Chapter 528: The Bolts
Rinne sat alone in his room with silence pressing against his ears. The candle on his nightstand had burned low, its flame trembling in the faint draft from the window. Outside, the night sky stretched vast with the stars cold and distant, their light too weak to reach the small, hunched figure on the bed.
It was quieter now that the rampage was over. Just now, crashes and rumbles and crackles could be heard, startling him. And it still felt close. Too close.
Anton sat across from him in a sturdy wooden chair he had pulled from the corner. The tiger’s fur caught the candlelight, and his dark eyes, usually so sharp, were soft now.
He had brought Rinne here when the chaos in the courtyard had grown too dangerous, or perhaps too shameful to watch. Just... too much for a ten-year-old to witness.
Since then, the boy hadn’t spoken. He had simply sat on the edge of his bed, his hands folded in his lap, his dark eyes fixed on the floor.
Anton didn’t push. Perhaps silence was the only gift you could offer the confused.
"Uncle," Rinne said at last, his voice barely above a whisper. "Do you think I’m still too young to know everything?"
"Too young? Yes," Anton said gently, but there was no condescension in it. Just without sugar-coating or empty reassurance. "Just because you are smart or mature beyond your age doesn’t mean you can take it. You think I, this old tiger, can take it? No."
He shook his head slowly, his tiger ears drooping. "I’m this old, and still, some truths broke me. Like knowing my son and my wife outright poisoned me."
"But... but I want to know..." Rinne’s voice cracked, his hands clenching into fists on his lap. The candlelight caught the glisten of tears threatening to spill over his dark lashes. "I’m not a baby anymore. I can—I can handle it—"
"Why do you think adults don’t want you to know?" Anton leaned forward, his mighty frame casting a protective shadow over the boy. "They sometimes don’t even want other adults to know. It’s not because of you. It’s them. It’s their own fear. Their own guilt. Their own need to protect the people they love from truths that might destroy them."
Rinne frowned, his brow furrowing with an expression far too old for his face. He was quiet for a long moment. Then, in a smaller voice, "Would you say the same to Arzhen?"
Anton flinched. He paused for a moment, and then exhaled a long, heavy sigh. "That punk..." He shook his head, his golden eyes growing distant. "I think he knew too much. But the wrong things. The harmful things. He was taught wrong, from askew facts and twisted perspectives."
"His mother filled his head with poison and called it wisdom. He knew everything except the truth that mattered."
"Is that why Lord Mother and Lord Father only told me certain things and not the others?" Rinne asked, his dark eyes searching the tiger’s face.
"Do you expect them to tell you the things that would hurt you so bad you might hate yourself?" Anton asked gently.
Rinne’s breath hitched. "But what if it’s true? What if... what if it’s my fault...? What if... what if I should’ve just... not exist?"
"There," Anton said, heavy with sorrow. "That’s why they don’t tell you. Wouldn’t you, their son, thinking that kind of thought crush them? And so they won’t tell you in the first place?"
"Uncle!" Rinne snapped, clearly frustrated.
"Rinne!" Anton glared back, his eyes stern. The tiger’s voice dropped. "You listen to me, boy. Whatever you’re thinking, whatever dark thoughts are spiraling in that clever head of yours, you are not a mistake or a burden. You are not something that should never have existed. Do you understand me?"
"But whenever Lord Father looks at me... he’d see her too, right...?" Rinne’s tears broke.
He looked up at Anton, his dark eyes swimming with grief, his shoulders trembling with the effort of holding himself together.
"Uncle."
The boy took a deep breath, not hiding his tears, but keeping his sobs locked in his throat. The candlelight flickered, casting his shadow against the wall, a small, lonely silhouette against the darkness.
"Do I look like her?"
***
The bolt lock was cold against his fingertips.
He pressed it into place with precision, measuring the distance from the doorframe, marking the screw holes with a charcoal, drilling them out with a steady hand.
He dug into the small hole using the hand tool, focusing his eyes intently on one spot.
Scritch. Scritch. Scritch.
The soft noise was almost therapeutic.
His expression was dark. Not angry, though anger would have been a relief, a fire to burn away the numbness.
His young eyes were dull, the reflection in them dimmed to something flat and distant, like a lamp turned down to its last flicker of oil.
He worked quickly, efficiently. It was all about control.
Control was the only thing standing between him and ruin.
Three bolts at the top of the door. Three at the bottom. Three at the side. He tested them all, sliding the metal bars into their housings with a satisfying click that echoed off the tiled walls.
The sound should have made him feel safe. It didn’t. It never did.
He turned to the window.
The bathroom window was small, too small for anyone to climb through, but that wasn’t the point. He installed the same bolt locks there, top and bottom.
The glass was frosted, opaque, but he still drew the shade down over it, blocking the last sliver of sunlight that had been filtering through.
Not long, night finally fell.
He could feel it in the air. The way the temperature dropped, the way the sounds of the estate grew muffled and distant, the way his own heartbeat seemed to slow in anticipation of what was coming.
He locked the final bolt and stepped back, surveying his work. Strange, because he felt like a prisoner, yet felt the need to lock himself in.
Like he was guilty.
Perhaps he was.