Page 8 of Sidhe
“Wally, stop that, it’s just Nathan,” Sasha said sternly, breezing past him to scoop the animal into his arms. She allowed him to pick her up but didn’t relax, hair still sticking up, eyes on Nathan, a low growl in her throat. “Wally,” Sasha said again, “it’s Nathan. You know Nathan.”
But not this Nathan, Nathan thought.Nathanbarely knew this Nathan.
“Nate?”
Nathan wasn’t even sure who said his name but he had to get away. He turned abruptly, no destination in mind just thethought of escape, something he was used to seeking the past year. But as soon as he turned and tried to move anywhere but where he was, Alex was in his path, reaching her hands out to grab his arms, her face concerned, her voice plaintive.
“Nathan?”
No. Nathan knew that look, a look that begged, that pleaded, that didn’t understand.
Jim had shredded it from her face.
Hewasallowedtowander the house, though he seldom did, afraid of what he might find. He still wasn’t sure what the place was, where it was, wherehewas, but it was a house, and every room seemed to hold something terrible. Only his room was safe, and it was never safe for long.
When he did venture out it was always for the same purpose—he had to find Sasha. He knew the incubus was alive. He had to be alive or Jim would have taunted him with Sasha’s corpse. But the silence, the not knowing made him fear so deeply for his love. The things he had seen Jim do to others…he didn’t want to think of that happening to Sasha.
Walking down the upstairs corridor, he could hear screams, growls, voices he knew belonged to sidhe and creatures under Jim’s control. He was safe from them. Only from them. So he walked freely until he came to a door that was quiet. Before he could dare try the knob, Jim suddenly stepped out of it into the hallway in front of him.
Jim was dressed simply, just a T-shirt and jeans, sneakers, his hair and face so like how Nathan knew it, but Jim’s eyes were never blue anymore and his face was never kind. Something else shook Nathan as he looked at his brother.
He was covered in blood.
“What…what did you do?” Nathan feared this was the room he meant to find after all and that something awful had befallen Sasha.
Slowly, Jim looked at Nathan, unconcerned as he wiped the blood from his face with the back of his hand as though it were as simple a thing as dirt and grime. “She wouldn’t choose me either.” He shrugged and walked past Nathan without a glance back.
It was rare that Jim would leave him so easily, but then the torture this time was in knowing that Nathan would have to look inside the room. He did. What was left of the body inside was a mangled mess, only recognizable to Nathan because of the long dark hair and the shirt he remembered her wearing the night everything ended.
Alex…
Nathanwasshakingagain,so cold—always shaking and cold. Small, gentle hands were holding his shoulders, trying to keep him upright, but he stumbled, falling to his knees and bringing his helper down with him.
“Nathan!”
It was Alex but how could it be Alex when she was dead,dead, so horribly dead.
“Help me get him up,” she said to someone else, someone whose arms were stronger, and Nathan knew by the way they grasped him that it was Jim. Jim, who had done those awful things, made him do awful things, who wouldn’t leave him alone,God, why won’t he leave me alone?
“S-Sorry…” Nathan choked out as he shivered, brought to his feet weakly with all his weight against the solid form of Jim that he knew didn’t mean him any harm—not this Jim. “I’m fine. I’m fine, I’m fine…” he chanted low enough that he hoped it didn’t sound as much like crazed ranting to the others as it did to him. “I’m okay,” he said more strongly, looking up at Jim who he knew was his brother and would never hurt him. “Just…got a little turned around.”
The look on Jim’s face did not agree with the words that left him. “I know, Nathan. Don’t worry, it’ll be okay. I mean…” he strained to smile, “it’ll get easier. I promise.”
Nathan offered another lie to match Jim’s, nodding as he said, “I know.”
He couldn’t face the others after that, and not just because he’d have to see their worried and pitying looks. He apologized, said he just needed to rest a little, and made scarce fast, avoiding getting too close to Sasha who stared after him still holding a spooked and growling Wally.
All those months. All those images and horrors. None of it had been real. And he hadn’t been able to tell the difference.
Nathan shook his head, knees pulled up into his chest as he stared at the TV in the back living room of the Gatehouse like an angsty teenager. He hadn’t even turned the damn thing on. He couldn’t think of anything worth watching. But if he kept on like this, he wouldn’t ever get over what had happened.
It was just so ingrained in his head, every visual, every sound. Malak had certainly planned things out well if he wanted to break Nathan and then send him back as a useless slug incapable of feeling or doing anything constructive. Even Wally sensed the darkness that Malak had so easily—too easily—stirred up inside of Nathan.
How could he have given in…?
“Hey…you, uhh…absorbed in your program there?”
Iain.
