Brian stared at his lover, pain radiating through him. He had thought that the torture he had suffered under Roth was the worst pain he had ever felt. Then he had thought nothing could be worse than the mindless rape, and the pain inflicted with it. He would take those a hundred times over. A thousand. The pain of seeing AJ on his knees, begging for Brian’s life, would haunt him for the rest of eternity. Knowing that AJ had done this; let Roth take him, simply to save Brian’s life. That guilt would cripple him.
“Alex.” He whispered. His lover was still on his knees, his body bent forward now, his head bowed. There was defeat in his posture. This was so wrong. AJ was the strong one. The passionate one. But he had been reduced to this limp figure, huddled on the floor, waiting for the whim of a madman.
The smile that Roth wore was smug. He was staring at AJ, every inch of his body gloating over the power that he held.
“Go.” The one hoarse word had Brian sitting up and staring at AJ in shock. He didn’t move beyond that, unable to comprehend what his partner was asking. AJ spoke again, his voice growing firmer. “Go, Brian. Get out of here.”
“I can’t leave you here, Alex.”
“I said go!” AJ’s head turned, and his eyes, oh Lord his eyes. They were dark, and oh so empty. The only thing that Brian could see in them, the only sign of life, was that love that was always there for him. In that look, Brian read what AJ was thinking. Go, I can’t stand for you to see me like this. Please, don’t make me do this while you watch. Don’t make this any harder than it already is. Go.
Though not a word had been spoken, Brian understood. Still, even as he climbed to his feet, he shook his head in denial. “I can’t leave you. Don’t ask me to, please. Don’t ask this of me.”
Magic filled the room. It surprised Brian to realize that it was coming from AJ, not from Roth. A wall of air slammed in to Brian, wrapping him in its hold, lifting him into the air. AJ propelled him backwards, against the shut doors, slamming them open. “Go!” he was shouting. “Go, go, go!” With a last blast of air, Brian was hurtled backwards down the hall. Even as he hit the wall, the doors snapped shut again.
In an instant Brian was on his feet, running to the doorway. He tried to open it, and found that it was sealed shut. He banged on the door, calling out AJ’s name over and over again. No, no! This wasn’t how it was going to end! He wasn’t going to let it end like this! Embracing his magic, Brian tried to use air to slam the doors open. Nothing. He tried to move them with earth, knowing that they were made of stone. Still, nothing. Roth had sealed the room against him. But not against sound.
AJ’s torturous screams filled the air. They broke only long enough for him to gather more air, then continued on and on, filling Brian’s head until he thought he would go insane. The only other sound heard was Roth’s laughter.
“Alex, no! Alex! Alex!”
A pair of hands gripped Brian, trying to pull him backwards. He struggled against them, breaking free to slam against the door again. But the arms simple grabbed him again, and this time they succeeded in pulling him backwards, yanking him towards the staircase. “No, no! Let me go! God, I have to help him! Let me go!” he screamed, but no one listened to him. Another pair of hands took hold of him, and Brian found himself flying through the air, further and further from his lover.
In that instant, Brian understood how AJ could have leveled a whole city with a tsunami. Wrapped up in anger and grief, he would have leveled the whole island if he had thought it would help.
Suddenly his feet found solid ground as he landed on something hard. Those arms were still around him, holding him down as he tried to break free, pinning him to the wood. A deck. They were on the deck of a ship. His vision cleared enough to see that it was Howie holding him down, and a beautiful red haired woman that Brian had never met before. He didn’t care. He had to get free, get back there and save his lover. “Let me go!”
“Brian, we can’t. We can’t. You can’t go up there.” Howie said, using his whole body to pin Brian’s down. “There’s nothing you can do for him right now.”
“No, I won’t leave him to die! I won’t, do you hear me! I have to help him.”
“He won’t kill him, Bri. Not if you stay down here, out of the way. Roth has no need to kill him. But if you storm up there and create such a ruckus, he’s going to either hurt him worse, or he actually will kill him.” Howie said through gritted teeth. Brian was putting up one hell of a fight. “If you want to keep him alive until we come up with a way to save him, you need to calm down and stay here!”
Those words sunk through the fog like nothing else had. All the fight left Brian’s body, so that he slumped down on the deck, Howie on top of him. For a moment Howie stayed there, as if trying to decide if Brian was serious. When he finally loosened his grip, Brian moved, rolling to his side to curl in to a ball. His pain was too strong, threatening to overwhelm him. It felt so wrong, so cowardly, to sit down here while up there AJ was being tortured to within an inch of his immortal life.
Howie reached to touch him, but Brian shied away from it. The deck was silent.
“We will save him, Brian. I swear to you, he won’t stay there a moment longer than he has to.” Howie said softly. Didn’t he understand? It had already been too long. One second under that man’s control was too long. “Do you have any idea what he’ll do to him?” Brian asked hoarsely.
There was no answer for a few minutes, and then Howie said, very softly, “He’ll want to hurt him, as much as possible. He lays a lot of his pain at Alyck’s door.”
Brian didn’t bother moving. He closed his eyes and lay there on the cool deck. “He’ll do more than that. He’s mastered the ability to hold you there, on the cusp of life and death. He can break your bones, cut your limbs off, and leave you lying there, not allowing your body to heal you. Or he can let you heal a piece at the time, or slowly, so that the pain lasts longer.”
He heard the twin gasps from over top of him, but he didn’t stop, didn’t care. “He’ll beat him, over and over. What was done to me will be pale in comparison to what he’ll do to Alex. He held back with me, wanting to upset Alex but not to make him furious beyond reason. But he showed me the things he wants to use on Alex. The knives, and belts, and other things. He’ll rape him, over and over and over again, until Alex’s body can’t take it anymore. Then he’ll heal him enough for it to begin again. He likes to watch a person bleed. He likes to watch you suffer.”
Unable to handle those images anymore, Brian’s voice felt silent. He could hear the woman quietly weeping; feel Howie’s anger emanating from him.
AJ had done this, he had taken this on willingly, so that Brian could live. He had sacrificed himself so that the one he loved would have life, and what was he doing with it? What was he doing with this selfless gift that Alex had given him? Lying on a deck, crippled under the weight of his grief. Was this what AJ would have wanted for him? No.
That gave Brian the strength to move, to rise to his feet. No, he would not let Roth win this. He would take what AJ had given him, and he would use it well. What was it that AJ had said before? He had been gathering others to come here, to rescue him. That task was now his. Brian stared out at the water as his mind worked. He would take over, and find the others that AJ spoke of. He would bring them to him, and together they would free AJ. No matter what the cost, no matter how long it took, Brian vowed that he would find them, and he would save his lover.
“Alex said there are others.” Brian said, turning to look at the two. “He said he was getting others, to come here and free me. Do you know where they are?”
“Well, a few.” Howie said slowly. “In India and Turkey. Two there in Italy. But they’re middling in strength. Aside from Roth, AJ is at the top in strength, and I’d say you come in a right behind him. I’d be next in line, the Isleen here. Marzio and Sofia are matched in strength; together they don’t even equal Isleen, and her power isn’t even a quarter of my own. Richard has almost none, he can barely light a candle. As for Geoff, well, his control of water is almost as strong as mine, but the rest of his magic almost isn’t worth mentioning, if it’s there at all.”
Brian’s blue eyes were frozen, and harder than ice. “We’ll gather them to us. Will they be willing to help?”
It was Isleen who answered. “We all, in one way or another, owe Alyck a debt. None of us would hesitate to help in this, even with our lives.”
Brian nodded, his gaze traveling back to the tall towers. “Get the ship ready to go. As soon as it is, we’ll leave for Italy, it’s the closest. I mean to be back here before the week is out, with our without help, and I will get him out of there, or die trying.”
A week was far too long, but Brian knew that Howie was right. Roth would not kill AJ. That wouldn’t be his goal in all of this. He would look to break him.
Hold on, Alex. I’ll be back for you as soon as I can. Just hold on, please, baby.