Sick Bargain (Vile House #1)

by Nordika Night

We are sick. Sick individuals who are sicker together. “And?” I ask, liking the heat of his hand on my chest. His grin is shy but sinister. “I like it.” He leans in, lips brushing my jaw. “Might even say I’m fucking obsessed with it.”

But so am I. I’m looking at my skin and seeing his protection. I’m looking at his worry and seeing how important I am to him. Nothing about us is healthy or even moral, but sometimes, two wrongs do make a right, and together, we’re something close to warped perfection. Turns out, I do need him. He needs me.

And I’m Remiel Sauder, Krypt’s pathetic hero who is going to make it to twenty-seven.

“Bargain struck, Krypt?” A new bargain. One where we move forward in life together, no matter where it goes. I don’t kill myself, and he doesn’t lose himself.

don’t want him to regret what he’s done to me. Regret is for our moment of death, and if I get my way, that won’t be for a long time.

“Guess I am gay after all.” “No,” he growls, fingers digging into my nape. “You’re mine.” About fucking time he came back around. I grin against his mouth. “Prove it.”

“How can you do it?” he asks. “Do what?” “Hold my eyes.”

“Because mine are finally open,” I tell him.

I wondered why he wasn’t obsessed with me all my life if he’s this obsessed with me now, but I think I have my answer. I never looked at him like this before. He never felt seen by me. He didn’t care about me because I didn’t care about him. Once seen, eye contact comfortable, he latched onto one of the only people brave enough to look into his eyes. Me.

He closes his eyes, breathes deeply, and when they open again, every single one of his inner beasts blink back at me. Oh, there he is.

“I’m whatever you turned me into. You woke up all my hidden parts, and this is what you get. I’m yours, Krypt. Keegan. I’m fucking yours.”

Please, accept me. Please, want me. Please, show me I’m important to you.

I flip it. And touch my throat as I shatter. Would you still be mine if I freed you? he had asked… I free you, Remiel.

Remiel diagnosed me. By holding my eyes.

Either way, I planned to die with no regrets. But once again, fucking Remiel has fucked with my plans. Because I don’t want to die. Would you still be mine if I freed you? I free you, Remiel. I’m desperate to know the answer. I’m terrified to know the answer. I might never get the chance to find out.

“I set him free. Our bargain is met.” Once Riot deals with the last name on Remiel’s list. I already had my goodbye chat with my brother. “He’s better off⁠—” “No, he isn’t. You fucked him up and made him yours, despite how many times I told you not to. You’re coming back to him.” He stares at me, hatred and respect mixing in his eyes. “I’m gonna kill you for this.”

“Watch out for Remiel.” “I always do.” That’s all I need to know to die today.

free you, Remiel. I free you, Remiel. I free you, Remiel. I don’t want to be fucking free! I want to be owned. Alive under his protection and under his skin because our sicknesses seek one another.

I could live my life as his voodoo doll because his attention is the best thing I’ve ever experienced.

“He’s a fucking master of mental control, Remi.” No, he’s not. He gets overwhelmed by emotions. He can’t talk about anything. He doesn’t know how to express himself with anything but violence. He’s not a master of control.

“Okay, let me rephrase. He’s a master at mental fortitude. Nothing gets in or out if he doesn’t want it to. Trust him, Remi.”

“He freed me.” Soren scoffs. “So you’d pick him willingly. Don’t be naïve, Remi. You’ll never escape him, whether you want to or not. He did this to make you choose him. But even if you...

Remiel wants me, but he doesn’t need me. He chooses me. Picks me.

Because I have a trigger word. It used to set me off on a homicidal path, but right now, it saved my life.

I don’t care who they are. My eyes search for Krypt, and my fingers touch the calling card that showed up yesterday. Remind me who I am.

I watch him, ready to die here if he chooses to end me. It’ll break my family curse, anyway, so fucking have at it, Krypt. You’re the only person I’ve ever loved, and it’d be a blessing to die by your hand. “Remi,” Ghost warns me, seeing the decision on my face. “Don’t.” Remind me who I am.

It might be a blessing to die by Krypt’s hand, but now that he’s back in front of me, I’m choosing to be his, even though I’m free. I don’t want to die before I make him mine again. I tap the word burned into my skin. “We’re sicker together, Krypt.”

“Mine,” he says, barely audible. “Even though you freed me, I’ll always be yours.”

Open your eyes and see me, Krypt. Look at me as yours and remember all the ways we fester together to create something poetically eternal. See my sickness and let it match yours, and when we’re combined as one, love me as an obsession.

“I was yours the night I walked into Vile House. Free or not, I’m fucking yours.” Krypt wraps his hand around my throat and squeezes hard. “Big fucking mistake, Remiel,” he says, but he looks relieved about it.

Because Remiel is the only person who ever saw my monsters and coaxed them into loving him. I don’t think I’m capable of love, but whatever monsters live inside me are, and they picked Remiel, making me want to obsess over him forever to understand why.

Remiel can move as slowly as he wants, so long as he keeps moving. This is his walk through The Mad House, and if he makes it out alive, I’ll know he has what it takes to survive me. Who is he now? Who am I now?

I love Krypt, the Vile Boy. I love Keegan Hallows, the teen who murdered his family. I love him in a way that isn’t sane, comes with shame, and hurts so harshly it entices me into continuing just to survive the pain. But mostly, he scared me into a life I didn’t know I dreamt about.

I want his sickness to infect me like poison, spreading throughout my bloodstream to taint me with his darkness. And in return, I want to give him the antidote to a mind that plagues him.

It’s time I face myself.

I have a family. A brother, a sister, a best friend, a Krypt. Things to fight for and a reason to exist. I’m important and wanted.

I free you, Remiel. Freedom means death, and I’m not ready to die.

if life and death are ahead of me, offering themselves as pretty options in a ‘this or that’ game, I pick life. I pick me. I pick Krypt and all the beautiful ways he’ll scare me.

“I fucking choose you! Free or not, you’re mine!” I laugh, crazed and pathetic, defiant about it. “Is this what you want? You want me to hope that you’ll pick me back? You’ll trick me into falling for you, and then you’ll kill me like I’ve wanted all along?” So poetic.

Krypt won’t kill me. He’ll keep me.

The Mad Hatter said, ‘We’re all mad here.’ Einstein said, ‘Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and over and expecting different results.’ Alan Watts said, ‘In madness lies sanity.’ William Shakespeare said in Hamlet, ‘Though this be madness, yet there is a method in’t.’ Madness is of the mind. To experience true sanity, I must free myself from my mind. A full break. Shut it off and live without it.

“I chose to die from my life to willingly live in a nightmare,” Remiel mutters. “Ironic.” He’s right, in a sense. He is going to die from his life, but I’ll be the nightmare he lives in. Not this mountain or these tunnels. Remiel is fucking mine, and our nightmare starts now.

“Only you would be powerful enough to challenge fate, Krypt. Are you going to?” It’s his way of admitting he wants to live and that he wants me to control him. It’s perfect. “I am fate. Your fate.”

He videotaped the session, and your name was the only one that ever came out. What do you live for, Krypt? Remiel. What do you dream of, Krypt? Remiel. What do you fear most, Krypt? Remiel. What would you die for, Krypt? Remiel.”

became Krypt and finally felt like myself. Now, Remiel’s name sits with mine because he is not only my source of pride, but my source of liberation. He is love. He is obsession. He is mine, and I am his, and not even death, fate, or a fucking suicide curse will tear us apart. Remiel is life. Krypt and Remiel is the only future I want.

“My love is dangerous, Remiel.” I tilt his chin and watch him cry. “I warned you.” “I want it anyway,” he says, crying harder. “I want it and I need it. I need you.”

What did you do to me?” “Exactly what I wanted.”

“It’s lovely the way you haunt me. Every part of my life is dictated by you now. When you’re gone, I feel you stalking me. When you’re near, I’m attracted to your monsters. When I sleep, you haunt my dreams. And when you’re inside me like this, vulnerable but dangerous about it, it shows me exactly who you are. Because I demanded rough enough to hurt, yet you’re being gentle with me while adding roughness to your words. You’re a fucking riddle, Krypt. I love trying to figure you out.”

“I love you,” he whispers. “Stop.” “I love you.” I groan, barely holding it together. “Shut up.” “Ahhhh, Krypt,” he moans, breath fanning my mouth. “I fucking love you.” “Remiel,” I snarl.

He whispers his love against my lips and then kisses me as his cock throbs in my hand and coats me in his mess. My ass muscles clench and a breath whooshes out of me, and on that breath, I say, “I’m obsessed with you.”