A dark, painfilled chuckle came from behind him and Raymond felt a sudden uncontrollable rage start to boil inside of him.
“You find something funny, Outworlder?”
This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. The boy had screamed like all the others but something was wrong. Missing. It wasn’t Raymonds fault, he had done everything right. It was his fault somehow. Something was wrong with him, not Raymond. It was on the tip of his tongue, like the shadow of a memory of a taste he had long forgotten. The Outworlder knew this and was somehow.... keeping it from him.
The Outworlder let out a strangled, wheezing sound that was more of a cough than a laugh. The sound of him in obvious pain should have made Raymond smile, should have warmed him like only suffering could. Instead, that shadow danced once more on his tongue and he ground his teeth together in angry confusion.
“Funny?” The Outworlder said in the raspy voice of two rocks being ground together.
He had punched him in the throat, hadn’t he? Repeatedly, he remembered suddenly.
Raymond had gotten carried away, but he’ll live, sadly. The boy would die eventually if his wounds were left untreated, but Raymond still had time before it was too late. Damn that Markov! They both knew the boy was useless to them, but he refuses to see reason.
“Not the ‘ha-ha’ kind of funny.” He continued. “But the ‘peculiar’ kind. Your kind of trying to mop the street while it's pouring outside, aren’t you?”
“What are you-” Raymond snapped and then saw his arms. The blood was no longer so thick it was dripping off him in rivulets, but there was still so much on his skin, he was basically just smearing it around. Raymond grabbed a nearby rag and mopped up what he could. It didn't take long for the cloth to become completely saturated in gore, and he tossed it away angrily.
He stormed over to Alex and glared down at him, who grinned back at him, some of his teeth were missing and several more were broken and jagged.
Had he done that?
The memory of fitting the tip of a blade between his teeth and then slowly twisting it filled Raymond’s mind, but the memory brought no pleasure.
It’s not right! He must have done something, some sort of magic. But he had no powers. None, except for those disconcerting eyes shining out from the gore and torn flesh of a slab of meat that barely resembled a human figure anymore.
“Why the long face?” said the mutilated meat sack with a comforting voice. “You feeling a little under the weather? I got a little tummy ache, myself.”
The Outworlder tried to motion towards his stomach, but his arms were chained above his head and the manacles rattled loudly.
Massive gashes crisscrossed all over his torso. Some so deep that Raymond had to magically stitch them closed and heal the internal bleeding lest he bled out. The stitchwork was crude and the skin was puckered up in long ridges with some spanning all the way from his groin to his chest. Sadly, the disfigurement wouldn't leave so much as a blemish on his skin once he was healed, but Raymond soaked the image in. Committing it to memory for when he needed it during the long nights ahead.
Raymond placed gently placed his hand on Alex’s stomach, lightly tracing the outline of the stitches.
A muscle in the Outworlders jaw clenched momentarily, but betrayed nothing else.
“You know,” Ramond said in a friendly, confiding tone. “I happen to have an item that was designed for people like you. People who like to think they won't break.”
Raymond glided his fingers down a particularly long laceration that started at the side of Alex’s neck and went all the way down to his knee on the opposite side, winding its way down his body like a drunk man walking down the street. The tips of his fingers barely touched the stitches, but Alex was aware of their passage like a trail of fire
This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
Raymonds fingers passed over Alex’s torn abdomen and continued lower, lower.
Raymond stopped when he saw the muscles in Alex’s body clench. He touched the sutured wound with the tip of a single finger, as if he was trying to point something out to Alex. Raymond gave Alex a reassuring smile and began to whistle softly as if it were a lullaby.
Maintaining eye contact, Raymond slowly, almost gently, pushed the tip of his finger into the wound. The stitches strained and then snapped as Alex screamed.
“The Puppitfly, the Lunar Lurker, Astral Echo, the Darkstar Stinger, The Orbital Wraith. It even has a name that reminds me of you: The Prismatic Teardrop.”
Raymond twisted his finger, popping more stitches and leaned close to whisper in his ear.
“Would you like to find out what it does? What it does to your mind? Defiance means nothing when I can make you want it.”
A low, staccato snarl came for Alex’s throat, his teeth bared.
Raymond stared at him, nonplussed, until he realized the outworlder was laughing.
“Isn’t that kind of cheating?” Alex asked hoarsely. “Breaking me means nothing if you have to use a magical MacGuffin to do it.”
Raymond’s face darkened and Alex tsked him, the two men's faces still close enough that flecks of blood landed on Raymond’s cheeks.
“Where’s your professional pride?” Alex asked in a voice so low that Raymond had to lean closer to hear him properly. “If I were you, I’d–”
Alex lunged towards Raymond mid-sentence, trying to sink his teeth into his neck. But Raymonds bronze rank reflexes were too quick. Alex’s jagged teeth clacked together on empty air and fresh blood trickled down his chin as another tooth came free in his mouth.
It was Raymond’s turn to tsk, and he twisted the finger still inside Alex hard, tearing more skin and stitches both.
“Now, what did I say about tha- Agh!”
Alex spit a glob of blood in Raymonds face. A glint of something white mixed in with the blood flashed in the oily light of the candles that filled the chamber. Raymond screamed again – this time in pain, and a predatory smile lifted the corner of Alex’s lips, exposing his jagged and missing teeth.
Somehow, the tooth fragment embedded itself in the sclera of Raymond’s right eye. Alex didn’t know whether it was a lucky shot or if the tooth was aided by his enhanced strength – nor did he have it in him to really care overmuch. Either way, he relished in the sight of seeing Raymond get the barest of what he deserved.
Raymond staggered and hunched forward, his hands covering his eyes. The erratic movement moved his face further from Alex’s, but much closer to his chained hands.
Each of the manacles around his wrists were attached to a length of chain that was then anchored to a metal ring that was attached to the stone wall. The chains allowed him some movement, but he only had enough slack to barely touch his forehead with his fingers – but with Raymond so close, it was enough.
Without hesitation, Alex struck like a snake. His hands flashed out to either side of Raymond’s head until they were jerked to a stop by the length of chain, then slammed his hands together with all the strength he could muster. the magickly hardened metal around his wrists closed in on Raymonds unprotected temples. Despite Alex’s sneak attack, despite Raymond being distracted, visually impaired, and injured, Raymond was moving backwards to dodge the blow.
Instead of taking the hit directly on his temples, the manacles smashed into his cheeks and nose. Alex felt all the bones in the front of Raymonds face shatter. The soft cartilage of his nose smashed flat as the manacles clanged together with a ringing sound so loud that it rivaled Raymonds scream.
The restraints were spelled to reflect kinetic energy by absorbing the force of a blow, strengthening it, and then directing it back at the source. This was intended to destroy any tool the wearer tried to use in an escape attempt. However, in this instance, the tool happened to be Raymon’s face.
A primal roar escaped from Alex as a satisfying spray of blood and teeth flew through the air. Admittedly, it became far less satisfying when Raymond’s blood filled his mouth, but he ignored it and reached for Raymond’s hair, determined to finish the job.
Raymond collapsed to his knees, somehow still alive, conscious, and out of reach. He stared blanky at Alex with only one remaining eye. His left eye was mangled and hung halfway down his cheek from a ruined eye socket.
There were small plates that stuck out vertically from the manacles on the inside of his wrists. A hole with a vertical bar was set in the center of the plate allowing a chain to be attached to it. The corners of the plates were sharp and one must have caught him in the eye when Alex brought his hands together.
Slowly, Raymond lifted a hand, reaching out to Alex, as though searching for comfort. His hand inched forward as Raymond swayed on his knees, magic gathering into his fingertips.
Please just die, please just die, please just die.
Alex’s whole body strained as he tried to rip the chains around his wrists and ankles out of the wall, but they hardly more than groaned in protest.
A single finger barely brushed against Alex’s skin but it felt like he was hit with a sledgehammer.
His entire chest caved in with a deafening crack. His ribs shattered into dozens of pieces, piercing his insides like shrapnel from an explosion.
Before the feeling of pain made him black out, before the fear realizing he was going to die here and no one back home will ever know what happened to him. Before he was enveloped by death’s warm embrace; he heard Vi mutter two words that surprised him more than anything else.
Do you hate it and think splitting the chapters like that was unnecessary or damaging to the pace of the story? Do you like that it was split?