Alejo

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I felt very happy and content with that Morana agreed so readily to let me go and pick up her stuff from work, though I hid that from her.

It had been obvious during the past week that she had tried to think about what had happened as little as possible. Me, on the other hand, had not been able to think of anything else when I wasn't occupied with spending time with her. She had been so broken that night and I needed to break Dereck in return. I could not let him get away with hurting her like that.

So going and picking up her things was the perfect opportunity to see him and punish him.

Getting her paycheck went smoothly, although I had to bite my tongue to not swear at the owner as he threw insults at Morana. If only he knew what type of lowlife he still had working for him.

I hadn't seen Dereck when I entered, but as I pushed open the door to the staff room, he was there by one of the tables. He looked up and his eyes widened at first when seeing me, but then narrowed.

"What are you doing here?" he snapped at me and stood up.

"Picking up her stuff," I answered coldly and turned my back on him and to the locker, which belonged to Morana. Locker number 17. 

"She still living with you?" he asked next, and there was something odd about his tone. It wasn't arrogant or rude like I was used to. Instead, it was more apprehensive.

"Yeah." I opened her locker and put the few personal items she had in there into my bag.

"Hey, so, I know we haven't exactly seen eye to eye. But..."

I slammed the locker door shut and turned to face him. "That's right. I don't tend to see eye to eye with rapists."

He visibly stiffened, but quickly managed to shake it off.

"I know I did wrong. But look man..."

"What? You think there's any possible excuse for what you did?"

"Just listen! I'm trying to warn you!"

I was on my way to yell insults at him. But found myself speechless at his words. He took advantage of that and went on at a fast pace.

"She's not normal, alright! She's fucking insane. A freak! She did something. It got all dark and... It was like shadows around her and there were voices..." His voice trailed off and he shuddered. But when he continued, his voice was strong again. "I don't know exactly what she did. But she's dangerous and you should stay away from her."

As he spoke, satisfaction and a bit of pride came over me. She had to have used magic somehow to defend herself. Probably completely unconsciously, but whatever she'd done had to have freaked Dereck out like hell if he was willing to warn me. She really could take care of herself, even without knowing she did. By the looks of it, Dereck was scarred for life by whatever she had done, but that didn't mean I would let him go.

"That's right," I told him and walked over to him. "She's fucking dangerous. And she is insane and a freak. But so am I and you hurt the person I care for the most in this entire world."

I didn't hesitate as I threw the first punch. He stumbled back a bit, caught off guard, and I got another punch in. At the third, he was more prepared and managed to block. After that, he also tried to land some punches.

The fight didn't last long. In just a minute, the door to the staff room flew open and the owner and another employee rushed in. They managed to separate us and as I saw the damage I had done to Dereck, I calmed down a little.

He bled from his nose, and by the looks of it, it was broken. His lips were busted, and he had the beginning of a black eye.

"What the hell is going on, Dereck?" the owner yelled at him.

"He's the issue. He's insane," Dereck answered, immediately pointing fingers at me. That didn't bother me in the slightest. I had managed to do half of what I intended to do to him and I was only focused on finding a good time to do the other half.

They kept us apart as they called the police. I had no idea what they were told, I kept my mouth completely shut. Not giving them anything more than my name.

Both me and Dereck was brought into the station, however. There they asked me more questions. It was clear from the questions that they knew I was the instigator, but they wanted to know the reason behind the fight. There was no way I would tell them. Morana didn't need to be interrogated by the police. They also seemed to not really consider it all a major thing, considering that I was left sitting on a bench while they went to process some paperwork.

I had an inkling as to why that was. Neri. My surname. They would have had a suspicion that I belonged to the Neri-family and a quick search would tell them I did indeed. The fact that witches got so old meant it was easy for one witch to build a reputation for themselves, or at least their surname, and my grandmother had already started doing that.

There wasn't a person in Sacramento that didn't know about the Neri-family and their many generous donations to the city and connections to various powerful figures. Honestly, there likely were few people in all of California that hadn't heard of the Neri-family one way or another.

After a long while, they let me leave with nothing but a warning.

As I walked out, I saw Dereck about to leave as well and knew I had to act fast to have time with the second part. I walked with long strides and caught up with him right at the exit. I grabbed hold of his arm, which he immediately jerked away.

"Gonna beat me up here as well?" he snarled at me.

"Not exactly," I smirked. "Remember how you called Morana a freak? What if I'm one too?"

His face paled, but he seemed rooted to the spot.

"Physical pain, grow and remain," I mumbled quickly while picturing the pattern I had worked on whenever I could over the past week. Then I put my hand to his forehead and felt heat emanate from me and to him.

He shook and took a few steps back, away from me. His lips trembled as he opened his mouth.

"Sta-stay away from me! I want nothing to do with any of you!" he yelled before running away from there.

I knew the spell would eventually wear off. But hopefully it did enough for long enough for him to be properly punished. It would increase the pain he was currently in somewhat and then make the pain remain, even after the wounds had healed. It felt like the perfect type of punishment for the pain he caused Morana.

Content with the day, I fished up my phone while looking for a good alley to teleport myself back to the apartment from. A message from Morana waited for me, asking me what was taking so long. I had no idea if she would approve or not of what I had done, but I would have to tell her parts of it since I couldn't heal the cut lip Dereck had caused me. I hoped she would at least understand why I couldn't stop myself from doing it.

As soon as I found an alley, I teleported myself into the hallway of the apartment. And barely had I arrived before the popping sound of someone else teleporting came, followed by a hard slap which made my cheek burn.

"Are you completely out of your mind!" Astria hissed at me. "Have you lost all pride as a witch?"

My blood turned cold and my eyes became fixated on the door behind Astria. A door that I begged the Goddess would remain shut, but that opened to reveal Morana.