#starlit asks

~~~

Nykim’s body shuddered when she pressed the cloth to a lash wound that was still sluggishly bleeding, and Riah flinched, her heart jumping into her throat. It wasn’t the first time he’d done that, even unconscious, but it scared her almost senseless each time. 

Her eyes flicked up, ensuring the chains were still stretched tight, holding his arms out to his sides. Even if he woke, he couldn’t hit her, she reminded herself. Or kick her–kneeling on broken kneecaps would ensure that. She supposed he could headbutt her, though, so she made sure to stay out of range in case he roused. 

And she stayed on the stone. No matter that it hurt her knees and aggravated her hip. 

But when she removed the cloth again, she decided that his back was as good as it was going to get. No point staying there, making herself suffer for a man who would only laugh at her pain. A man with a reputation worse than Merrick’s. Gods. 

Biting back a whimper, she rose, gathered her supplies, and limped over to the table at the side of the room. Her eyes slid off the cruel devices of torture littering its surface, including the barbed whip laying in a puddle of coagulated blood, which she placed the washing bowl in front of to hide. 

With nothing else to do, Riah sacrificed some of her clean drinking water to get the blood off her hands and pulled out the stuffed bun she’d swiped from the pocket of her gown. Hunger gnawed at her stomach, but she only took a small bite, chewing carefully before she swallowed. 

The spices in the savory center were probably good, but she couldn’t taste them, not while she was in that room, staring at a back that resembled nothing more than a slab of sloppily butchered meat. 

Half the bun was all she could tolerate, so she wrapped it back up. Shifting from foot to foot was no longer a viable option, her hip all but screaming at her, but what if–oh, screw it. If Merrick returned and found issue with her sitting on the ground, she’d deal with it then. 

She’d rather suffer later than suffer more now. 

Of course, after what felt like hours of sitting on a stone slab watching an unconscious man do nothing more than breathe and occasionally moan, Riah was forced to revise her opinion. Her life was measured in degrees of suffering, and it always would be. 

The degree was rather high right then. Riah decided that maybe moving, miserable as it would be, might serve her better than sitting on hard stone that leached away her body heat. 

Unfortunately, halfway to her feet, one of Nykim’s semi-conscious moans turned into a barrage of curses so colorful that her ears burned. Riah’s foot slipped, and she fell, yelping as her hip hit unyielding stone. 

“Who’s there?” Nykim asked.  

Even with his voice hoarse from screaming, the man managed to make the question more of a demand. A threat. 

Riah froze, her heart thrumming. A quick look at his back revealed no change to its sorry state. She wasn’t sure about the knees, not without touching them, and she’d rather be thrown in the sea of flames than do that now. But why… how could he even speak? 

“There’s… light,” he said, subtly gasping for air between the words. “Are you… the shadow woman?” He tried to turn his head to look but gave up rather quickly, biting back another curse. 

Riah didn’t move. Couldn’t move. 

“Little shadow…” the thief master taunted. 

Bone crunched as the man shifted, and Riah almost threw up her meager meal from earlier. Guess that answered her question about his knees. 

Or–her eyes focused on the obvious deformity of his forearms–maybe it had been those bones shifting. Her stomach churned again, so she looked at the ground, swallowing convulsively. 

“Why are. You here. Little shadow?”  

He couldn’t hurt her he couldn’t hurt her he couldn’t 

“Your breathing sounds… worse. Than mine,” Nykim remarked drily. 

Gods, and what did that say about her? She opened her mouth, intending to say what, she didn’t know. Anything other than what actually came out–

“How are you alive?” Riah cringed, curling in on herself, halfway expecting a blow… from a restrained man. Mother help her. 

That man released a disappointed-sounding sigh. “If you don’t know. Rather not say. Would have to kill you… too, then.” 

She clapped a hand to her mouth, too late to completely stifle her gasp. Impossibly, her heart beat even faster, black flecks dancing in front of her eyes.  

“Fuuuuck,” Nykim groaned, so softly Riah almost missed it under the sound of her throbbing pulse. 

Ironically, the expression of pain soothed the edge of her panic, loosening the tightness in her chest. It reminded her that despite his terrifying reputation, he was still just a man, beaten and bloodied and broken, at the mercy of Merrick, of all people. Perhaps he even deserved this treatment.

Congrats, you found bonus knee-related torture *cough*, I mean, bonus reading! Yeah, that lol. Same warnings. Just, like. More.

A boot slammed into his abdomen, knocking any such concerns away. Lightning shot down his arms, pieces of bone grating as his body shifted. Any air left in Nykim’s chest was expelled forcefully, emerging in a high-pitched whine whistling from between lips he couldn’t force closed to contain the noise. 

It took longer than he’d like to admit to regain control of his breathing. And just as he did, that boot returned, resting lightly on top of his left thigh. 

His heart hammered in his chest with even that slight pressure. This was not going to be fucking pretty. 

A snap sounded, one that was beginning to make Nykim want to bite this fucker’s fingers off. A strange shuffle step followed, and more whispering. Unable to see anyway, Nykim closed his eyes and turned his Sight inwards. Were any of the fucking bone shards in his knee in position? Could he heal any of them before–

The pressure increased. And not incrementally. 

No. 

His captor put all his weight on Nykim’s thigh. 

It hurt–unbearably it hurt, it hurt it hurtithurtithurt

Someone was screaming, screaming so loud that his ears rang with the sound, his mind filled with it. Red-hot molten lava traveled down his arms, where the weight of the other man forcing his body down pulled his fractured bones even further apart, where the manacles split the skin of his wrists. And his knee… 

Several somethings popped inside, ligaments and cartilage giving way or shredded by the bone chips floating around in the swollen cavity. He could see it happening, which was almost worse than just feeling it. 

Silent Fucker ground his foot on Nykim’s leg, seeming to relish the agonized cries he could not keep inside. 

He lost his hold on the Sight. Lost his hold on his sanity. 

Lights burst behind his closed eyelids. The food and water he had just consumed churned in his gut, bile rising in his throat as the pain just went on and on and on… 

“Stop it!” Shadow cried, the words barely audible over his shrieking. 

Mercifully, Silent Fucker actually listened. Nykim’s head drooped, his breath sawing in and out, burning in his ravaged throat. His skin prickled, hot and then cold, and he wondered if he would pass out after all. Wondered if it might be better if he did because at least then he could escape the shame burning him alive from the inside out.

~~~

More red was splashed across his smirking face and the front of his white button-down shirt. His hands and the skin of his forearms beneath the rolled-up sleeves were coated in it.

It glistened on the blade of the hunting knife he held in his right hand.

Her gaze followed the path of a fat crimson droplet, beading and rolling down the blade’s edge until it reached the tip and fell with a plop, merging into a small puddle on the floor.

Suddenly, it clicked.

All that red was blood.

Marcus spun, the movement catching her attention as he presented her with his back. His arm moved, the arm holding the knife, and when he turned back around, he was holding up a tan strip, dripping with red—no, dripping with blood.

Alaia stared, a roaring in her ears blocking out all sound while Marcus strode over to her, holding out that strip like some sick kind of offering. Her hands rose of their own accord, and he stripped off her gloves before delivering his gift into her waiting palms.

It landed with a wet squelch, warm, tacky liquid sliding between her fingers.

He opened his mouth, and she tilted her head, fascinated that his lips were moving, yet no sound was coming out. His hand flashed in her peripheral vision, and she blinked, sound rushing back in.

Was someone crying? Maybe it was her. She went to touch her stinging cheek to check but found her hands occupied.

“I said, do you like my gift?” Marcus said, his brows lowering.

He must be irritated, but his tone barely registered, her head feeling stuffed full of cotton wool.

“What?” she said thickly, looking down at the slimy thing in her hands again. “What is this?”

Marcus stepped to the side, gesturing behind him. “It’s a memento, something to remember your former lover by.”

Her breath caught when she finally looked up and saw what… no, who, was behind him.

A gagged, bloody figure tied to a chair, sweaty hair partially obscuring a flushed, tear-streaked face. Familiar pale blue eyes peeked through, so full of pain and sorrow and regret that all the air was sucked from the room.

Serin.

Her eyes traveled down his bare chest, taking note of numerous gaping lacerations and reddened marks that would surely bruise before stopping at an area on his lower abdomen. Sullenly oozing blood, the patch appeared to be a square of raw flesh, missing the upper layer of… 

She fell to her knees, gagging as she flung the strip of Serin’s skin away from her. Frantically, she wiped her hands on her skirt, trying to erase the warmth of his severed flesh biting into her palms.

~~~

His keeper was eerily silent as he forced Nykim’s arms up to drape the chain over the hook. He disappeared without a word, and soon after, the hook raised until his feet were barely on the floor. His shoulders screamed in protest at the all-too-familiar positioning. 

Without fail, they whipped him before a match. And each time was a bit worse than the last, sapping what little strength and resolve he had left before he ever stepped foot in the ring.  

He wasn’t supposed to win. He’d never been supposed to win. Any of them. 

How it must gall that it kept happening. 

Nykim's lips twisted into a parody of a grin. “We gonna… get on with this, or–” 

The whip came down without warning, knocking the breath from his lungs and the bravado from his tongue. 

The burning embers of the pain in his already lacerated back burst into a blazing inferno. His chest spasmed, refusing to draw in more air before the whip came down again.

And again. And again. 

There was no acclimating to it. And while he might’ve been used to being beaten unconscious in his youth, his father had never layered the beatings so close together.   

Crack. Crack. Crack.

Each lash jolted through his body, made of fire and lightning that flashed and burned and shot sparks of electric agony through his veins. The pain was unparalleled. He might’ve cried out, if he had any air left in his lungs. 

Nykim’s ears were ringing when it stopped. A shuddering breath tore through him at last, accompanied by a stabbing pain in his chest that kindly reminded him of his cracked ribs. 

And then it started again. 

Lash after merciless lash, each crack sounding increasingly wet when the leather met his shredded skin.

His back arched against the onslaught, and he leaned into his restraints in an attempt to lessen the impact, even if by just a fraction.

It didn’t work. 

It didn’t work and his thoughts spiralled within his air-deprived brain–ah!–and it didn’t work and why was–oh fucking gods!–why was he doing this again and–Reaper’s fucking pits!–it didn’t work and why couldn’t he have just died already and–

Another pause. 

Nykim sagged. The shackles cut into his wrists, and blood trickled down his arms. His breaths came in ragged pants, barely dragging in enough air before they punched out of him again. Sparks danced before his eyes. 

The whip cracked off to the side, and very subtly, he flinched. Gods. Gods, he couldn’t do this. 

Another crack, closer. 

But he had to–

Crack!

Fuck! He had to–

Crack! 

A thready whine edged the huff of air escaping him. His jaw closed with a snap, narrowly avoiding his tongue. No noise, never noise–

Crack!

Fuck fuck fuck fuck–he had to or it would get worse, and he couldn’t–he squeezed his eyes closed until lights burst behind them–he couldn’t take it if got worse and if he couldn’t take it–

Crack!

Oh gods. If he couldn’t take it, it would get worse than worse–

CRACK. 

That one had to have crossed every lash line he had because his whole body lit up. 

Pain engulfed his entire being. 

The chains rattled as he trembled. Something suspiciously close to a sound of distress tore free before he could stop it. 

He was losing before he’d even started. 

The sodden whip kept coming down, no rhyme or reason to the blows. The splatter of his blood against the wall punctuated each strike.

Or had he started? 

Splat, spatter. Splat, spatter.  

Started, ended, never begun. Did it even matter? Did anything matter?

One thing did. 

Nykim bit down on the inside of his cheek and swallowed the sounds being beaten out of him along with the blood filling his mouth. He had to keep it together. 

Keep it together, or it would get worse. It would get worse. It couldn’t get worse.

~~~

“He looks like shit,” a different voice said. Deeper. 

“Yeah, well. You shot him. Don’t know what you expected, really. Don’t think it hit a lung, at least, or surely he’d be dead by now.” 

He wished he was. Gods, how he wished he was.

“I need your help. Need to wash the wound out again, but he always fights, even restrained. Tore the stitches out once already.” 

A sigh, then hands clamping on his shoulders–his bare shoulders–pressing them flat against the hard surface he laid upon. Pain lanced through his chest, and he cried out soundlessly, trying to pull away. Another figure straddled his hips, pinning him down even more. 

“We’re just trying to help you!” one of them shouted at him, but he didn’t, couldn’t trust the words, especially as the liquid poured over his chest. 

He could feel it bubbling in the wound, the fire multiplied by a thousand, burrowing in to burn him alive inside now as well as out. He would’ve screamed, had the prince not ripped even that away from him already. 

“I know it hurts, and I’m sorry, but I have got to clean out the wound.” 

Lies. He wasn’t sorry. Resh shook his head from side to side, straining, desperate to get away from it. Lies lies lies lies

“He hasn’t made a single sound, but he looks like he’s screaming.” 

“Have you seen his chest? This guy has been through some shit. I don’t like doing this, Lox.” 

“It needs to be done, or he’ll die. Do you want that?”

~~~

Someone knocked on the door, scattering every thought she'd ever had to the four winds. She froze in place. 

“Riah, you in…” 

The door swung open, since it evidently hadn’t latched when she’d closed it behind her, revealing Nykim, dressed in the loose, casual clothing that had become his mainstay over the past few days. He had boots on and his hair braided back, so he’d obviously already been outside that morning.

“There?” His inquisitive expression and tone morphed into one that set her heart racing, and not in a good way. 

Even with the lanterns, it was dark enough in the evenings that when she stripped down to her shift to climb in bed with him, she wasn’t too worried about him seeing things he shouldn’t. 

But in his bathing room, with the sunlight streaming in from the high windows beside her, there was no hiding anything.  

Her back thumped into the wall as she jumped back, arms rising to cover how low she’d pulled the neckline of her shift down. 

“Are those fucking teeth marks?” Nykim stalked across the small room–which was no small feat, considering the state of his knee–and gently, but firmly, pulled her arm out of the way so he could see. 

His fingers brushed the scabs running up her forearm as he did so, and a hint of green overtook the blue-gray of his irises. 

Without waiting for an answer, he swept the knuckles on his other hand over one of the semicircles marring the swell of her breast, and she gasped when a familiar current washed through her. 

When she looked down, the bruise was gone. She highly suspected the cuts on her forearm were gone as well. 

She tried to pull away and failed. “Nykim… don’t. You promised…” 

He scowled. “That was days ago, and only good for that moment. If I’d known that was what that feeling was… Damn her. She should’ve fucking told me.” 

“What feeling?” she asked, her heart sinking. 

Deftly side-stepping the question, he pushed her hair aside to reveal more marks on her shoulder. His expression darkened even further. “Did any of these break the skin?” 

“What does it matter?” she asked bitterly as his hands unerringly sought out the bruises, even through her shift. It was the short bursts of magic that were leaving her shivering, not the hot press of his fingers. 

Finished with her front, he spun her around, and her breath came short as his touch seared down the length of her spine. She pressed her cheek into the wall, its coolness emphasizing how warm her face had become.

“Human mouths are filthy,” he said. Each word throbbed with the intensity of his anger. “Tell me, or I’ll have to sweep your entire bloodstream.”  

“Are they now?” she murmured, momentarily forgetting that he had cornered her in the bathing room and was now forcibly inspecting her back. 

“Riah,” he snapped. “The skin is broken here. Teeth or something else?” 

He was already manhandling her, so she didn’t understand what was stopping him from yanking up her shift to see for himself. But sullenly, she said, “Something else. Belt. His teeth didn’t break any skin.” 

Long moments passed in silence before he turned her back around. His hands were shaking when he placed them on the wall on either side of her head, and she caught a glimpse of the stricken look in his eyes before he pressed his forehead against hers. 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize…” His breath exhaled on a shudder. “How bad the bruising still was.” 

Tears pricked her eyes, and she couldn’t decide if she should feel humiliated or… cared for. “You shouldn’t have done that,” was what she settled on.