I stiffened. “What do you expect after a decade? Everyone becomes different with time.”
He narrowed his eyes, the left side of his face rivered with blood from a cut on his temple. “We both know that’s not what I meant.” Digging his hands into the dirt, he sucked in a pained breath as he slowly, gingerly pushed to his feet. He wobbled a little, hopping on his right leg, unwilling to put too much weight on his left.
Had Kas broken anything?
Seemed I had two patients in this valley now, instead of just one.
“Does he do that often?” Jareth cocked his head at Kas unconscious on my lap.
I bit the inside of my cheek, still unsure of how much to share. “He...hasn’t been well. He fell a few weeks ago and...has had a bad concussion ever since.”
Jareth spat another mouthful of blood on the grass. Unzipping his jacket, he grabbed the hem of his T-shirt underneath and wiped his face, trying to avoid getting more blood in his eyes as multiple cuts kept oozing. Black shadowing already framed his blue eye, and bruising had begun to gather along his jaw. Kas had been ruthless.
Only once Jareth had tended to his facial injuries—finding yet another cut on his chin and swelling on his cheekbone—did he make eye contact again. “It’s not just the concussion causing him to pass out.”
I sat taller. “Are you a doctor?”
He snorted, his laugh derisive and almost uncaring. “Do I look like a doctor?”
“You could have studied anything since you left here. A decade is a long time.”
He shuddered as moonlight speared through a cloud, painting him in a pewter glow. He couldn’t quite hide his scorn or his pain. “That wasn’t the sort of education I received when I left here.”
I cocked my head, hearing a wealth of history and truth in that sentence. “What sort of education did you receive?”
He turned his head left and right, cracking something in his neck. Stretching out the bruises in his body, he gave me a thin smile. “Not the kind you want to hear about.” His strange stare fell on Kas again as he jerked on my lap. “Coming to?”
I ran my hand over Kas’s forehead. His eyes tightened and mouth bracketed as he flinched away from my touch. A usual reaction. One that was understandable but still hurt my heart. I hated that he would rather be alone than find comfort in my touch after being so conditioned to expect only agony.
“Why are you here?” I asked suddenly, pinning Jareth to the spot as Kas sucked in a breath. Only a few seconds were left before he’d wake. And I needed to know. Needed to understand, why now? Why had Jareth appeared now? Where had he come from? What did he hope to achieve?
Jareth stilled, his cloak of aggression and threats settling back on his shoulders. “I was going to ask you the same question. Just because I’m allowing you to hold my brother doesn’t mean I trust you. Doesn’t mean I accept whatever the hell is going on between you two.”
“Answer mine, and I’ll answer yours.”
He went to cross his arms but winced, letting them hang by his sides. For a second, he looked as if he’d rather hit me than reply, but then he sighed and rubbed between his eyes. “I made a promise.”
“Which was?”
“I’d come back for him.”
“Why did it take you so long?”
Emptiness filled his eyes, haunted like Kas’s but also full of evil. An evil that he’d embraced, unlike Kas who couldn’t reconcile himself with doing bad things even if his past groomed him to be. “I was busy.” He pointed a finger in my face. “And I suggest you don’t ask me again.”
I opened my mouth to ask other things. What things I didn’t know, but Kas suddenly sat bolt upright, his hair flying around his shoulders, his eyes dancing around the forest.
Alert and aware, he swooped to his feet, his stare locking instantly onto Jareth. He swayed a little but he balled his hands and fought to stay standing, never looking away from our new intruder.
I leaped upright too, not wanting to be sitting when both men towered over me.
The two men just stared.
The air turned chilly.
The forest went quiet.
Jareth didn’t smile. Didn’t wave. Kas didn’t move. Didn’t speak.
Both men gave no indication that they’d once been close enough to love each other. Once endured hell, side by side.
Jareth continued studying Kas as if he already accepted whatever he’d do. A hug. Another beating. Either would be fine with him. Blood continued to run down the side of his face but he didn’t rub it away.
Kas slowly took a step toward him.
Jareth didn’t tense or prepare. His hands stayed by his sides, permitting Kas to hit him if he desired. Was that out of guilt or respect? What exactly did these two men share? How deep did their bond go after surviving being slaves for most of their childhood?
“You’re alive,” Kas breathed, stopping in front of Jareth.
“No thanks to you,” Jareth muttered, his lips twisting into a sick smirk.
Kas winced, his own bruises from Jareth’s fists starting to be noticeable around his jaw.
The moon skated behind a cloud, drenching us in gloomy darkness as I inched closer, desperate to witness the awakening in Kas. I wanted to see the same wholeness that’d been there when he’d attacked Jareth. Maybe the pieces that he’d been hiding from had finally slipped into place. Maybe his mind would stop blacking out and he’d find the courage to face the things he kept forgetting.
Maybe Jareth’s arrival was the medicine Kas needed to get better.
But as the two men studied each other, both wild and bristling with darkness, I didn’t see freedom in Kas’s face, only guilt. The cleansing that’d been there before was now drowned out by regret and dishonor. “I hurt you.”
Jareth’s nostrils flared before he shrugged as if he hadn’t even noticed. “I’ve had worse.”
Kas inhaled sharply. The bloodlust from before had well and truly vanished, leaving behind the man I’d fallen in love with. A caring man who took on way too much blame for not being able to protect those he loved. A martyr who would continue denying his own happiness if it meant he could give it to others. “That scar is new.”
Jareth’s fingertips came up and ran along the nasty cut down his cheek. “New to you. Not to me.”
“Who gave it to you?”
For the first time, Jareth’s stoic savagery slipped a little. “No one you know.”
“Someone other than Storymaker?” Kas choked.
“Someone who’s dead. We’ll leave it at that,” Jareth snapped.
A long moment stretched in silence.
Goosebumps once again layered me inside and out.
Kas finally shook himself and yanked Jareth into an embrace. A hard crash as their bodies slammed together. The whip fast lasso of their arms as they held tight. The undeniable connection of two messed up boys who’d become violent men.
I wanted to give them privacy, but I couldn’t look away.
I couldn’t stop watching the relationship that switched from historic to present day. Kas buried his face into Jareth’s neck, his back shuddering with shame. “I’m so fucking sorry for hurting you.”
Jareth pressed his forehead against Kas’s cheek. “I’m sorry I couldn’t come sooner.”