Status Updates From The Devil's Mercy (A Devil ...

Aodhan was loath to admit it, but the sound of consent was like music to his ears.

~ He's so iconic

“Fine,” Cal repeated. “I played you. Happy?”
“You wanted me to kill Sister Grace for you, didn’t you?” Aodhan was…impressed. So impressed, he started feeling something strange that he wasn’t entirely familiar with. Something warm and lifting.
“That’s pride, baby. This is vicarious pride. A wholly foreign concept to you up until now.”

~ AHHHHHH HE'S MY BABYYYYYYYY, I'M SO PROUD!!!! I'M A BOY MUM NOW <3

“Good boy.” Mercy’s eyes narrowed. “Was ensnaring a Connect your real endgame, or was it just an unfortunate result of you biting off more than you could chew?”
“It wasn’t an accident.”

~ God I love him

“You’re claiming you lured us here by taking on those clients tonight? What would have happened if we didn’t come for you, huh?”
Calix shrugged like it was no big deal, but he avoided Aodhan’s gaze. “Then I would have taken that as my answer.”
“Answer to what?” Aodhan asked.
“To whether or not you really wanted me.”

~ He's my bae

“When did you realize there was a tracker on you?” Mercy
“Just after I left the house. When I was on the ship.”
“And when did you take it out?”
“After I arrived,” he confessed.
"If you’d known you were being tracked, why didn’t you get rid of it?” Unless… “You wanted us to come for you.”
Good. Fucking. Light.
“Did you…play us, Be’urn?” A proud chuckle burst out of him. “No way.”

~ I love Calix, that's my boy!!!! <3

Aodhan heaved a sigh. Sadly, all good things must come to an end. “When did you take this out, Be’urn?”
Mercy frowned when Aodhan presented the small tracking device he’d been holding onto since they’d brought Cal here. He’d found it in the bathroom while getting clean water. “If you figured out he’d removed his tracker, why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

~ OHHHHHHH, I'm happy again :)

Allowing the perfect candidate for joining their pod slip through their fingers…He’d taken it pretty hard.
Even if it had all been a part of the plan.
...
The tracker they’d secretly implanted behind Cal’s right arm, up close to the armpit, was state-of-the-art and could keep tabs on him across the entire universe.

~ I'm having infinitely less fun now that I know Calix didn't really get away himself 3

I was like "wtf hot metal rod???" but I assume it's just branding

There we go, it's them <3

Tonight, he was entertaining two men whose interests had aligned with his own when they’d undergone the screening process.

~ What are the chances it's them..?

“It’s been three months,” he said to Vesper, mostly to distract himself, “and they haven’t come. I can’t keep waiting.”

~ I'm sad

Like permanent damage to his person.
He’d selected no for broken bones or dismemberment of any kind, but had clicked yes for things like knife play, blood play, fire play, and even branding.

~ BRANDING IS INSANE, CUZ I KNOW AODHAN AND MERCY WILL NOT LET THAT SHIT FLY!! Okay tbf I have the foresight of knowing Cal will never escape them and he doesn't...

Oh my god, he really did take "I can never be what you want" to heart!!

Sorry, becoming a sex worker or adjacent is genuinely the most insane decision possible. Not even cuz I don't think it fits him, cuz he has to know that Aodhan and Titus will find him eventually and kill everyone who has ever touched him!!

Cal... why tf are you in Altar!?!??! You told THEM you would go here! That's insane behaviour

HOLY SHIT HE ACTUALLY RAN AWAY!!!I FUCKING LOVE HIM, HE REALLY SAID "STAYING WITH THEES TWO WOULD MAKE ME A HYPOCRITE LIKE SISTER GRACE" !!! AHHHHHH MY BABY IS DOING IT!!!

They hadn’t brought him here to poke at old wounds and trick him into a confession to save the sylar.
They’d brought him here for this.
As far as betrothal gifts went…
“Good Light. May the gods have mercy on that poor girl's soul,” he returned the last thing he’d ever heard her say.
Calix Valimir finally left his past behind.

~ Sick betrothal gift actually, holy shit

The way Calix saw it, he had two options.
Give in and accept his fate.
Keep resisting and end up under their thumbs—and their bodies— with no autonomy.
If he went with the first, Cal was starting to believe they’d give him back some semblance of freedom.

~ So it this how it resolves every CLF book???? I'm super noticing it now, this happened to the MMMM book as well

Cal listened to them go and the sound of the door shutting behind them, sealing him inside the room with the remains of the person who’d raised him. Whether or not she’d done a good job of that was debatable.
He’d both hated her and convinced himself he cared for her for so long that it was a struggle to grasp his emotions now.

~ My baby :(

Calix had never wanted to harm anyone.
Until he did.
Until Nero Quinten was walking in front of his car, laughing on the phone, probably telling whoever was on the other end all about how Calix let Sister Grace ride his dick.
Let.
As if he’d let any of it happen.
As if he’d ever wanted it.

~ WHAT THE FUCK!!! LET ME HIT THIS BITCH WITH MY CAR!!!

CALIX YOU PMO, LET ME LOVE YOU AND TAKE CARE OF YOU!!! FUCK ALL THIS SHIT, THE TRAUMA GOES DEEPER!! I WAS LOWKEY ANNOYED HE BLAMED HIMSELF SO MUCH FOR HITTING A GUY WITH HIS CAR, THAT'S NOT THE FUCKING REASON HE FELT LIKE HE DESERVED TO BE PUNISHED!!!!!

A part of Cal had always hated himself for losing control in front of her that first time. Of giving her that opening. But…
Aodhan would tell him if he’d been the reason. The doctor never pulled punches, and Titus…Titus called him little monster. Titus knew about him, about everything.
“It’s…not my fault?” he asked, softly. Pathetically. “Not even a little? I—”

~ "Rumors" NERO DIDN'T LIE ABOUT SHIT

“Yeah,” Aodhan sneered, “excuses just like that.”
“I don’t like being forcibly fucked because of her,” Cal stated, voice shaking slightly. “That isn’t the reason. I’m messed up but…Not like that. I hated what she did to me. Every time she did it, I felt like dying. She never made me like it, even if she could manipulate my body and make me—”

~ I don't know what to say

“She used to beat you, touch you until you were hard, then call you disgusting while she forced your dick inside her cunt,” Aodhan growled. “She died after an hour and thirty-seven minutes. I should have made it longer. I lost control when she realized why I was doing it, and she started to make excuses.”
“She waited until I was eighteen,” Calix said. “The sex. She waited until I was legal.”

“How long have you known?” Cal sounded different to his own ears, numb.
“Since the beginning,” Titus said.
“The beginning eight years ago,” he swallowed the lump in his throat, “or the beginning four months ago?”
“I found out after the trial. I looked into you after you disappeared.”
“Oh.” So always. He’d always known exactly what Calix had gone through as a teen.

Being owned by a man he hardly knew wasn’t the problem.
No, the issue here was Calix. Pure and simple.
“I can never be what you want me to be,” he confessed.
Aodhan made a choking sound, but didn’t let up, the look in his eyes turning almost pitying when Cal risked glancing down at him.

~ My baby 3

“Are you saying you learned how to mimic those pheromones?”
“Don’t you feel like you should submit?” his voice turned sultry. “Doesn’t it feel like that would be in your best interest?”
And now that avoiding was impossible?
He did want to submit.
Which seriously pissed him off.

~ Lmao, it lowkey pmo too

“How?” Cal needed to know. It was too late to fight against it now, so all thoughts of resistance went out the window, but still.
That explained why Titus always skirted questions about his abilities. He’d answered the ones about his snake tattoo without hesitation.
It should have been a clue, but like an idiot, Cal had fallen for the distraction tactic.

~ CLF is such a blessing to the literary space

NOT JUST FOR THE 'OBVIOUS SHIT', TITUS DID ALL THAT INTENTIONALLY SO CALIX DIDN'T CONSIDER THE MORE SUBTLE USES OF HIS POWER!!! HOLY SHIT, THIS BITCH!

When he tried to close his legs, the director clicked his tongue, the sound somehow enough to get him to freeze up as though a blaster was being held to his head.
“How long have you been doing that?”
...
He’d always felt like the director was somehow above the rest of them. Had gotten the sense he was the one Cal needed to convince

~ MOTHERFUCKER!!! THIS BITCH HAS BEEN USING HIS POWERS THIS WHOLE TIME