MALACHAI
I never had a choice.
People like to think that every man chooses his path, that we're all given some kind of control over our destiny. That's a lie. A comforting one, maybe, but a lie all the same.
I did what I had to do to survive.
That's what I tell myself. Every day, every time I follow an order, every time I stain my hands with blood. It's the only way I can keep going without breaking apart completely. Because if I let myself stop and think about it, really think about it, I might never recover from the weight of everything I've done.
Six more months.
That's how long I have left before I can walk away from this life. Before I can leave Lucius and everything he's made me do behind.
I had accepted it. I had resigned myself to this fate, to enduring whatever hell I needed to in order to make it out alive.
And then Ezra happened.
That boy.
That slim, slender, beautiful boy with eyes that saw straight through me.
I can't let him go.
I knew from the moment I first saw him that he was going to be a problem. Not because he was difficult, or because he was some kind of threat…but because he made me feel something I had no business feeling.
Hope.
It started the first time I walked into that cold, dimly lit room and saw him bruised as he sat up on the bed startled and shouting " you were the guy in front of the alley" . I shouldn't have said anything. I should have turned around and left, but instead, the minute he asked me.
"What's your name?"
"Malachai" I answered swiftly
His head lifted weakly, eyes dull with exhaustion and pain. And then, despite everything, despite the situation he was in, despite the fact that he had no reason to smile he did.
Soft. Faint. Almost nonexistent. But it was there.
Something in me cracked at that moment. Something I had spent years burying deep inside.
The next thing I knew, I was moving before I could stop myself. My hand reached out, and before I could even think about what I was doing, my fingers brushed against his ear.
A simple touch. Nothing more.
But it ruined me.
Because in that instant, I knew.
I was in trouble.
I had crossed a line that I could never uncross. Because suddenly, Ezra wasn't just another name on Lucius's endless list of victims. He wasn't just another person I had to ignore to get through my time here.
He was someone I wanted to protect. Someone I wanted to know. Someone I wanted to hold onto, even though I knew I had no right to.
And the worst part? He didn't even realize what he had done to me in that moment.
He didn't know that a single smile and the warmth of his skin beneath my fingertips had been enough to break me completely.
I should have walked away then. I should have done everything in my power to erase that moment from my mind, to pretend like it never happened.
But I didn't.
And now, I'm paying the price.