A multitude of them, actually. The most important one was the reason why the mark on the back of her hand was the line between a tattoo and a burn conveniently shaped like a serpent. The woman was no demon â she was merely bound to one out of desperation and convenience. Little did she care what it did to the souls it laid claim to each time she put an end to their lives. Little did she know the gruesome sight it was, to watch someone whose body had been so violently torn apart only get their pain extended as the precise hooks and chains came from a fiery pit that was not in the floor before Sara drew her last breath. Dragged down below, to endure who knows what for eternity. Yawen had no idea that was what happened. But anyone who had been around her at least for a few days would be able to tell she wouldnât have stopped even if she knew.
Her newest member seemed stunned. She could understand that. No matter what you saw out in the desert, a sight like the one she had made out of the redhead was not easy to stomach. What she couldnât understand was why Finch stared at her with more than fear in his eyes. As if she was Satan herself, summoned to drag all of the West down to Hell. It drew a dry chuckle from her, one that died at his question. He wasnât moving. A dangerous gaze fell on him, and for anyone else that gaze might have meant certain death. Yet, somehow, maybe whatever deities existed had favored Finch that night, Yawen looked away, toward the cracked windows and the bright moon outside. Wherever she wanted to go with him, she knew she had the time.
The room smelled like death. Blood made her taste metal on her tongue. With a precise hit from her elbow, the cracked window broke, letting in the cold night air. Yawen then moved, at first seemingly to the bag that had held all of her toys, but instead grabbed the only other chair in that house. Surprisingly enough, she placed it next to the cornered Finch.
Not a good thing to be told by a seemingly pissed criminal. Instead of tying him to the seat though, Yawen left him to drop onto the chair anytime he wanted and moved toward the first chair they had used. With a slight shove and a gross fleshy noise from the impact and the shifting of exposed organs, Sara was on the ground and her killer had turned the seat around, resting her arms on the back. Given how caked in blood her clothes already were, the extra mess did not seem to bother her.
âFinch, have you ever lost something incredibly dear to you?â
There was an unplaceable softness in those words and her expression, even if both only lasted a few seconds. The sudden lack of a southern drawl, replaced with the lightest hint of a Mexican accent, somehow managed to reveal a lower and almost more threatening voice than the higher-pitched one that she used to yell, order, and threaten. Finch was not expected to answer, and even if he did start talking, she would have interrupted.
âYou know that I lost something, very long ago. And what I lost peeled away the layers of my heart,â she illustrated by tapping at her chest, where the heart rested right below, âIâd have thought there was nothing left of it if it wasnât for the weight. I survived, somehow, to adulthood.â At least, for her, a sixteen-year-old with nothing to live for and who had enough knowledge about how to shoot a gun was an adult. âI didnât want to, but I did. And I met the right people. Right, at the time. They took me in. Gave me a family. It helped make those fleshy layers grow again, you know? Even if my time was spent reloading and shooting, taking money and lives alike.â
Yawen rested her chin on top of her arm, head slightly tilted, the mismatched eyes of a serpent not leaving Finch. The eyes that everyone in the gang avoided, the gaze that froze their every bone. Staring into them for so long, there was exhaustion amidst the fury and madness. âYou see, Iâm not incredibly lucky. Good stuff doesnât last around me.â Almost mockingly, she gestured with her head towards Sara. âThe people that made me lose â that stole â the dear things I had were the same people I had found. I wasnât very smart back then. I showed them my whole hand, let them see that I knew what they had done. It wasnât too hard of a choice to figure out what to do with me.â
A tilt of the hat and a quick brush of loose, messy black strands was certainly enough to know what she meant when the moonlight licked over the nearly faded burn scars. âTied and left in a shack. Sara was the last one out, she closed the door. I thought I could make it out. What were some ropes gonna do? There had to be something sharp to cut them. I could try to get up. Then I smelled the smoke.â A small pause, and a barely noticeable tensing of her shoulders. âAnd I panicked.â
Red Demon did not panic. She barely flinched. But at some point, some day many moons before Finch came to her for a partnership, she too feared death. âI was choking. I prayed for the second and last time in my life. I dragged myself to a corner, and only then did I notice the rotten wood. I could kick it broken.â A humorless laugh fell from dark lips. âOut of a fiery hell into a wet one. The stupid river. I was still tied. And yet, I made it.â
Only after passing out. Only after being reached to by something unnatural. Something that grasped her, stopped her from being dragged deeper in. The ability to live, to avenge, to light the West in infernal fire until every rat that had harmed her was turned to ashes. That was what lacked in her history. The how and why she made it. Finch was not ready to hear it. Maybe he never would be. But his abilities â she did not even know if they only extended to shapeshifting â were needed. He was needed. If not, the conversation would not have happened. She would have made sure he stopped breathing.
And perhaps, part of her did not wish to harm him. A part still so deeply buried in her, that she wasnât even aware of and could not yet deny its existence.
âIâm not a good person. Some people could have lived the same life as I did and decided to become barmaids. Maybe sheriffs. Not me. These animals,â her boot unceremoniously stepped on what had once been Saraâs perfectly good leg, and the brittle bone snapped under it, âbetrayed me. Each of them will have this treatment if I have the time. They deserve every ounce of pain. The people within my own gang â I cannot trust even them. At the slightest fuck up, I make sure it is the last one in their life. I cannot take those risks, Finch. You came to me. Iâve showed you what working with me means.â There could not be a demonstration clearer than Saraâs, after all. Working with her meant leaving behind the regard for other human lives, aside from oneâs own and hers. âNow,â
And there, only highlighted by the moonlight, one could swear a darker shadow lurked behind Yawen, with eyes as bright as the flames that engulfed Sara before. A blink, and it was gone, just as it seemed to be slowly gaining a more palpable shape.
âare yuh ready tâ move out?â
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