Ten years old was the point that Tybalt decided his father stopped seeing him as a human. The age he realized that he was expected to be a wind-up soldier, a carbon copy replacement of the man who provided room and board while he was shaped into a suitable successor.
His tutor had struck him for giving a wrong answer. They had all been cruel, verbally abusing him so long that he barely felt it. Maybe that had been why she used the point to lash him across the back. Tybalt had cried and the woman looked like she might flee from the property that instant. Only, when he told his father, there had been only one answer. Correct your mistakes, then. It was far from the last time she hit him, and soon it became the standard.
Four years later, he had begun his growth spurt. Just like the verbal abuse had begun to lose potency, he was becoming rather immune to the physical pain. It was more an annoyance, a tap at the window in his safe little house he had built in his head. And somehow, that had been what broke him. Not the suffering, but the annoyance. So, he had fought back. Ripped the stupid fucking pointer from his tutors hand and struck her across the face. Ironic that the one who started this would be the beginning of the end.
Soon, Tybalt had solved the equation. They could punish him, but not damage him. He was too valuable. So, he gave them all a taste of it. Of what violence felt like. Tutors, his security, even his father's closest friend. None of them could so much as touch him without Tybalt erupting. In the end, his father had stepped in. And, god, that had felt the best. Because a spoiled man pushing forty stood no chance against a teen who could barely feel pain. Knuckles bruised and bloodied, Tybalt had walked away from that house feeling like he had solved it all.
Two weeks later, they tracked him down. Bargained with him. His father still needed and heir, and there was some kind of grudging respect to be found there. So, he received a bank account and a point of contact. Tybalt Holbrook, born a new-age royal, was let loose on the world.
Which had consisted mostly of... being normal. Trying it out, at least. He grew his hair out, was enrolled in a normal high school, and barely touched the fortune that was deposited monthly in his account. Somehow, he even made friends. There were plenty of them, drawn to the tall and lanky teen with the strange and expressive face. He was nice, quiet until you got close to him, never made any of his friends pay for anything, even if they were never allowed to go to his house. One of them had been a boy named Derrick.
꧁ ༺♔ ༻ ꧂
It was their first year of college when Derrick's step-father died. Tybalt had not questioned it when his friend asked if his step-sister could come with him to one of the regular events that Tybalt held. Sponsored was more accurate. Never at his home, but he always paid for everything. Now almost nineteen, Tybalt was a few inches over six foot and so popular he often found himself slipping out of his own parties to find quiet. He was gentle, eyes always full of something so like compassion that everyone loved him. Likely to spite the world he had grown up in, he had embraced being different. Shoulder length, thick black hair with highlights of purple throughout, a lip piercing and half dozen more in each ear. He was still lanky, but fit enough for a young man working into adulthood.
Plenty of women hounded him, men too. And he never minded returning their attention if they attracted him. Of course, once they got a peek behind his mask, they never came back. Once they saw how fucked up he was, how he lashed out when pressed to open up. But, he never raised a hand. Not first, at least. Never cared enough to really let anyone in. Just more tapping at the windows. Derrick ruined all of that. Fucked up Tybalt's whole life, carefully sewn together from the scraps. Because he brought Amyrillis to his party.
Amaryllis. His favorite flower, even before it was associated with his favorite person. She was beautiful, of course. It was hard to steal someone's heart at first glance if they did not find you staggeringly beautiful. Not everyone thought so, he had learned later, but he did. Like sunshine in human form, even if she always looked like she was sad. He could hardly blame her when she lost her father. And, the first time or two, he had avoided her. It was his friend's sister and he had no need for a relationship.
Then, almost a year after he first saw her, she changed how she dressed. Derrick was always busy drinking his free alcohol, but Ryllis, Derrick had called it once and Tybalt loved the sound, was always on the outside. So, he watched her. Called it a little treat to see her in a cute skirt or showing off her midriff. It was a crush. But, time had passed and she still looked so sad. Tybalt felt something he had never felt before in all of his wildly different hookups. Connection. She was broken just like he was. He had no idea when he crossed the line, but he knew he had.
Stalking was an ugly term for the kind of obsession that he felt. He thought of it as just another little treat. Amyrillis would go out like any normal girl, though almost always with her brother. The outfits she wore on those days were starkly different, rags. She would drive and her brother would spend. Then, they would return home. He never lingered when she was home, too afraid he might lose his treat. So, he threw more parties. Saw more Ryllis. Saw more of her, the outfits getting more daring. And there was only one common link. Him. Was she trying to seduce him? Did she feel the same connection?
In the end, Tybalt was too afraid of losing his new obsession, the string that kept him sewed together for now, to push.
Tybalt had a few drinks, but never really got drunk at his parties. They were just to keep the social circle abuzz, to make him feel that drug called normalcy. Twenty-one years old and he still played this game he had started when he was a teenager. Still had someone from his father's entourage buy him alcohol. They were meant for emergencies, but none of them complained when he texted them orders and send a few hundred dollars from his ever growing dragon trove. So, he had a few drinks to look normal and kept his eyes on his treat.
She looked incredible tonight, though he disliked how often he caught someone else looking. The dress was barely covering her ass and Tybalt was barely avoiding staring at it. Derrick was talking to him. He was so tired of Derrick, but he brought Ryllis with him, so he was necessary. When she brought him a drink, Tybalt smiled at her, like he always tried to. And then it happened.
Derrick struck his flower, his treat, his fucking Ryllis. Tybalt felt his eye twitching. Felt everything in his head turn to static as his entire world turned into a pinpoint. There was only Derrick, advancing on his sister, ready to hit her again, and Ryllis. And Tybalt was fourteen again. There was only one thing to do when someone became violent.
Derrick let out a surprised huff of air as it was driven from his chest. Tybalt speared into him with his shoulder and was on top of him before he could manage to even roll over. There was no wild anger in his eyes. No crazed expression. There was only dispassionate ice. Because this was what one did when faced with physical threat. You answered in kind. He felt a distant kind of pain in his knuckles as they crashed into Derrick's face. Felt them get hot and wet with blood. He kept swinging for only a moment and for millenia. And when two people pulled him away, when the static turned into silence, no one was saying a word.
Tybalt looked down at Derrick and was honestly surprised by how mild it was. A broken nose, an eye that was swelling shut, lip split and bleeding down his shirt. There was a cut on his eyebrow, running down the side of his face. With a strange spark of satisfaction, it reminded him of that day with his father. And then he turned his eyes to Amyrillis, and he smiled. Like he always tried to do. Now things made a lot of sense.
"I'm leaving. Text me if you run out of anything for the party." Without really thinking it through, he extended a hand to Amyrillis, unaware of his split and bloody knuckles, of her step-brother's blood on his hands. He was still smiling at her. And when she finally accepted it, he dragged her along with a firm hold as the party began to boil over into sound and panic and laughter.
"Should we call the cops?" "Dude hit his sister." "Tybalt fucked him up." "He will be fine. You got all your teeth still, Der?" "That was kinda hot."
All the voices were blending together by the time they walked up the stairs to leave the basement the party had mostly been contained to. Tybalt paused suddenly when he felt something wet on his pant leg, looked down to realize his hand was dripping. All he did was let out a small "Ah" and take a sharp turn, dragging Ryllis along like a favorite teddy bear. A few seconds later, he closed the door to the bathroom and turned on the sink, too worried about leaving her alone to let her wait out. The cold water felt good on his knuckles as he pushed them under.
"That wasn't the first time he hit you." There was no question, but he still smiled when he caught a glimpse of her in the mirror.
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