PeaceMaker

They followed her into the large hall walking past empty walls painted white. The walk seemed longer than why she had walked away from the room, the weight on everyone's mind was following her. It was only her who felt lighter.

Finally at the end of the darkest hallway in the house was the metal door that held it's sleeping prisoners behind its small bars. 

Annabeth peered through the hole on the door, a little smile tugging at her lips when she saw them sound asleep. She thought about turning around and leaving them be. After all, it had only been about 20 minutes of rest that they got, they should have gotten to sleep more. But as she turned her head around and laid eyes on Justin, her hand raised to the door and she banged her fist against the metal door, waking up Kalmin immediately.

"I'm coming in," She announced, bending down and reaching up to touch the pocket she had sewn into her underskirt, there was the master key of the house. One of only two in the family. 

Kalmin immediately shook his sister awake as the clattering of the metal door's began. He had gotten her to sit up by the time Annabeth walked in. 

"My lady," Kalmin fell to his knees, helping Alice down as she found it difficult to move with her giant baby bump.

"No," Annabeth turned to Alice, "remain standing please." 

"Ah," Alice's eyes skirted to Justin at the opening of the door and then back to Annabeth. She trembled. 

There was an awkward silence when Kalmin heard the pattering of multiple feet in front of him. He looked up to see the shoes of six people and pushed away the fear building up in his mind. Thoughts of the end poured in, visions of him being kicked out of his old home followed accompanied with assumed visions of what was to come. He was terrified and knew his sister was too so he put on a calm expression and steadied his voice. 

"What may we have the pleasure with assisting you with," Kalmin muttered, his eyes nervously bouncing off the red eyes staring down at him, "masters."

There was something different about this. He glanced at Marie's hand which to his surprise, there weren't any whips, then to Jena which to his surprise wasn't wearing loose clothing. His eyes made contact with Mrs. Crowly and he pressed his head into the ground. 

"My apologies Madam," Kalmin greeted, "it is an honor to be in the presence of the kind hearts that have provided us with a home for years."

"Mother can you see it," Annabeth called out, pointing to Kalmin's collar. She didn't need to turn around to know the expression on her mother's face. 

Mrs. Crowly simply nodded, her heart falling to the floor. Even though he was well dressed, on the tiny square of skin on the back of his neck his shirt allowed to be seen was purple marks from some sort of whip. She didn't need to be told to know that the marks on his back would match with the shape of one of the whips spilled on the floor of the clean, wide, living room they were once proud of. Now it was dirtied beyond fix by the people who moved into it in a matter of hours.

Annabeth locked eyes with Kalmin, "Undress yourself," she commanded. She gave him a smile of reassurance, making an unspoken promise of safety with him. 

Kalmin gave a nod and slowly started to undress himself, his rough hands unbuttoning the loose buttons on his outfit. He could hear soft gasps after the first 3 buttons on his shirt. By the last one, the room sat in silence. 

Kalmin looked around the room. 'An inspection to see if we are worthy of being sold off?' he thought to himself. 'No…it couldn't be… the air is way too tense for that and the silence…This deafening coat of just pure silence scares me.' 

He turned to Annabeth a bit taken aback by the resolve on her face. She was frightening. He had never seen that level of concentration on her face before but then again he had never seen all of the nobles in the house gathered in one place so this might be a situation that called for it. He observed her mother next. 'Maybe they're here to give us a new role? Maybe feed us more?' She looked sick as her eyes ran up Kalmin but he ignored her stare. It became very clear to him that they weren't there to was their living situation when Mrs. Crowly turned away from him.

"Mother. Don't turn away, keep looking," Annabeth snapped, touching her mother's shoulder, "you're supposed to be managing the slaves in the house too, aren't you? I thought you were going to work harder to be what you failed at being for these years? Why are you backing out now?"

"I-" Mrs. Crowly tried to look at Kalmin but her eyes immediately turned away. 

"Are you disgusted mother?" Annabeth chuckled, her eyes mocking the weakness in her mother. "Are you appalled by the marks on his body? The marks your kids made on his body? Don't be. You raised them up like this anyway right?"

Mrs. Crowly turned back to Kalmin, using all her might to keep focused on him.

"Good mother," Annabeth smiled. She turned back to Kalmin. "Take off your shirt and turn around." 

Kalmin simply nodded and turned around, revealing a gruesome back that looked permanently stained purple. Cuts laid on top of more cuts each digging deep into his back, the more recent wounds revealed his flesh, and the older ones like large stripes on his back that also dug into his skin. There was no skin on his back that wasn't covered with cuts, he looked like a clear canvas that had been painted black and then stabbed into by its paintbrush and dipped in many places. 

'A tattered piece of art,' Annabeth thought to herself, resisting the urge to hug him, 'that's what he is.'

Mrs. Crowly gagged, unable to take the sight in front of her, and Marie and Jena both turned away, ashamed of the mess they had made. 

"Do you see this? When you say I'm overreacting WHAT THE FUCK WOULD YOU CALL THIS THEN?! Calm? DOES THAT LOOK CALM TO YOU?! it's vicious and atrocious. Perfectly representing the ones who did it to him," Annabeth screamed, tears running down her face. She turned to Alice, trying her best to control her tears, "Alice, can you do the same as Kalmin, please? Only expose your shoulders in the front but expose your back please."

Alice nodded. She tried to undress but couldn't, she was too big for it now. 

"Kalmin, please assist her," Annabeth sighed, her voice cracking from her hot tears. 

Kalmin slowly unbuttoned his sister's baggy dress and immediately stepped back when he saw her back. It was bruised with cuts like his but not to the extent of his ruined back. Her back was bruised with slashes from a whip but there was something else Kalmin's back lacked. The bite marks. Lining her body were bite marks and red spots he was sure didn't come from mosquitoes. Some were purple and others looked new. It looked like someone had polka-dotted her back with hickeys and bruises. It's was a terrifying sight to behold. 

"Can you see it now? CAN YOU FINALLY SEE?!" Annabeth screamed. She turned to Justin in anger, "look what you did! Can you see it? What has this house come to? WHAT THIS FAMILY HAS COME THROUGH?! ok sure. We have money, we have supporters and we have more land than a commoner could ever dream but that doesn't mean we can be this way. Imagine if someone was to find out. Peek into this perfect family lie we have, do you think we'd last? No. This entire family, this life, would come crumbling down to pieces SO STOP ACTING BLIND AND FIX YOURSELVES SO WE DO DESERVE IT!" 

"I-" Mrs. Crowly muttered. She had nothing to say. Nothing to comment, nothing to question, nothing to report, all she wanted to do was leave this place and hit a reset button. Start from the beginning where her kids were pure and nothing had changed. She wanted to pretend none of this happened, the pain was too much to bear.

'How did she-' Mrs. Crowly thought to herself as she looked up at her daughter, 'how did she keep all of this in for so long? Is this- no… it shouldn't be possible.' it was surprising but somehow she had seen it coming. Annabeth had always been the one to stop the fights, she was level minded, calm, and peaceful and always treated her siblings with love.. 'To think… that she was holding this in… waking up to the same faces she hated and calling them her family… she's so much stronger than I could ever be.'