Tasting Darkness

Read Taming Darkness By Jessica Hall Book 3 Chapter 4 - In the next vision, | cto lear that Darius not handing Kalen over means he becthe “experiment, yet it still wasn't clear towhy they were experimenting. However, it becclear why he hated my father. My father was the head scientist and the one that cup with the vile tests they ran on him, yet Darius didn’t hate him, not like he did his father. As Darius slumped over in the chair, drool dripping onto the floor after being shocked by electrodes, his father grabs his hair, lifting his head up.

“He has had enough. Are you trying to kill your son, Xandrius?” my father asks him. So that was his father’s name, | had wondered, he hardly spoke of his father and no one referred to him by name. Xandirus Wraith was a monster.

“What? Of course not, Grayson. | am just saying Darius can handle more than you think.” My father shakes his head, and Darius watches them, his vision fuzzy. He just wanted it to end.

“We are so close to a breakthrough. We can replicate it, be all-powerful, we can save the world, save the Harmony-Fae from extinction, imagine how much we can sell this serum for, My father says, his words confuse me. Wasn't this serum the reason we were extinct?}) Darius’ father purses his lips. “Are you sure it will work?” “Positive, we are so close. We just need to figure out the right tweak to his DNA. But that won't work if he is dead. Take your son home. Let him rest,” He nods before walking over to Darius, who could hardly move. He undoes his restraints, yet Darius’ eyes are on the vial my father held up to the light before he sets it in smachine that spins it around.

“You have been very good today, son, you will be rewarded when we get home, you can see Molly,” his father tells him, picking up his limp body. Darius mood instantly lifts hearing his sister's name, but it was becoming apparent that his sister was used as a tool to make him comply.

“Give him the week off. Let him be a child. He endures too much. He needs rest,” My father tells him.

I don’t understand why this memory lingered in his head, why it remained, but for sreason it was one that stuck, score memory of his.

From Darius thoughts the only reason | obtained for why it stuck with him besides the agony he lived through, was that it was the day he realized by not handing over the boy he didn’t know, that this would be his future, forever strapped to a chair to be tested on.

The memory fizzled to what appeared to be later that night. Darius was reading over his father’s notes, he had snuck into his father’s office, stolen the documents with Kalen’s parents names on it, opened it to learn how to kill off the Harmony- Fae side. He knew if he wanted to keep his promise, he had to find a way because Kalen would be sensed. It was only a matter of time.

Darius could barely hold his head up, he was tired, his eyes hurt, but he had the information he needed, and he was right, to kill off what makes them a harmony-fae they had to die, or it could be removed by a Demonic-Fae, he could siphon it if he was careful enough not to kill the boy he saw.

That's how Kalen’s parent lost their white magic, Xandrious siphoned Kalen'’s father by accident, and his mother wanting to die with her husband, who she thought was dead, she jumped through a window to kill herself, only to wake up a Dark-Fae.

Darius opened the portal to the room he saw in Kalen’s parent's head. He hovered over Kalen’s sleeping form, despite how much he wished he could give him up to take his place, he made a promise. He killed Kalen’s parents, he couldn’t bring himself to kill Kalen too by giving him to his father.

Darius watches him, watches the glow that emanates from him. Darius could feel his magic, it wasn't like his, it was weaker, untrained. Yet there was also something else he could sense in Kalen, something that separated them from being the same, Kalen’s magic mad him feel sad, he couldn't explain it, he just knew the emotion of what he was feeling from him, sdarker version of what he possessed himself.

He purses his lips, glancing around at the other sleeping children, he was hesitant at first, worried that maybe Kalen was masking his power, worried it wasn’t as weak as he first thought, yet feeling for it again, he lets out a breath, Kalen’s power wasn’t awoken yet, so it was nothing for Darius to steal it, remove it.

Darius | cto realize had been trained in hist magic for as long as he could remember, he had no memories where he had no magic, it had always been there, he was an oddity, a rarity.

Darius feels for his darker elements, feels for the demonic side of him as he pokes Kalen’s cheek with his index finger, | watch as black webbing spreads across Kalen’s face, his breath making frost clouds in the air, and he shudders.

His brows pinch like he is having a bad dream, Darius curious peers into his head to see what he is dreaming.

He knew he was their son, but what he didn’t realize was that from the moment he was born, they knew he would be put at risk. So they placed him in the basket at the orphanage doors when he was born and through Kalen’s dreams, he had access to every moment since he was born.

Seeing that Darius jerks out of his head, Kalen grew up believing he was unwanted, yet Darius knew otherwise, he knew Kalen’s parents placed him in the orphanage because they loved him, they just didn’t know any other way to protect him.

Shaking his head, Darius wipes his puffy eyes before doing what he cthere to do, he siphons Kalen’s magic, careful to only take the light magic, knowing he had no way to return it, if he took it all. Darius watches Kalen’s aura change, watches the shadows in it to determine he got it all, only once it was black and no color remained did he remove his finger from his cheek.

Darius watches him sleep, wondering why he saved him, he couldnt explain it, but he was glad he did. Darius opens the portal to go back to his room, when he hears the blankets ruffle and Kalen whimpers in his sleep. He stops looking back at him, Kalen had kicked the blanket off and Darius tucks him back in. “Your parents loved you, | wish my father lovedthe way yours loved you,” Darius whispers to him before turning back to the portal.

Only when he does, did he notice his father watching him through the portal he left open. Darius freezes, his father’s eyes furious.