Random Forsaken tat
Jul. 28th, 2009 10:28 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
annwfyn.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
writing_shadowsI got a tale for you, kid. Back in '56 or '57 it must have been. Went like this...
John Knight - Foe Hammer, you might know him better as - he was just a boy then. Barely seventeen. He was running with a pack out of East London back then, called the Barrow Boys. Nasty group they were as well; they'd been formed during the war, and their Alpha had come back from France with a necklace made up of Nazi teeth. Got a name for that as well, but this isn't his tale. It's John's.
So, the Barrow Boys are sniffing around the East End, because there've been some funny killings. Bodies turning up where they shouldn't have done. And as it's in the Barrow Boys territory, they need to go hunting. Now, the Alpha is an old and crusty sort and he starts off thinking that it's bleeding well going be vampires, if you pardon the language and the pun. Always has been vampires in the past, he reckons and they are awful close to the Square Mile where the vampires are strong. So, he starts his pack off just killing every damn ugly needle toothed bastard they can find in the area. And John had a feeling in his gut there this weren't the case. Something just didn't feel right, but he figured most of those vamps probably had gone and done something they deserved killing for anyway, so out he went.
He killed four of those ugly bastards in one night, just for the joy of killing them...
When your Dad is a Rahu, you grow up with death. Death is, after all, their trade. First you learn the smell of it, on your Dad's clothes when he comes home late at night, or in the small bundles of cloth that your mother disposes of in the morning.
Then there is the night when there are raised voices and the sound of smashing glass, and in the morning neither of your parents are there, only a thin faced Elodoth who doesn't understand why his duties have suddenly expanded to telling a small and ragged group of children that their Mum isn't here anymore, and won't be coming home ever again.
And afterwards Rio and Raphael cry, and Rusty tries not to, because it's his job to try and protect the younger two now, and none of them know how to put all these feelings into words.
When your Dad is Rahu and he's raising you on your own, you get really used to death, really quickly.
The Knight kids all learn how to dispose of bodies early on. The police don't really understand the difference between 'murder victim' and 'human with a nasty case of azlu fever', so it's best to make sure the bodies are kept nicely buried and out of the way.
There's some woodland out back where no one will go looking, as long as you did the bodies deep enough. The smell is pretty vile, but all the kids know that you need to wash with lemon juice to get the smell off of you. The lemon juice stings like a bitch if there are any cuts on the skin, but at least you don't go into school the next day smelling of the dead. Rusty did that once. The other kids still refer to him as 'Reeky', very quietly, behind his back.
No one calls Rusty names to his face.
Rusty and Raphael do most of the digging. John Knight was, after all, born in 1940 and has views on what is appropriate for girls. He doesn't want to see his thirteen year old daughter hauling corpses around, or digging graves in the middle of the night.
Rio is there to hold the lantern, and keep watch for anyone coming by.
In the evenings, when your Dad's pack gather at the house where you can't bring your school friends (because really, would you want them to see the cloud of flies around the woodshed, or the dirty brown stains on the kitchen knife by the back door), they tell the tales of the People. They tell the tales of Glory, of Purity, of Cunning and of Honour. They tell the tales of John Knight, of the deeds he has done, of the enemies of the People that he has slain.
And Rio remembers those that she has helped bury in the woods, by lamplight.
John Knight - Foe Hammer, you might know him better as - he was just a boy then. Barely seventeen. He was running with a pack out of East London back then, called the Barrow Boys. Nasty group they were as well; they'd been formed during the war, and their Alpha had come back from France with a necklace made up of Nazi teeth. Got a name for that as well, but this isn't his tale. It's John's.
So, the Barrow Boys are sniffing around the East End, because there've been some funny killings. Bodies turning up where they shouldn't have done. And as it's in the Barrow Boys territory, they need to go hunting. Now, the Alpha is an old and crusty sort and he starts off thinking that it's bleeding well going be vampires, if you pardon the language and the pun. Always has been vampires in the past, he reckons and they are awful close to the Square Mile where the vampires are strong. So, he starts his pack off just killing every damn ugly needle toothed bastard they can find in the area. And John had a feeling in his gut there this weren't the case. Something just didn't feel right, but he figured most of those vamps probably had gone and done something they deserved killing for anyway, so out he went.
He killed four of those ugly bastards in one night, just for the joy of killing them...
When your Dad is a Rahu, you grow up with death. Death is, after all, their trade. First you learn the smell of it, on your Dad's clothes when he comes home late at night, or in the small bundles of cloth that your mother disposes of in the morning.
Then there is the night when there are raised voices and the sound of smashing glass, and in the morning neither of your parents are there, only a thin faced Elodoth who doesn't understand why his duties have suddenly expanded to telling a small and ragged group of children that their Mum isn't here anymore, and won't be coming home ever again.
And afterwards Rio and Raphael cry, and Rusty tries not to, because it's his job to try and protect the younger two now, and none of them know how to put all these feelings into words.
When your Dad is Rahu and he's raising you on your own, you get really used to death, really quickly.
The Knight kids all learn how to dispose of bodies early on. The police don't really understand the difference between 'murder victim' and 'human with a nasty case of azlu fever', so it's best to make sure the bodies are kept nicely buried and out of the way.
There's some woodland out back where no one will go looking, as long as you did the bodies deep enough. The smell is pretty vile, but all the kids know that you need to wash with lemon juice to get the smell off of you. The lemon juice stings like a bitch if there are any cuts on the skin, but at least you don't go into school the next day smelling of the dead. Rusty did that once. The other kids still refer to him as 'Reeky', very quietly, behind his back.
No one calls Rusty names to his face.
Rusty and Raphael do most of the digging. John Knight was, after all, born in 1940 and has views on what is appropriate for girls. He doesn't want to see his thirteen year old daughter hauling corpses around, or digging graves in the middle of the night.
Rio is there to hold the lantern, and keep watch for anyone coming by.
In the evenings, when your Dad's pack gather at the house where you can't bring your school friends (because really, would you want them to see the cloud of flies around the woodshed, or the dirty brown stains on the kitchen knife by the back door), they tell the tales of the People. They tell the tales of Glory, of Purity, of Cunning and of Honour. They tell the tales of John Knight, of the deeds he has done, of the enemies of the People that he has slain.
And Rio remembers those that she has helped bury in the woods, by lamplight.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-07-28 11:15 am (UTC)