My mom stared at the ground for a while, her eyes distant and downcast, before she finally looked up at me with tears in her eyes.
"The day you disappeared... I had enough." She said, which made my eyes widen slightly before she continued, "Everything he did to me... every time he yelled at me... every time he hit me... I put up with in all because I refused to let you go... because I love you, my sweet Eli."
That made my eyes sting as I reached out and took her hand. That part of me that was mad at her, that blamed her, had been beaten to death when I found her in that basement, and now that corpse was being shredded to bits as she talked to me. How could I have just left her behind?
"I tried to leave, you know? I told your fath- no, I told Marcus that it was enough. I hated him for pushing you away, but when I you disappeared?" She said, grasping my right hand with both of hers, "I didn't even want to see his face. I didn't want to hear his voice anymore. I didn't want to get hurt anymore. I told him that I was leaving, and that he would never see me again."
More tears fell down her face as she spoke, and now Cici had reached out and placed one of her hands over my moms, which caused my mother to give my wife a teary eyed smile.
"You found a sweet one, Eli." My mom said, making Cici smile in return, and lean her shoulder into mine.
"What... happened next?" I choked out, dreading the answer.
Her bottom lip quivered, and I leaned myself into her, just like I used to do when I younger. It definitely helped, as her breathing which had picked up was slowing back down again, and her shakey body became more still, more collected.
"Well... he didn't take it well." She said, letting out a self depreciating chuckle, "Obviously he didn't... he grabbed me and threw me around, into the walls, and onto the ground. He hit me so many times I lost count. He would never hit me in the face... but everywhere else was fair game for him. Then, he dragged me into the basement, and handcuffed me to the boiler downstairs... and then he spent days building those damned bars..." She choked off a sob at the end, and I wrapped my arms around her and pulled her into me.
I was trying really hard not to lose my composure, but the things she told me... all of this was for me? It was my fault? I was gone for this long... and this had happened to her? What kind of son am I? My mom kept talking after a moment longer.
"He began to fall further into insanity as time went on... he would only only come downstairs to give me food... or to change my waste buckets. He gives me a bucket to clean myself with every few days... and sometimes he would come inside just to use me to relieve his stress, then he'd leave again..."
I felt my blood boiling inside of me. In this world, and the other one... humans seemed worse than any monster I've heard about. They were all evil, degenerate scum. Marcus was going to pay for this... I am going to bleed him. He hurt my mother... and even if they are married... consent matters, and I'm sure she didn't want anything to do with him like that any more.
"I think the worst part was what he'd say when he was drunk, and came down to vent to me..." My mom suddenly said, breaking me from my thoughts again, "He told me that ever since you got sick, not even his job or our insurance was enough to pay for your medical visits and treatments. The fact that you seem all better now is honestly a miracle..."
She said this with a small smile, and while I was still furious at Marcus, and at myself, I couldn't deny the warmth of that smile, or how it made me feel. She really was coming back to herself... but at what cost?
"He would go on and on about how he had started taking under the table jobs, which then eventually led into worse things..." She said, looking grim, and to be honest, I was feeling that way myself, "He told me he started taking bribes, started getting paid to look the other way, and even began doing other... more deplorable things if the money was right. He'd help people dispose of bodies, tamper with evidence to get people off of the hook, and he..." She choked out a sob at that point, but she pressed on after a moment, "He even said that he took money from human traffickers to leave them be, and he would even sometimes help them find girls if the pay was right."
The ground shook below as my anger manifested into a physical form. My mom grabbed onto me for support.
"What?? Earthquake?" My mom asked, looking up at me, and then she froze.
From the reflection in her blue eyes, I could tell that my eyes had gone back to a deep red, and they burned like the fires of hell itself. I planned on telling my mom everything once we got back to Nagalise. I mean, I'm sure the portal, the fantasy landscape, and all of the cat people would be a big clue, but I had let my anger get the better of me, and she had seen this part of me at least.
"E-Eli?" My mom asked, and I returned her gaze with my own.
"Mom... I will explain everything to you, I promise. But not right now... I want you to be far away from here. There are a lot of things about me that are... much different, and I haven't told you anywhere close to the full story. I hope you understand, and I hope you aren't afraid of me." I said, and when I saw a small flicker of something different in her eyes, I had to look away. Was it fear, or something else?
"I'm a terrible son... I left you here all by yourself, and so many awful things happened to you... while I was off being happy, and getting married, you were still here... being treated like shit." I said, my tears running down my face in streams.
My mom grabbed my face only a moment later, and forced me to look at her. There were tears in her eyes, but that smile I loved seeing so much was still in place.
"You're still my precious baby no matter what you tell me!" She said, now realizing that what I saw in her eyes was anger, "And I won't have my good boy talking about himself like that!"
Well, that didn't really help my crying situation, but it did help to easy my heart considerably, and she wasn't even done yet.
"You are such a blessing in my life, and you don't know how incredibly happy it makes me to see you again. It makes me even happier to know that you've been happy, and that you found true love. Nothing that happened was your fault, Eli. Everything that happened to me, was caused by the person who did it in the first place, not you, not me. Only Marcus. So please, don't blame yourself," She told me with a big smile on her face, before it turned into a smirk, "But you will tell me what is up with your eyes! And all of this." She sajd, gesturing at me entirely.
I laughed, then cried, and then laughed some more. She truly was like the best mother a person could ask for. However, that was quickly overshadowed by what I was about to do next. I grabbed my mom's hands, and looked directly into her eyes, finding the red of mine still reflecting in them.
'Mom... answer me truthfully. You don't ever want to see Marcus again, do you?"