Artifice - Man x Man - Book Six

Chapter 4

My fingers glide slowly through the freshly washed tangles of his hair as I take in the reality that this day should have been the last day of our lives. I hold him against my chest, crammed into the hospital bed that hardly seems big enough for him, let alone me. 

Yet it was the only way to achieve peace with all that we'd endured since our arrival here. To be truthful, I needed the closeness as much as he did. The bed was unbelievably comfortable compared to most of what we had back in our time.

When death is at your doorstep, everything else begins to pale in comparison. One might say a stubbed toe is the worst pain imaginable until you've felt greater pain that is. The scale is infinite for most, pain can always be raised, but once you have felt the icy chill of black oblivion trying to snuff out your very existence; true grit surfaces and pain becomes a very tolerable thing. 

It's life, it's existence, it's the reminder that you will remain if only for a moment more. Feeling pain is a guarantee of life for once you cross the thresh hold, you feel nothing and long to find if you will ever feel anything again. 

One of the things I had allowed to slide about my husband was his suspicion and fear of doctors. His lack of trust in anything that he didn't completely understand and his reluctance to undergo any sort of procedure. Where one might realize this is a necessary evil, Verando seemed to bank on his immortality and would rather succumb to decay than even stand the palpation of a sore joint. 

Where it benefited in a lack of complaining about physical ailments, it meant there was a lot he tolerated and it assured that he was hard to treat. 

With our pristine surroundings, we hardly fit in with our grit-covered clothes and the distinct smell of harbor backwash coating our bodies. The walls reminded me much of our times with the elves save for the smooth texture, not a stone or brick in sight, the walls were without flaw and yet without an ounce of life or likeness.

 Each one was identical to the next, with no paintings, no sculptures, not even potted plants, I felt as though this place was too sterile. We scrubbed our bodies and washed away the remnants of our past lives, handing over our clothes for sampling and washing though Verando seemed uncertain if we would ever get them back. I'd say the hardest part of the evening had been looking upon his beaten body but I'd be lying. 

Mr.Balan had made his last impression quite memorable, though he didn't suffer from the broken limbs that Haryek did, his beautiful skin was marred and broken by the lash marks and scalds. "Cigar." He'd told me, giving me a whole new meaning for the appreciation of this new life. 

It would mean Mr.Balan was dead, buried in the ground for centuries. It's almost a blur now, counting the marks over and over in my head only to lose track and just hug him under the scalding stream of water. I toweled him off with the white, fluffy towels they provided us, one of my original roles that I always took great pleasure in. 

I briefly recall the pang of reality I felt when I skirt the towel over his abdominals to find that he is not dirty, he was marred by heavy bruising from the chains. 

"Does it hurt?"

He shrugs. Stoic. I'm vaguely aware that I'm daydreaming, lost between two realities and a handful of half-truths.

Tonic pulls me out of my trance, I lift my eyes from watching his chest rise up and down, breathing with him. "I figured he'd be asleep."

"Of course he is. He died today." My voice is hard, I try not to be bitter and angry but it's difficult when I feel as though we were misled about what was really going on here. Yet, how can you mislead someone when you give them very little information?