Page 61 of Petals for Vicious Secrets

“I knew you couldn’t keep that mouth of yours shut, but it was worth a try. As for asking him to stop hurting you…” He sighed. “That was fucking stupid.” He swallowed, as if he was resisting the urge to say something else.

“He was going to kill my friend.”

“He will kill him. You know that already. But your fucking pride couldn’t resist arguing with the Cardinals-damned Organ Mandor,” he finally looked at her, his jaw clenched.

“Look, I’m sorry about him slicing you because of me,” Lenna started, and Jake was shaking his head as he sat down, biting his lip at whatever pain the movements caused. “I don’t want to imagine—”

“You don’t get it, do you?” he cut her, slowly shaking his head. “I don’t care about him hitting me. He’s been hitting me all my existence. But you? You shouldn't have given him any reason to hurt you.”

“It was only five strikes. It could have been worse,” she lied. She didn’t want to even imagine how twenty-three had felt on Ciaran. If he had even stayed conscious for all of them, unlike her weak body. She didn’t dare ask Jake what his father had meant when by “his favorite number”. She wasn’t sure she could bear what the answer would be.

“Have you ever seen the Lawful Stabs used on a female?” he simply asked.

“I had never seen them used before. But I had heard of them.”

“Yet you say it was only five strikes? Blood of the five Cardinals was used to create the Red Lawful Stab, Brachyan,” Jake said. “Female blood for female pain. It doesn’t affect males nearly as much as females. If my father had hit you with it twenty-five times, you would be dead right now.”

Lenna exhaled softly, a part of her relieved at the fact that maybe she wasn’t a pitiful coward after all. Or not as much as she had feared she was.

“How many times did he hit you?” the question left Lenna’s lips before she could stop it.

Jake looked at the floor in front of him, his bare shoulders tensing and marking every muscle on his torso. He flinched, as if that had made his back react.

“It doesn’t matter.”

Lenna put her hand on his cheek, and he lifted his eyes to meet hers again. His skin felt cool against the warmth of her fingers, and she wondered if the rest of his body was as cold, since he hadn’t cared to Give himself a blanket.

“How many?” she insisted.

“Fifty. Always fifty,” he said, leaning into her touch.

Lenna bit her lips to resist the urging tears. There would not be more tears caused by that piece of shit of a Mandor, she had promised herself.

“I’m so sorry,” was all she managed to whisper, dropping her hand.

“Don’t be. Sooner or later, he will pay. I will make him pay,” he said. She couldn't take her amber eyes from his silver ones. From the anger and determination in them, as he added, “For hurting you.”

It wasn’t a hopeful wish, Lenna realized. It was a fact. A statement.

“I don’t mind the pain. I only wish I could find a way to help Raoul. To save him,” she swallowed. To help you from a father like yours, she wanted to add. But she continued, “The only thing I ever wanted was to become a panom, to access my full powers. I thought they would make me whole. I was convinced they were the missing part that I had been lacking all my life. Even now, being barely capable of using two powers, I don’t know what I would do if I lost them. What the purpose of my life would be. I believed they would give me some sort of control over my life and the lives of those around me. But that was a foolish, ridiculous thought. These powers make no difference against someone like your father.”

“The Cardinal powers can change lives. For the better, and for the worse,” Jake said. “But the Organ Mandor will always surpass the power and ability of any other panom. The only actual way to protect oneself against him is by controlling the Fifth Power, and getting it is extremely difficult, and extremely dangerous.”

“If I ever master the four Cardinal powers, maybe it would be worth considering,” Lenna said, and a glimpse of navy sparks flickered in his eyes.

“My back would appreciate some Healing, Brachyan,” Jake said, turning his destroyed back to her. She held her shudder at the sight of what that monster had done to his son. Jake added, “Hover your hand over the wounds in small circles, visualizing how the skin should look in normal conditions.”

It should look very muscled. Very damned muscled and terse and distracting.

Lenna extended her hand over his broken skin, tracing circles slowly over it. Jake added, “Try thinking about the West petal of your mark as if it was the medicine, and you were applying it to my skin to Heal it.”

So she did. Slowly, his wounds started closing one by one, as if they were being sewn by an invisible but experienced healer. The muscles on his shoulders were tense.

Lenna felt her heart tighten in her chest. She was glad that she could somehow Heal this man. This man, who had endured this torture in a failed attempt at stopping her own. One circle of her hand, another wound closed. He who had challenged the Organ Mandor of Thyria in front of all the other panoms of the nation. Another circle, and another wound closed. This man, who maybe wasn’t as evil as she wanted to believe he was.

A few minutes later, she placed her hand on his now scarred back. He breathed deeply at the touch. She stroked it softly, careful to not press her palm against it too hard should the wounds reopen again. Should his pain return.

He turned his body around until he was facing her. “You now own three Cardinal powers, Brachyan.” He lifted his hand to her face and his thumb stroked her bottom lip, slowly. She opened her mouth slightly.

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