how pretty Italy was, and he was so dreadfully boring. He was loud but awfully ordinary, forgettable. At least he was hot, Evan supposed.
Evan smiled complacently, and flirted, batting his eyelashes, and got touchy, getting a reaction out of this man. He flirted back at Evan, smiling an ordinarily pretty smile. He ordered Evan a drink, a vodka cranberry that he didn’t drink. He wasn’t a cranberry fan. He let this painfully boring man believe he was interested, dragging it on until the man dragged him out into the back alley of the bar, a dark, damp, seedy place.
He kissed Evan, rough and needy, biting at his lip. He tasted like whiskey. Evan glanced side to side, making sure no one was there to see it. He hiked up his leg against the brick wall of the bar, stealthily slipping out his dagger. The metal is cold and hard against his palm as he slips his hands behind the man’s neck. Evan slipped the blade against skin, prepared to kill this man in the dark back alley of a dingy bar.
He didn’t get to, though. He slipped the blade just under the skin of his neck, hearing the man’s breath go shallow and his eyes go wide. But that wasn’t the finishing blow, no. It was a blade unlike Evan’s slipping between the man’s ribs, wrenching in and pulling out life until he slumped over onto Evan’s shoulder, coughing up blood until he stilled, dead, dripping in spilled life. Over the dead man slipping bloodily off of Evan was Barty, his eyes dark, filled with bloodlust. There was red on his hands, on his face, and he was gorgeous.
Barty kicked the corpse, which had now fallen to the ground, off of Evan’s shoes, smearing blood across the gravel. He dropped his knife on the ground, followed by Evan’s, clattering loudly against the ground. Barty surged forward, red-stained hands in Evan’s hair as he kissed him. Evan cupped his cheeks, knowing that he was smearing the blood across his cheeks. He smelled metallic, and tasted like such, someone else’s blood on their lips, lingering on Evan’s tongue.
When he pulled away, staying close, Barty’s lips were tinted crimson, not from the kiss, but from thick red blood coating his mouth. It matched the gorgeous red staining his cheeks. Their daggers were left forgotten and blood-stained on the gravel. Barty tugged gently on Evan’s hair.
“You’re a fucking asshole,” Barty growled, glaring at Evan with dark, heavy eyes. Moonlight glinted off his silver septum ring. “You just wanted to piss me off, didn’t you?”
Evan smiled cheekily, so fond of the man in front of him, soft for the slight pain of his hair still being gripped so tightly. “Maybe I just wanted a kill. How was I supposed to know you would come?”
“You knew I would come.”
“How could I?” Evan asked, still smiling ever so sweetly. “After all, you’re not my boyfriend. There was no reason you should.”
Barty practically growled, and Evan bit back a grin. He looked furious. It was beautiful.
“You’re mine, Rosier,” Barty said lowly, pulling him slightly closer by his hair. Evan smiled softly and leaned his forehead against Barty’s. “Don’t forget it.”
“Don’t worry,” Evan responded. “I won’t. If you take me on a proper date, that is.”
Barty breathed out a soft laugh. “Yeah, Ev. Okay. Wherever you want. Just no more assholes in bars.”
“I figured you’d like the kill.” Evan said. “Besides, he wasn’t all that bad.”
“Evan.”
Evan laughed, kissing Barty’s cheek. “I’m kidding, B.”
“You’re an asshole,” Barty glared. “I love you.”
Evan smiled softly, feeling his cheeks flush, though Barty probably couldn’t see it under the layer of blood on his skin. “I love you too, B. Always have.”
Barty grinned before kissing him again. It was soft and sweet, with just a tinge of biting roughness, because what were they without a little roughness?
They were bad people, Evan knew that, as they kissed lovingly in a damp alleyway, covered in the blood of the corpse under their feet. There was blood on their tongues, on their hands, and the putrid smell of death was in every crevice of their being. They found euphoria in the shared taste of death, and the stickiness of their embrace, thick with blood and death and ending.
This was the destiny Evan wrote for himself, built in blood and devastation. He had wanted love to be soft, but that wasn’t what happened and that wasn’t the life he loved. Love was rough, built in the blood of men. Love was kissing behind a bar, in a pool of a dead man’s blood. Love was the way Barty’s septum ring gleamed in the moonlight, and the way he kissed Evan like it was the only chance he’d ever have. Perhaps it was. Perhaps one day they’d be caught and the world would see them as evil incarnate, and they would pay for the blood on their hands.
For now, Evan was lost in Barty, lost in their kiss, lost in blood-stained beauty.