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Adult story. Moogle-based delays. New sexual content still pending, so you'll have to settle for plot in the meantime. Drama ensues. Enjoy!

• Master Meridian

Blood and Water

Justify The Means

Oswell sighed and slammed the knife in his paw noisily down on the table. "You know, I am starting to think that you are attempting to force me to cause you irreparable damage at this point," he growled.

On the table, his chest still pried apart by magical forces to expose his internal organs to the open air and his life sustained and suspended by an arcane thread woven from his own spirit's energy, Bane shot Oswell a venomous glare. His muzzle twitched as it tried to form words, but he hadn't the strength to even gurgle anymore. Instead, every ounce of strength went to surviving a trauma his body was not built to endure.

The magi sighed again and waved a paw over the otter's ripped-open chest. "All I need to do is map out the physiological changes that you have undergone since your awakening. Once I have done that," he said as he picked the knife back up and waggled it in front of the otter's eyes, "I will be more than happy to let you die. You need only be patient."

When Bain's glare gained strength and a weak gurgle came from his blood-choked throat and muzzle, Oswell rolled his eyes. He brought the knife down hard in the otter's thigh and sank the blade in deep. A weak, fatigued cry issued from Bain's muzzle, and with it came a cough that cleared much of the fluid from his throat. "I apologize; I could not hear your threat to kill me or your begging to end you now over the sound of your body trying desperately to drown you. Please. Repeat yourself."

"D..." was all Bain could manage. His muzzle worked back and forth silently again, but the rage in his eyes was all he could coherently convey. His body twitched again as he writhed slowly under Oswell.

Oswell just perked an ear and cocked his head. "Well that tells me nothing. That is not a complete word, let alone a sentence." He ripped the knife out of the otter's leg and drew another pained convulsion from Bain. "You really need to learn to enunciate, Bain," he added, as he waggled the bloody knife at the otter.

A tickle of awareness in the back of Oswell's mind drew him up straight, and he tilted his head toward the ceiling as he stretched out his awareness. It was Corella, up in the manor. The first pangs of hunger had struck her. It was, ostensibly, time for the princess to receive her dinner and for Oswell to play the dutiful host once more.

It also meant, to his frustration, that he had to leave Bain. He growled as he shut out the sensations from upstairs and tossed the knife down onto the table. "I thought I told you to give up your body's secrets before dinner, so that I might offer you a merciful end," he muttered as he raised his paws. As he concentrated, the blood began to flake off of his fur and skin and puff away into the air like smoke. "Alas, you are going to have to now endure this state for an extended period of time while I serve and enjoy my meal."

He flashed the otter a smile. "What to have, though? So many options. I think perhaps, in your honor, some smoked fish will do." The fox leaned down over the otter's bloody face and whispered into one ear, "I shall serve myself a double helping, but fear not! I promise to enjoy your share as much or more than my own."

As he lifted his head again, Oswell chuckled at the anger in the little otter's eyes. "Oh, go on. Glare a little harder. You had to have known at the end of your time here, this would happen. What other reason could I possibly have for allowing your pitiful, unnatural habits? Hmm? You were always going to die, Bain. The question has only ever been when."

When Bain offered no reply, Oswell lifted his paws high over the otter again. They began to weave slowly back and forth as he once more drew the ilaen powers out of Bain's broken body and up into the air. Under his direction, the energy began to take the shape of runes and markings alien to the otter beneath them, but commonplace to Oswell.

The light sparkled in Bain's eyes as Oswell looked down at him. "This," he explained as his mind remained focused on the energy pattern, "is a simple, if inefficient, healing weave drawn from your own ilaen powers. Disrupting it would leave you to die a quick, and relatively painful death. It is not powerful enough to restore you on its own, of course; it cannot knit your flesh together if it is torn so far asunder." He grinned wider at Bain's glare. "It will, however, keep you alive until I return from dinner. I will be very interested to see your progress... or if you have broken the spell sufficiently to earn your death." The fox threw him a wink. "Surprise me," he added, before he turned on his heel and started away.

Bain watched him go as best the otter was capable of. He could barely hear the open and close of the large glass doors into the magi's lab over the sound of his own heartbeat as it thudded in his ears. Had he the capacity, he would have sighed as his head slumped back. The energy above him continued to twist and writhe, like a tapestry constantly being made and unmade. It was hard to focus, what with the pain that filled him.

Weakly, he tried one last time to tug against his bonds. Bain knew it was useless the moment he began to try, but that didn't stop him. He pushed through the pain to tug his body against the leather straps on his legs and arms. Even though they refused to budge, he gritted his teeth and tried anyway. And tried again. And again. After the third attempt, Bain closed his eyes. He felt tears run from the corner of his eyes toward his ears, and his limbs slumped limply in their restraints.

Then his fingers brushed something.

His eyes shot open wide as he fought to lift his head and look down. His own body was in the way; whatever his fingers were able to rub ever so gently against, he wasn't able to see what it was. The angle was wrong for a visual, but he gurgled through a smile regardless. It was the knife. It had to be the knife Oswell had just been using. He'd left it on the table. It was almost in reach!

It took a moment for Bain to force himself to calm down. He curled those fingers back into a fist as he forced himself to breathe as best he could in his horrifically broken state. Even if he freed himself, that would only kill him. Bain felt himself shiver at the prospect. Would that even be so bad a thing at that point? He should already have been dead. He was only still alive because Oswell had used that spell - that energy weave above him - to keep him alive. Without the weave, the pain would stop. The otter would die... and that would be that. He'd be dead, just like he should already have been.

As he closed his eyes again, Bain slowly uncurled his fingers and reached them out. Once more, they bushed against the knife. Maybe he would just let himself die. Maybe he would choose to live. Maybe he'd decide to do something else. He just knew he wasn't going to be able to make a choice until he got that knife in his paw.

Matters of life or death could wait until he was free to choose.

It wasn't like Oswell to be late to dinner.

Deacon had conveyed as much to Corella when she had informed him that she'd been unable to find him. A little of the princess' impatience had shone through when she'd insisted that Deacon find his father and query him as to the delay on dinner. It didn't seem lie Corella was interested in waiting to see; for a time, she had insisted on following Deacon on his search through the manor for his father.

He knew where Oswell was, of course. There was only one arcane-shielded room in the entire manor, and that was his father's underground lab. Magi within could sense beyond its walls, but those outside could grasp no feel of anything inside the dome. If he couldn't sense his father's presence, he had either left the manor or was within his lab. The latter was far more likely than the former.

It wasn't until Corella gave up and went to see Istvan than Deacon was able to break away and head for the staircase to the lab. He reached it just as his father was taking the last few steps up to its peak, and he bowed his head quickly. "Apologies, father. I meant no intrusion."

"And yet you intrude nonetheless," Oswell growled at him. He glanced across and around the lobby before he fixed his eyes once more on his son. "Your betrothed wonders after dinner?"

When Deacon nodded, Oswell swatted the fox's muzzle with the back of one paw. "And you thought to simplywait for your father to prepare her meal. Foolish, selfish boy. I have trained you better than this. Why do you not see to her wishes? She is _your_bride."

As his cheek stung from the blow, Deacon felt his eyes narrow. They lifted to, ever so briefly, meet his father's gaze as the pain flickered briefly into defiance. "She is not mine by choice," he muttered.

His head snapped to the side as Oswell reversed his previous stroke and folded his arms. "Speak up, boy," he growled as his ears began to flatten. Before him, Deacon straightened up from the blow. "If you have a voice of dissent, use it. Do not cower. Speak."

The younger of the pair glanced out into the lobby. There were no guards that he could see, nor the princess, but any of them could have been on the balcony above. Out of sight, but not out of earshot. Regardless, the frustration built up in Deacon and forced his muzzle open again in spite of years of instilled fear. "She is not mine by choice," repeated the younger magi. Even he was surprised by the firmness in his voice.

"No. She is yours by my choice, and you will respect that." Oswell's eyes narrowed as he leaned down and forward to leer into Deacon's face. "She is heir to the throne, you ungrateful cur. She is a beautiful female. She is refined and intelligent and far, far more than a simple, weak little waste of my time like you deserves." His eyebrows lifted as a sneer drew across his muzzle. "Or perhaps you think she is not good enough. Hmm? Do you perhaps believe that you deserve better than the heir to the Noctus Imperium to call your own?"

It took every ounce of strength and concentration for Deacon to keep his father's stare. Every ingrained instinct begged him to look away, or to back down and apologize. Everything his father had ever taught him begged subservience to Oswell's will. Where he found the strength to override that even Deacon didn't know. "I believe I deserve the right to choose," he finally said.

"Do you? Hmf." Oswell stepped back and waved toward the lobby. "Then go. Tell her as much. Inform her that I will prepare dinner momentarily, and then go and inform her that you need not be married. Inform her that she has come all this way for no reason, and will leave humiliated and rejected by you." He snapped the fingers of his other paw in front of the still, surprised Deacon. "Well? Hurry up. You wished a choice, and now you have it."

Deacon blinked as he felt his tail tuck up between his legs. "Do you... think that she would-"

"Hers would be the fury of a female scorned by a suitor," Oswell interrupted with a snarl. "Royals are not accustomed to being told 'no' by anyone, male or otherwise. Her mother would be furious with me for wasting her time, her resources, and her daughter." Deacon's tail tucked further in as a rumbling growl began in Oswell's throat. "And that speaks nothing to my fury, when she and her entourage have left these halls."

A little growl of his own slipped out of Deacon's muzzle as his ears flattened back. "A fine choice you give me," he muttered. "You present the illusion of a choice - the ability to freely choose one option or the other - and inform me of how badly I will be punished if I do not follow your whims. I am a slave to your choices."

Oswell's arm dropped back to his side as the other reached out to grip Deacon by the shoulder. "And now you have learned a little more of the way of the world," he replied. His voice grew gentle, as he squeezed warmly at his son's shoulder. "All choice is illusion, unless you have the power to control the variables. Until you have the power to shatter the illusions and set your own terms, a slave is all you will be. For now..." The paw shifted to Deacon's throat and pinned him against the wall as Oswell bared his teeth. "Do not allow yourself the illusion of choice in this matter, and do as you are told."

When he let go again a moment later, Deacon brought one paw up to brush across his throat. "I understand," he grumbled after a second. His head tilted as he glanced down the dark staircase. "How is Bain?"

"Resting," Oswell replied. He all but pushed Deacon off the wall and toward the lobby. "He is no trained magi. My method for accessing his ilaen powers is draining to him." He raised a paw as soon as Deacon opened his muzzle. "I assure you that I am taking all precautions and sustaining his life. I have not completed my studies yet, boy; do not presume to dictate to me my methodology. The otter is alive; he will remain that way for now." Oswell lifted both eyebrows as he gave Deacon another shove. "Now. If you have no further demands on me, I shall prepare you, our guests and myself a dinner we can all sit down to enjoy."

It was a clear dismissal, and Deacon's head bowed by instinct rather than desire as he nodded. "No further concerns, no," he replied, and watched as Oswell stepped past him and into the lobby. He watched the fox move toward the stairs, and turned back to the staircase.

No sooner had he laid eyes on it than a shimmering curtain of white light flashed into existence over the passage. Deacon whirled around to see Oswell at the base of the stairs, one arm extended toward his son. "He needs his rest," the older fox bit out, emphasizing each and every word. "You are not to pass that barrier, however much you wish to. I will know if you attempt it. My experiments are progressing well, and I will not have your short-sighted concern endanger his well-being or my efforts." He straightened up, lowered his arm and started up the stairs.

For his part, Deacon muttered a curse under his breath. In spite of his father's warning, he reached out with a couple of fingers to brush across the light. It was warm to the touch, and far more solid that he had anticipated. He could trace his fingers across the shimmering surface, but there was no give to the barrier whatsoever. Deacon sighed and let the arm drop away. In spite of his father's words, Bain's silence and the inability to sense the otter did not bode well in the younger fox's mind. Just because his father said Bain was alive didn't mean that the otter was well.

And all he could do was get dressed and ready for dinner.

Dinner started out as a dour affair. Oswell, through the meal, seemed distracted and disappointed with more than just his son's behavior. Corella was quieter than she had been when she'd arrived. Whether the reality of her situation and lack of choice had truly sunk in or whether her silence was drawn from some other cause, Deacon refused to speculate. The younger magi himself was equally quiet at the table. Bain consumed his thoughts.

It was almost merciful when one of the royal guard burst into the dining room in the middle of dessert. Istvan almost jumped out of his chair, one paw on the hilt of his sword as he whirled on the intruder. "What is it?" he growled as Oswell, Corella and Deacon all looked up.

"Ahron assassins," the guard replied as he bowed before Corella. "They number at least twenty, Kristr thinks there's a magi with them. They must have heard the princess was here."

Before the guard had even finished his warning, both Istvan and Oswell were out of their respective chairs. The older magi turned to his son with an intense glare. "Take the princess to her chambers and lock the door," he told Deacon. "I will take her protectors to head off these assailants."

"You will do no such thing," Istvan growled back as he drew his sword. "My soldiers answer to me, and not you. I will leave-"

"Deacon will remain here," Oswell interrupted. The other royal guard turned to leave the room as the fox raised his paw until his palm was level with Istvan's face. "He can seal the house against any intruders while we deal with these miscreants. Leaving your forces here will only cause more of those accompanying us to perish."

A green shimmer washed over Istvan's eyes as Oswell dropped his paw back to his side, and the wolf snorted quietly to himself as he nodded. "Fair point," he muttered, before he turned to Corella. "Your majesty, Deacon will sequester you in your room until we deal with this threat."

Without another word and before the princess could offer a word of protest, Istvan turned away and marched out of the dining room. She pushed herself out of her chair as she glanced to Oswell. "Master Oswell, I must protest."

Oswell just waved a paw and shook his head as he drew himself upright. "Your safety is paramount, my lady," he replied as he pointed a finger toward Deacon. "You will be perfectly safe in your quarters, I assure you. Deacon will be able to, in my absence, assure your well-being." His eyes narrowed as they shifted to take in his son. "He has been trained in the manor's defensive functions. I have zero expectation that you will be in any danger while he is your caretaker."

Even as Deacon opened his muzzle to speak, a waggle of his father's finger and an equally-firm glare shut him up. "You are to ensure that she is locked in," he instructed Deacon. "If she leaves her quarters, she could place herself at risk. This cannot be allowed to happen." The elder magi's voice lowered as he growled. "She is especially not to touch the laboratory. Should you do anything to disrupt your marriage... well, I trust you to do the right thing." His eyes narrowed slightly. "See that I have not made a mistake."

The magi was gone almost before either Deacon or Corella could blink. Lightning ruptured through his flesh and clothing in a brilliant flash, and when sight returned it was to a dining room almost empty. The wolfess' eyes were wide as she turned to Deacon. "You cannot possibly-"

"I have my orders to keep you safe, and I will," Deacon interrupted her with a lifted paw. Somewhere deep inside, he shuddered with revulsion. How similar he must have looked to his father. He'd even sounded like Oswell. "I am not going to let them in, but I need you to help me. If you wander around-"

"Wandering the halls will be no more dangerous than sequestering myself in my chambers until the males have saved the helpless princess from the marauding attackers," she countered from behind folded arms. "I will remain in the manor, but I will not be locked in my room like some frightened cub!"

The force behind her words almost made Deacon step back, but he instead felt himself draw up straight and tall. "With respect, you are putting yourself in danger," Deacon said. He forced his voice to even as he looked to the door his father had left through. "Should the manor be breached, I can isolate your quarters from them until they can be driven back. If you are wandering around, I can do _nothing_for you in that eventuality."

The princess' jaw clenched as she stared at Deacon. It seemed for a moment that she was still going to argue the point, but finally she sighed. Her shoulders drooped slightly as her tail tucked down against one leg. "I hear the wisdom of your father in your words," she replied at last. "Very well. I will go now."

She turned away too quickly to see the shiver that wracked Deacon's body. He watched her leave as he wrapped his arms tightly around his middle. Eyes fell closed as his ears flattened. Corella hadn't respected his authority until he'd sounded like his father. Was that truly what he had to do to be heard? Was Oswell right, and imposition of will was the only thing that would allow his voice to be heard? Was that so bad, in the pursuit of protecting someone? What lengths would he go to in order to protect Corella? How much further would he go if Bain were in danger?

Deacon sighed as he hung his head low. Questions on power and morality could wait for later. For the moment, he had a princess to protect and a manor to see to.

Steel clashed with steel somewhere to Oswell's left, but the magi cared little for it. His senses were extended further ahead through the night. The fighting of Istvan and his soldiers against the various Ahron assassins arrayed against them mattered less to Oswell than the disruption to his experimentation. If he returned to the manor and Bain had managed to kill himself, the magi was not going to be impressed.

A flicker of arcane-influenced warning came from Oswell's side, and he pivoted on one footpaw with supernatural speed and grace. A scimitar blade sliced through the space he'd previously occupied, and he caught the glint of fear in the eyes of the equine that wielded the weapon. In the split second before Oswell's counterattack, he took in the horse's tattered leathers and unkempt mane. Peasant, he thought with a derisive sniff.

His paw shot out in the next moment as electricity raced up his arm. His fingers opened as he pressed his palm to the equine's head, and the sparks of lightning leaped from his flesh into the unfortunate equine. There wasn't even time for the attacker to cry out in pain or surprise. His body was launched away from Oswell with enough force to sever his head messily from his neck. The head travelled considerably further into the night, alight with arcane electricity for a second. When the residual energy faded, the head was still well and truly in flight. On the bloody grass, the horse's body twitched for a few seconds more before it fell still.

Oswell resumed his slow, steady pace through the battlefield that had established itself on the plains. Though a smaller force, Istvan's guards seemed to be far better equipped and trained than the Ahron soldiers. They were holding their own, in spite of the enemy numbers. Oswell might have been impressed if he'd ascribed any particular importance to any of them.

A rippling pulse of energy broke his thoughts as he detected the magi the Ahron attackers had brought along. A glance to the side showed one of Istvan's soldiers on the verge of striking down one of the invaders. The ground beneath the guard cracked and shook, and the earth itself rose up to drive stone spikes through his thick armor. Blood stained the shards of rock as the guard shuddered and cried out in pain. Another pulse of energy reached Oswell's awareness, and a great spire of stone shot up through the ground and ran the guard through. His armor split open and fell around the spike as the warrior's flesh was ripped apart.

It was a trivial matter to trace the origin point of the magi who had caused the damage. Oswell turned his head even as he stretched out with his mind. While he couldn't see the magi in the dark, Oswell could feel the power - earth magic, born of an ulurn-attuned spirit - that coursed through their body. He could sense the will that directed it. It was weaker than his own, naturally, but formidable enough.

The moment he sensed his foe, he knew that the other magi had detected and locked onto his position. Electricity burned in Oswell's eyes as he took the initiative. His mind pulled inward and curled around itself as he erected layer upon layer of defensive enchantment. The fox felt a surge from his opponent, and mentally braced himself as he gritted his teeth.

There was no storm of dust and dirt, and no hurling, battering wave of force. The attack instead came more subtly. A spear of malicious thought launched across the mental link between the two, solid as rock and aimed for Oswell's mind. It shattered against the fox's established defenses, as did the next two attacks launched at him. Each impact chipped away at Oswell's protective enchantments, and he growled as he reinforced them.

For the fourth attack though, he dropped his defenses entirely and reached out to the attack. He grasped a hold of that mental spear and drew it deep into himself, directed not to a vulnerable point but to a well of strength. He felt more than heard the enemy magi's gasp as that magi's extended will was grasped by Oswell's. Oswell wrapped himself around it and eroded it, even as he kept his opponent trapped. A smile touched his muzzle as he felt the magi try and pull away from him. "Too late," he muttered.

Oswell took a fraction of a second to trace the attack back directly to its source. Trapped as he was, the magi was unable to extract his will from Oswell's mind to defend himself. Oswell's smile broadened as the electricity left his eyes. He poured it through the link he'd forced with the trapped magi, and he was vaguely aware of his physical ears detecting the screams of pain from his opponent.

In spite of that pain, the magi was able to break Oswell's hold shortly after the counterattack began. He retreated back into his mind and began to erect his own defenses as Oswell consolidated his power. The small didn't waver as he drew himself up straight. A battle between skilled magi was never as simple as who could hurl the most fireballs or anything so flashy. He'd weakened his opponent during their first attack on him. That gave him the advantage, and put his enemy off-balance.

"Allow me to show you how it is done," he growled, and reached out to begin his own attack.

Deacon's first order of business had been sealing the princess in her quarters. She'd grumbled and growled all the way there, but she'd at least accepted the necessity of her self-described imprisonment. Convincing her that it was necessary had been harder than actually inscribing the enchantments on her door that would keep her safe.

Both were easier than managing the defenses of the manor itself. All manner of protective energy weaves were present in the outer walls of the manor, and Deacon had had to integrate himself into all of them, one by one. While not individually time consuming or difficult, as a collective they sapped a not inconsiderable quantity of his concentration and focus. By the time he was finished though, it would take a magi even stronger than his father to breech the defenses. An ordinary person would be lucky to survive an encounter with the defensive fields.

There were only three rooms in the manor that Deacon was able to effectively monitor the defensive fields from. One was his father's quarters, and those were off-limits under threat of death. One was the laboratory that Oswell had sealed off and insisted Deacon stay away from. The other was Deacon's own room, and it was there that he travelled to with all haste. His father had been very clear on Deacon's role in the attack. If he failed to defend the manor, being married to Corella would become the least of his problems.

It was on the way to his room that he discovered the blood on the floor of the lobby. Deacon frowned as he crouched down over it and looked around. It was unlikely to belong to any of the soldiers Corella had brought with her; they no doubt knew how to handle their weapons safely. It wasn't his own, and Oswell would have never allowed himself to sully his home in such a manner. Corella would have certainly told him had she been injured, and Bain was safely hidden away in an impenetrable part of the manor. The notion of an intruder was laughable, but Deacon shivered nonetheless. If someone had slipped in before he'd raised the manor's defensive fields, then one of their assailants could be already inside. His father was good at not being caught unawares, but it wasn't a technique that Deacon had mastered.

As he looked about, Deacon caught sight of more blood near the staircase. His eyes followed the direction of the trail, and they widened slightly as they climbed near the top of the stairs. Blood was on the wall at the edge of the upper balcony, smeared by fingers toward the ground. Deacon quickly hurried up the stairs and stumbled as he slipped across a spot of blood he'd missed.

Fingers caught on the balcony's balustrade and stalled out his fall. As the fox straightened, he caught sight of still more blood in the carpet. It ran the length of the balcony and rounded the corner up a corridor. With a frown, Deacon summoned a ball of flame to his paw as he started after it.

The firelight set a glimmer through the bloodstains. They seemed to pool larger the further down the corridor Deacon travelled, and he frowned as he saw them stop before his bedroom door. The fox pressed his back to the wall and quietly slid toward his door as he forced his breaths to slow. If the magi his father was hunting was wounded but had managed to break free of the battle, he could even now be lowering the manor's defenses. Deacon took a deep breath as he reached the door, and held it as he pushed the door open and spun inside.

Bain's head snapped up, eyes wide as he coughed blood.

The fire instantly went out of Deacon's paw at the sight of the otter. He was dressed in nothing but badly blooded fur and possessed of a gash down his chest that drooled red in a way he'd only ever heard his father describe as a form of punishment for some offence or other. One arm braced himself against Deacon's bed as he lay slumped atop it. His broken chest heaved with labored breaths, and he grunted through blooded teeth as he met Deacon's shocked gaze. "Deacon..."

The fox crossed the space between them in less than a second. He pressed one paw to Bain's shoulder to force the otter down on his back. The other swept Bain's legs up and out from under him to settle him fully on the bed as he took in the barely-closed gash in the otter's chest. "What in the hells happened to you?" he asked. A shiver of dread wracked him as he remembered what had happened when he'd last seen Bain.

His fears were confirmed when Bain shook his head. He tried to open his muzzle and speak, but could only gurgle for a moment. He coughed once, his airways cleared for just long enough to murmur, "Oswell."

The name froze Deacon up for just a second. Doubt and anger and fear all flashed through him, before he took a firm hold of his emotions. Whatever his father had done was done. If he didn't act, Bain wasn't likely to survive much longer. "I need you to stay very still," Deacon told him. Inwardly he cursed at the sound of the waver that had entered his voice. "There will be pain... but I believe I can restore you somewhat."

Bain's only response was to offer a shaky nod. Deacon nodded back and pressed one paw to the otter's chest, while the other stroked over Bain's shoulder. He hesitated a moment longer even as he felt the first stirrings of his powers summoned to his fingers. Fraen magic wasn't exactly efficient healing, and it certainly wasn't pleasant. The alternative of simply allowing Bain to die was considerably more unacceptable. The irony that his father had taught him the technique that would undo the damage he'd inflicted on Bain was not lost on Deacon.

He took a deep breath before he pushed down harder on both the otter's shoulder and chest. Heat - and the arcane power that was conveyed along with it - drove into Bain's body with incredible force. It sank down into the otter's wounds and tore him open, and through his focus Deacon could hear the mortally-wounded Bain's whimpers and cries. The fox forced those sounds out of his awareness again as he threw his full focus into his powers.

Flesh and fur bubbled under his touch, melting and melding back together again. Bone fused slowly back together. Tenuously bound flesh strengthened slightly. The flow of blood beyond the skin stopped up, as the trapped fluids began to pump through Bain's body with renewed vigor. It carried that molten heat through every inch of the otter, and it took as much of Deacon's strength to hold Bain still as fill him with that restoring arcane energy. Even the blood caked on his fur began to boil off.

Deacon began to sense very quickly that the process was being inhibited by Bain himself. The pain that the otter was being subjected to was overwhelming his body completely. It couldn't help the healing process that the fox was speeding up through his magic when it was so overloaded with sensation. Whatever Oswell had done to him and whatever magic he'd used to do it had weakened Bain so completely that there was no way Deacon could heal him in his current state.

There was only one unpleasant option left to heal Bain, and the fox steeled himself to take it. His eyes fell closed as he drew himself quickly into a trance state. He could feel the echo of the otter's heartbeat as he synchronized himself to it. While weaker than his own, Deacon could sense the otter's defiance both of death and Oswell in each beat. He ground his teeth together as he forged a connection to the otter, as much physically as mentally.

Deacon's strength faded as he poured it into Bain. Bain took a sharp breath in as the fox's vitality surged into his body and revitalized his broken form. The pain faded as it drained back the other way through the connection, and a groan broke through Deacon's muzzle as he drank deeply of Bain's agony. Every second that he maintained the connection, Deacon's intense healing efforts were able to make headway. The fox panted harder and harder as his eyes squeezed shut tighter by the moment. The transferred pain built and built as he drained himself.

Through it all, Deacon could sense the source of the trauma that Bain had suffered. It was magic, of course. Only magic had the ability to pervade someone's body so completely and tear it asunder the way Deacon could sense it had been. Echoes of every incision, every tear and every slice washed over him as he delved deeper and deeper into the healing process. He couldn't deny what had happened anymore. Every wound bore the mark of his father's powers. Oswell had tortured Bain to the brink of death, and Deacon grit his teeth as he fought inch by inch to undo it.

It was working, though. Every ounce of strength that he forced from himself into Bain helped to draw his body back together again. Every surge of pain that he took from the otter allowed his body to use his gift to heal. Theirs was a tormented dance, invisible to all unfamiliar with the arcane but brilliant to those with the eyes to see. Every moment that passed saw Deacon weakened, but Bain given new life. The fox trembled with the pain he took in, even as the otter's breathing steadied.

The breaking point came faster than Deacon wanted, and it severed the connection with an abruptness that shocked him. He fell back from Bain as a wave of dizziness took him, and the ceiling spun above as he struck the floor. Reality swam around him as he fought to maintain his consciousness against the tingling echoes of his connection to Bain. He tasted blood as he groaned on the carpet, and the fox allowed his eyes to close as he sucked in a long breath.

He immediately coughed the blood that he'd tasted, and rolled to the side to hack and wheeze for a few seconds more. When he lifted his head again, it was to the sight of Bain's extended paw. A glance upward showed the otter panting as hard as he was, but with considerably more concern spread across his face. "Are you alright?" Bain asked. It looked like most of the blood that had soaked into his fur had burned off during the healing process. The otter almost looked clean, save for a few lingering red dabs.

A few more seconds had to pass before Deacon had enough control of his body and his dizziness to nod in response. "Yes," he forced himself to reply. His tongue ran across his lower lip and found a gash there, ostensibly from a self-inflicted bite during the trance state. The fox sighed as he hauled himself upright again. Tiredness rolled across and through him as he fought to keep his eyes open. "I'm... sorry that had to... hurt so much."

"You don't look so good, yourself," Bain said as he gently eased Deacon upright. He helped the fox up onto the bed and watched as Deacon curled in on himself with a sigh. "What did you do?" he asked.

Deacon just shook his head. "You wouldn't understand," he muttered back as he rolled over. It brought Bain into view, and he frowned at the glare on the otter's face. "What? I don't think you have spent the better part of your life studying trans-physical interbonding techniques."

The otter glanced at the door as he wrapped his arms tight around his middle. "I dunno," he replied. "Your dad showed me a lot of interesting things down in that dungeon you got."

"Dungeon? What... the laboratory?" Deacon shook his head as he forced himself to sit up a little higher. He'd almost forgotten about how Bain had come to be in that state in the first place. "That's not a dungeon, Bain. It's... never mind. What happened to you? What were-"

"Your father was torturing me's what happened!" Bain shouted back at him. The glare returned full-bore as his eyes locked on Deacon's. "He cut me up with his magic and tortured me!"

The urge to push that prospect aside as preposterous was strong, but Deacon frowned at his own narrow minded thinking. He looked down as he turned his thoughts inward. Why? Why exactly was it preposterous? Oswell was cold, calculating... and Deacon had known for some time that the experiment would end with Bain's death, if only by his father's relatively consistent reminders of such. There was no one else that could have inflicted the trauma on Bain's body that he'd sensed while trying to heal the otter, nor was there anyone who could have sustained him throughout the process. The wounds had been Oswell's doing. There was no doubt. "He... was looking for something," Deacon replied at last. "Something he could only obtain that way."

The answer didn't satisfy Bain, from the surge of anger that rushed to his face. "And that makes it alright?" he spat. One paw lifted to point at the door, and it trembled with his rage. "Did you know? Did you know he was gonna do that to me? To lock me in that... laboratory and rip my chest open?"

"Of course not!" Deacon shouted back. The accusations had set his blood boiling. It overrode the exhaustion he'd suffered in bringing Bain back to a healthier state. "Why would I have let him take you away if I knew he was going to do that?"

The otter shrugged and shook his head as his eyes narrowed. "Maybe because you don't want to disappoint your dad," he snapped. "Maybe I'm not worth that much to you high and mighty magi. Just some dumb baker's brat to... to experiment on! Maybe that's all I've been, and you just tricked me!"

Deacon felt his jaw hang open as he stared into Bain's angry eyes. He opened his muzzle to speak, or argue, or yell, or something. He had to force it closed and take a slow breath to calm himself down. Indignance wouldn't help anything. Anger wouldn't help anything. The otter was upset and, based on what he'd felt while trying to heal him, justifiably so.

Instead, Deacon brought himself to a state of enforced calm. Engaging Bain in an argument wouldn't solve anything, and would probably just help the otter to hate him. "If that was the case," he started, surprised at the calm in his voice, "I would have had no reason to heal you. And if you truly believed that to be the case, you would not have come to my room after..." He frowned as he trailed off. "How did you come here? If my father had you trapped and tortured you as you said, how did you get free?"

Bain's eyes softened slightly as he considered Deacon's words, and finally they darted to the side. When Deacon's gaze followed, they fell on a bloody knife that rested atop a dresser. He instantly recognized it as one of his father's blades. It was one he'd been told was only used for the study of the recently deceased. "You cut yourself free."

"He didn't mean to leave it so close, I think," Bain muttered. His eyes had dropped, and he studied his healed - but still very bloody - chest as he spoke. "I had to work to get at it."

The fox shook his head as he frowned back at Bain. "But the barrier," he continued, as he waved a paw at the door. "There was a barrier he erected to keep me from coming down to see you!"

A shrug was all Bain offered for a moment. He stared at the knife for a few more seconds, and a shiver ran through him as he hissed a sigh. "Maybe that was for you, not me," he muttered at last. The otter shrugged again as he brought Deacon into sight once more. "Your dad didn't think I'd get out. He thought I'd... what'd he say? He thought I'd disrupt some healing spell-weave or something and die, or still be there. I walked right through that barrier you're talking about."

And Oswell wasn't back yet, looking for the intruder to his laboratory or his escaped subject. Deacon's mind raced as he hugged himself tightly. Maybe his father had just made the mistake of assuming that anything inside the laboratory would not be able to escape it. But after leaving a knife in Bain's reach? Would Oswell have really been that careless? Was he giving Bain a way to escape deliberately? Was he testing his son again, or did-

"Deacon?" Bain's words interrupted the thought process and caused the fox's head to lift. The anger had returned to Bain's face, but it was mingled with concern. "He said you... that my parents were dead. He said you knew."

Both of Deacon's ears flattened as he glanced away. He knew it was all the answer that Bain needed; indeed, the huff from the otter told him the truth of the matter. It wasn't something that deserved silence, though. Bain deserved more. "They... came for you," he replied, voice quiet. "Your father, and your mother. He attacked me and took me hostage. Spat threats at my father." The memory of the otter's dagger point in his chest had to be forced down with a gulp. "I was... freed through my father's magic. When your mother came to your father's aid, she was..." He glanced down. "I'm... sorry."

"Why're you telling me now?" Bain growled. When Deacon glanced up again, it was to the sight of a teary-eyed otter, glaring at him. "Why couldn't you have told me earlier? Why didn't I matter enough to you to tell me that your dad murdered my parents?"

The magi's eyes squeezed shut as he hung his head. "I couldn't," he murmured under his breath. His paws clenched tightly into impotent fists.

"The hells you couldn't!" snapped Bain. "You _couldn't_have told me that your dad killed mine? Huh? Or was he right? Does he matter more? Do you two not respect the gods because you don't recognize their wisdom, or is it just that Oswell's his own god, and he's teaching you to-"

"Because he would've just killed you!" Deacon roared back as brilliant flame exploded within his clenched fists and licked out between his taut fingers. Bain recoiled from him hard enough to nearly fall off the bed, but instead scrabbled back toward the headboard. The flames pulsed with Deacon's heartbeat for a few moments.

With a deep breath on the vulpine's part, the fire flickered away. His fists opened, fingers atremble as he forced himself to look down at his sheets instead of at Bain. "He would have just killed you," he repeated, voice softer and just as shaky as his fingers. "He said his experiments relied on you being happy... not a prisoner, and not afraid of us. He told me if you found out the truth, it'd spoil the experiments." Eyes twitched as his gaze lifted slightly to bring Bain's relaxing legs back into view. It was close to eye contact as the fox could manage. "I knew that's what he'd do, if you found out."

While Bain didn't push back off the headboard again, his muscles continued to relax as he settled. "I deserved to know," he said. The anger was gone from his voice again, but the bitterness remained.

Deacon nodded. "You did," agreed the magi. "But I was not going to undertake any action that would have given my father cause to end you. Even now, I..." He trailed off with a shake of his head. "I don't know what to do, Bain. If you run, he'll hunt you down and kill you."

"If I stay, he'll capture and kill me," Bain argued with a shrug. "He's gonna kill me either way. Least if I run, I have to make him work for it. Besides, you..." His muzzle hung open even after the words caught in his throat, and he glanced away.

Deacon frowned as he looked up again at last to the otter's face. Mixed in with the bitterness was something else he couldn't put his finger on. "Besides what?" he asked.

For a long few moments, Bain was silent. He wrung his paws together as he looked all over the room at every little thing except Deacon. The otter even offered a non-committal grunt, but that only elicited a perked ear from Deacon. Finally, with a sigh, Bain hung his head. "Because you'll be leaving soon with the princess. Oswell said so."

"Maybe we could hide you until then," Deacon suggested. He crawled over on the bed and reached out to gently envelop Bain's paws in his own. "Maybe we could find a way to shield you from my father until Corella and I leave, and we take you with us." His voice grew more animated with each new thought. "And she is heir to the throne! If we tell her what my father has done, she could-"

"She'd do nothing," Bain interrupted. His fingers began to intertwine with Deacon's, despite his words. "Her mum's friends with Oswell, remember? And who goes up against a magi, anyway? You think he'd have a problem fighting off the Noctus army?"

Deacon smiled, but it was half-hearted at best. "I think he'd give them a good fight before he exhausted himself," he answered. The doubt in his voice had to have shone through, based on the way Bain sagged. "Besides, there are other magi in the Noctus Imperium. Magi outside it. He has enemies; he's mentioned them."

But Bain continued to shake his head. "If they were powerful enough and really wanted to stop him, wouldn't they already have come after him?" he asked. The otter sighed as he pulled himself closer to Deacon and carefully sat himself down in the fox's lap. "No. You're not gonna be able to protect me from him. Thanks for trying to heal me, but... well, he said I was meant to die here. Guess he was right."

The whimper that squeaked out of Deacon was stifled by Bain, as the otter pulled the magi into a tight hug. It faded into a sigh as Deacon slid his arms around the otter's middle and tugged him closer, and he felt Bain shudder as he nestled his head into the fox's neck. His mind raced as he fought to find a flaw with what Bain had said and all the chances he'd shot down, but there was nothing. Everything the otter had suggested in counter to Deacon's ways to potentially save him had made too much sense. There wasn't anything left to do except-

The door to Deacon's room swung open just loud enough for both males to hear it, and two heads turned in surprise as the light from outside was shed across the bed. A shadowy figure stood there, one paw on the door itself, and for a horrible moment Deacon was afraid that Oswell had returned. Then his eyes adjusted to the sight, and they widened nonetheless.

Corella.

Instantly, he became aware of the situation. There was the princess of a holy empire in his doorway, betrothed to him. The shock on her face spoke volumes of her thoughts on the sight of a naked, male otter wrapped up in her husband-to-be's arms. He knew he had to say something, but what? "Corella, I-" he began.

The shock on her face turned into disgust, and she shook her head before she darted away from the doorway. The door was left ajar, and Deacon sighed as he shook his head. "Well," he muttered as he leaned down and touched his forehead to Bain's. "Looks like I may yet join you in the noose instead of sitting on a throne."

Bain frowned at the open door Corella had left. "What, you think she's gonna tell Oswell that I'm here?" he asked. "Pretty sure he's gonna check if I'm not in that dungeon."

"Laboratory," Deacon insisted as he rolled his head back and sighed at the ceiling. "And no. She's going to tell my father that she caught me here, with you. She cannot marry me like this. She will not marry me like this. And my father..."

"Don't think he'll take too kind to it, either," Bain said. He frowned at the door as he pulled himself slowly up and off Deacon's lap. A hardness entered his eyes as he started off the bed and headed over to Deacon's dresser. "Don't know about you, but he's probably gonna be pretty upset."

Deacon snorted as he followed Bain with his gaze. "He is rarely not upset with me," he admitted as he frowned after the otter. "What are you do- hey! Those are my clothes!"

Bain seemed to ignore the shout of protest as he dug through Deacon's dresser. "I don't wanna walk around all cold," he replied as he tossed some of the fox's older robes out and onto the floor. When he glanced back at Deacon, the magi just looked more confused. "I'm not gonna just wait here for Oswell to come and find me and put me down. I wanna go back to his dungeon and find out what he's doing here."

With widened eyes, Deacon stood up and waved both paws at the otter. "You were just down there," he reminded Bain as the otter began to pull on an older, crimson robe. "You nearly died when he took you down, and you want to go back?"

"You know he's gonna kill me anyway," Bain reasoned as he popped his head up through the appropriate hole in the cloth. "If I'm gonna die, I at least wanna bloody-well know why. I'm not just gonna sit around and wait for Oswell to decide everything for me." He slid his arms through the sleeves as he turned finally to stare back at Deacon again. "You shouldn't, neither."

The fox frowned as he glanced down. "You are remarkably calm for someone who thinks that he is about to die," he said. "Aren't you worried? Os... my father could kill you quickly, or he could kill you slowly. You could at least-"

"I won't care once I'm dead," Bain countered with a shake of his head. He walked back over to Deacon and folded his arms. "Besides, he thinks I 'corrupted' you. He's already told me there's no more mercy in him for me, and that's fine. He killed my mum, my dad, and he's trying to kill me. Maybe even you, after all this's done." His brow furrowed. "Besides, I thought you'd wanna offer me something a bit more than just the reminder that I can try and die fast or slow."

Deacon blinked. "I don't think this is the right time for-"

"And I wasn't talking about that, either," Bain growled. So firm was his voice that Deacon retreated a step, tripped over the side of his bed and tumbled awkwardly down onto the sheets. Bain leered over him from behind his folded arms. "Don't you want to know what he's really doing? Don't you want to know what he's got planned for you?" His expression softened slightly. "And what about me? Do you want me to die?"

"Of course I don't!" replied Deacon as flame licked between his fingers again. It faded almost as quickly as it had bloomed. "But I don't know how to stop it! If my father wants something to happen, it happens! Nothing happens that he doesn't want to happen! If things aren't going right, he makes them right. That's what he does!"

Bain just tilted his chin up. "What about us?" he asked. When Deacon just blinked in confusion, Bain sighed and sat back down beside the fox. "What about you and me? What about that night at the lake? What about when we..." He cleared his throat and nodded with a shrug. "You think he was okay with all that? You think he planned it? You think it's part of his big, grand designs?"

Deacon frowned again as he held the otter's gaze. Of course Oswell couldn't have planned it. Everything that Oswell was doing - everything that Deacon knew or had heard about, at least - made sense to him from a magi's perspective. Oswell didn't care about what anyone else thought about his choices. He didn't care about morality from someone else's point of view. He cared about results for his work and the most efficient way to obtain them.

What possible design could there have been behind what had developed between Deacon and Bain? The question ran through his head, looping over and over and over again. The answer eluded him, until the fox frowned deeper and put forward a new idea. "He didn't plan it," he muttered. "He did not want it to happen. It makes... no sense if he planned it, but considerably more if he did not anticipate this variable." He looked up at Bain again. "It is the only conclusion. He made a mistake."

"Does he do that?" Bain asked. He didn't sound disbelieving so much as curious.

The magi nodded vigorously as he sat up. "It happens all the time," he replied as he strode over to the door. He cast a glance up and down the hall, but Corella was nowhere to be seen. "Experiments fail. Processes do not produce the expected result. All his effort cannot change the way certain alchemagical properties exhibit themselves, in spite of his best work. He can make mistakes. He _does_make mistakes." He glanced back over his shoulder at Bain. "But he always finds a way to correct them."

The otter pushed off the bed again and stepped over to Deacon's side. He peered out into the empty hall before he ducked his head back in. "So he's not perfect?"

"Close enough to be dangerous," Deacon answered. He closed his eyes as he fought to calm his mind. Part of him wanted to just sit back down on his bed and shut out the world. Part of him wanted to do what he could to protect Bain and send him away. Part of him wanted to follow the otter down to the lab. Part of him was itching to find Oswell and confront him about what he'd done. Part of him - the largest - just didn't know what to do.

He looked Bain over. The otter was putting on a brave face, but it didn't take more than the slightest sifting through his surface emotions to know that it was just a front. Bain was terrified. He was scared out of his mind at the prospect of heading back down to the laboratory again. The immediate impulse Deacon felt was to try to protect him, but then reason caught up to him. Could he really defy his father to try to help Bain?

Oswell was always trying to instill in him a sense of self-determination through the application of his powers. Could his father really argue if Deacon tested himself against him? The obvious lesson had always been to use his power to impose his will over those less-capable or intelligent than him, but not Oswell. Oswell was always more capable. He was always more intelligent. Was he right? Was he right to have done what he did to Bain, just because he wanted to and because he could? Was that really the same argument Deacon wanted to make for himself.

The fox sighed and closed his eyes, even as Bain looked expectantly up at him. The otter he'd come to care for, or his father. The only family he'd ever known, or the person - the male, he forcibly reminded himself again - he'd built a romantic connection with. He couldn't have both. He couldn't save Bain without facing his father's wrath, but he couldn't allow Oswell to simply kill Bain for the sake of his ilaen magic research. Blood and water. He had to choose a side.

"I shouldn't have asked you to come down with me," Bain said. His words broke Deacon's concentration, and the fox's eyes opened slowly to the sight of Bain watching him. "I shouldn't have put you in this position. I shouldn't have let myself get interested in you. I shouldn't have tried to see if you'd want..." He shook his head. "I'm sorry. I thought things might be better with me here, with you... but I was wrong. I helped ruin your life."

Deacon blinked as he looked at the suddenly outwardly-scared and saddened otter. That was it. That was the difference. Blood and water. The differences between the two were night and day. His father had never worried about the wrong choice. His father had never concerned himself with any suffering Deacon had to endure in the pursuit of his goals. His father had never tried to earn Deacon's respect. It was implied. Expected. Demanded.

One paw snaked out to gently take one of Bain's in its grip. The fox squeezed it gently as the otter looked up at him again. Bain worried about him. Bain was upset by what was going to happen. He was sure of his death, but he still wanted _for_Deacon, not for himself. He'd earned affection. He'd earned respect. He'd earned appreciation. He hadn't just expected it.

And as he held the otter's gaze, Deacon still wasn't sure what love was. He didn't know and he didn't have to know, because Bain represented something closer than he'd ever dared hope to reach. It was more than his father had ever offered, for sure. "You didn't ruin anything," Deacon replied at last, as he glanced out the door again. Clear, for the moment. "And besides, if you're right, I've always been... like this. Better I have someone who understands it than someone who would condemn me for it." He glanced back over his shoulder. "You sure you want to go back down there? You might not come back up again."

Bain cocked his head to the side as he studied Deacon, and the fox caught the flicker of surprise in the ripples of his emotional state. "You're coming too?" he tentatively asked.

"Someone's got to tell you what you shouldn't touch down there," Deacon replied with a short-lived little smile. He reached out again and fought to keep his fingers from trembling before they closed down gently around Bain's paw again. "You're... right. Whatever my father has planned for you, you deserve to know what it is. I want to know what it is."

The otter gave Deacon's paw a little squeeze as he glanced at the hall. He seemed more unsure than he had before. "Are you sure? I mean... maybe you can still get out of this with your neck."

Deacon began to lead him out of the bedroom even before he'd finished asking. He just shook his head as he made his way to the balcony, Bain drawn gently by the paw behind him. "After Corella saw enough to make her doubt me? I do not think so. She was looking for a way out of our wedding herself. If she tells her mother that she suspects her betrothed of being... well... that-way-inclined, as it were? She can break the engagement and return with the royal guard to take me away." He shuddered as he squeezed Bain's paw. "Or she could order them to cut me down here and now on her own authority."

As Deacon led him down the stairs, Bain frowned. "But doesn't the queen work with your father?" he asked. His voice lowered considerably until it was barely above a whisper, a marked contrast to the shouting he'd engaged in only minutes before. "If she has you killed, won't that upset your father? Won't that... mess up his plans for you worse than I did?"

The sound of an explosion in the distance stalled out Deacon at the base of the stairs, and he clutched tighter still at Bain's paw as he paused. He carefully reached out with the barest contact he could manage, but was almost instantly met with the sense of his father. Oswell was wounded, but still very much alive. Whatever magi the Ahron rebels had brought along, they were talented if they could injure his father. Foolish, too; Oswell would not suffer the attack lightly. "His plans are already ruined if he truly still requires my marriage to Corella," he replied after a few more silent moments.

When they rounded the stairs and headed for the staircase, the same shimmering curtain of light. Deacon pressed both paws against it, and the surface was just as firm and unyielding as it had been before. He bit back a curse as he traced a circle across the arcane-forged wall. "He's still locked in battle with the Ahron magi," he told Bain, as he turned to meet the otter's gaze. "I'm not sure he will come running if we break in, but the manor's defensive screens should slow him down if he tries to make a fast approach. Even knowing them as he does, he will have to bypass each one individually to enter again, let alone reach us. He may not even notice this until he returns."

"And you're sure you wanna do this?" Bain asked. He squeezed back at Deacon's paw and pulled the fox in closer. "You come down here with me, and you might be getting yourself killed."

Deacon shook his head. He'd made his choice. Oswell had gone too far for him to let his father continue his experiments. He had to know what the old magi was up to, and he had to protect Bain from it. "I think I am pretty sure I do not want_to," he admitted as he tried a smile. "We must. It might be the only way to save _your life, and... well, I wish to know what he intends for me, too."

When Bain nodded, the fox waved him back a couple paces. His paw slid out from within Deacon's grip, and the magi pressed both palms against the arcane barrier. He closed his eyes as he reached deep for the burning magic he possessed, and drew it up through himself and along his arms. His paws began to glow red-hot as his fingers hooked in against the barrier.

Sparks flickered and flashed from the barrier under the collision of magical energy. It resisted Deacon's efforts for a moment; the white light drew itself in under his paws to reinforce the wall's strength. As the fox's eyes opened, ablaze themselves with magical flame, he pushed all the harder. Before him, the wall began to flicker and fade. His arms pulled apart, and the fox grunted hard once before he ripped a molten hole in the energy barrier.

The curtain of light vanished in the heat shimmer of Deacon's powers. His paws and eyes cooled again as he turned to Bain and nodded once. "If he felt that, he will be on his way," he said as he extended a paw to the otter. "Come. We may have only moments."

No sooner had Bain taken Deacon's paw than the fox tugged him onward. Deacon waved his free paw at the door and Bain watched it swing open as they made for the laboratory. "What're we gonna do once we're down there?" he asked. "Hells, what are we gonna do after we're done down there?"

"After we're done, I try to send you far away from here," Deacon answered as he raised his empty paw ahead of them. A small ball of fire flickered into existence in his grasp, and it lit their descent into the earth. "Father has techniques to transport people and objects great distances with magical energy. He refused to teach me them, but I believe I know where he keeps the texts in the laboratory. I can send you home if we can find them and if I can read them."

They reached the glass double doors, and it was then that Deacon noticed the blood all over the stairs. In his haste, he'd forgotten how the mortally-wounded Bain had dragged himself out of the laboratory. The volume of blood smeared across the doors could only be described as macabre, sufficient enough to effectively opaque the view. "Ready?" Deacon asked.

"I think I'm pretty sure I'm not," Bain replied, and it was his turn to smile slightly. It broadened as Deacon copied the expression, but the otter's smile faded as he leaned up to kiss gently at the fox's cheek. "Just in case we don't have time, and either one of us doesn't get back out of this dungeon... this laboratory... thank you. For everything."

Deacon nodded, nuzzling into the otter's neck as he wrapped his lover up in a tight hug. "I'm going to get us both out of this, Bain," he said, voice muffled. "I promise. I'm not going to let you die here." He drew back to smile at the otter, but Bain didn't meet his eyes. They were fixed on the floor, his face mirthless. Whatever was wrong, the fox had been right earlier. Time was short.

With a gentle squeeze, Deacon released Bain and turned instead to the door. It opened easily as he pushed with both paws, and the fox immediately recoiled from the sight. Blood - Bain's, ostensibly - was everywhere. It dripped in thick drops from one table nearby, and from it Deacon could sense the lingering aura of his father's magic. It was mingled with something else that felt familiar, and he could only assume it was the otter's latent ilaen powers.

Before he headed over, he nudged Bain's side. "On the far side of the laboratory is a black box," he said. Meantime, his eyes couldn't be torn from the bloody table Bain had been strapped to. "I have never been able to open the lid. I suspect my father enchanted it to keep me out... his personal tomes should be inside it." He forced his head to the side to see Bain had already started in that direction. "You need one that contains information regarding matter transmission or arcane matter conduits."

The otter nodded and headed off as Deacon started toward the table. Even the echoes of what Oswell had done hadn't prepared him for the sight of the place where it had happened. The sheer volume of the blood - more than any one person's body could possibly hold - boggled the young magi's mind. Whatever regenerative weave his father had crafted from Bain's spiritual energy had been more powerful than Bain had implied. If it could have held him at the brink of death through the sort of trauma Deacon had sensed, then the otter's spiritual vibrancy rivalled his own. It was no wonder Oswell had taken such an interest in him.

Deacon reached out to the table with one paw and let a couple fingers slide up underneath the top edge. They trembled at the knowledge that Bain's head had laid there not even an hour ago, his whole body subjected to monstrous torture. The fox had to force those thoughts away to concentrate, and he took a breath as he felt for what he knew rested under the table.

Finally his fingers brushed it. They ran across the surface of the half-sphere of intricately-carved and smoothed diamond, and the gem reacted instantly to his touch. It warmed, and the blood at the head of the table began to sizzle and burn away. It left an acrid stink in the air around the table, strong enough to force Deacon to even take a couple of steps back while it cooked off.

When he could approach again, it was to a softly-pulsing arcane projection. Old runic symbols adorned the head of the table, spread out as if the table's head were the page of a book. Deacon frowned as he looked down over the runes. He'd learned many of them, of course; most alchemical combinations were written in the old runes, and even more old spell tomes were entirely scribed in the most ancient of runic language.

The glyphs before him were older than the ones he'd been taught, though. The fox's brow furrowed deeper as his tail tucked up between his legs. A couple of translated words and concepts leaped out at him; vibrancy here, categorization there, references to spiritual degradation just near the end. As Deacon reached for the diamond again and brushed his fingers across the surface, the runes reshaped themselves into new glyphs.

He began to skim through the notes as best he could. The obscurity of the runes was inhibitive, but he had enough of a base to work from to make sense of a report. It was all about Bain and his ilaen powers. The runes spoke about their power, how they ebbed and flowed based on different stimulus, how this latest subject had fared better than any previous, how the otter's biology was held in check by his latent powers, how he would have made a capable magi himself after Oswell had augmented his mental pathways and-

Deacon blinked and backed up the runes. He read them again, and again, and then once more to make sure that he'd caught that right. He blinked and rubbed his eyes, and then he read them again.

This latest subject?

The fox's eyes widened as he swiped over the diamond half-sphere more rapidly. There was little more left to the report; most of the data there was supposition from when Bain had been woken up for his first extraction. There were a string of numerical combinations that went along with the initial entries in the diamond's report, but no more information. There was nothing more there for him.

It only took a moment for Deacon's mind to catch up to the numbers. He glanced to the side as his fingertips brushed across the runic number combinations. Eyes fell on the pillar in the center of the room. Even just the barest look at it was enough to apply a slight pressure to the back of his mind. The pillar's heartbeat echoed in the furthest reaches of his awareness, and he frowned as he pushed past the discomforting sensation. The fox started toward the pillar, with one of the number combinations in his mind.

He'd been taught about the combinations a long time ago. It had been years before he'd even met Bain. His father had told him that the sleep pods he'd loaded into the pillar could only be removed with certain combinations that he'd kept to himself at all costs. Simple numbers didn't make any sense in and of themselves for a magical combination, but Oswell had taught him a scale system that was used to measure magical power discharge from a subject. The conversation had happened years before he'd even heard the word 'vibrancy' used in the same context.

In spite of the pulsations from the pillar echoing through his mind, Deacon reached out to the pillar with his powers and forged a connection as he pressed a paw to its surface. He felt his ears flatten against his head as the heartbeat of the pillar drew him in deeper and deeper. It took effort to keep himself separate from the pillar itself; it almost felt like it was trying to draw him in further and further, the longer he was connected to it.

Deacon kept Bain in the forefront of his mind. He kept the connection to the pillar, but allowed his conscious mind to fill with thoughts of the otter. They flooded his awareness, and kept him anchored as he sifted through the pulses of the tower. Those pulses came faster as Deacon felt down and through them, swimming amongst them as he sought one sequence...

Then, like an island in the middle of the ocean, he sensed it. The combination he'd seen in the runes, echoed in the flickers of power that flowed outward from one of the pods held in the pillar. He held onto it, stayed with it and worked himself in along with it. As its power pulsed, so too did Deacon allow his strength to seep into it. It fed on him, even as he drew its power back into himself. His mind danced with the pulses of the pillar, surge after surge after surge-

The connection broke abruptly as Deacon completed the combination. He felt the pillar rotate to face him, and it released the fox from its grasp as one of the pods began to hiss. It popped once as Deacon stepped back from the tower and looked up. One of the egg-like sleep pods hung loose in its slot. With a gulp, the fox reached out to the pod with his mind and willed it to lift.

It floated out of the slot under the magi's direction, and Deacon watched it slowly move down to settle on one of the less-bloody tables. He followed the pod but didn't open it as Oswell had. Instead the fox moved to the head of the table and ran his fingers down under the edge. Again they brushed along a little half-sphere of diamond, and again the runic symbols were projected up on the table proper.

With lax jaw and wide eyes, Deacon sifted through the recorded information. The occupant of the pod was recorded as less capable as Bain had been, but all manner of markers seemed to match up between the two. Whatever traits Oswell had been looking for, that subject had shared them. Bain had just been closer.

Finally, Deacon reached up to the pod itself. He reached into it with his mind and willed it to open, and he stepped around the table to watch as the pod peeled itself open. Cool air rushed out from the interior of the pod in a thick mist, and Deacon had to fight to peer through it. When at last he could see the occupant, his tail stiffened.

The fox hurried back over to the tower and began to turn it again. He pushed harder into the pillar's power as he sought another combination. Now that he'd already integrated himself with the pillar's quaint energy flow, it was easier for Deacon to sift out one pod in particular. He matched up its combination with another exchange of arcane energy, and once more it forcibly ejected him from the pillar's matrix.

When that pod released, Deacon was ready for it. He quickly brought it over to another empty table and set it down. One paw activated the runic projector for the pod's report while the other split the pod's seam. More mist billowed out from inside the pod as he scanned the report. Another subject. More similarities. More detailed notes. More of Oswell's work. Horror touched Deacon's face as he looked in over the pod's occupant.

Another pod. The same information. The same disgust. Another pod. Over and over. Five pods lay on the various tables around the laboratory before Bain peeked his head out around the tower. Deacon felt him approach, and quickly raised a paw to ward the otter off. "Bain, you must stay back."

"It sounds like you've been running around over here," Bain said with a frown. He continued closer anyway, eyes on one of the pods. "What are you doing with those?" he asked as Deacon turned to block him. "Are you going to stick me in one of those?"

The fox gulped as he felt his ears start to droop. They were there for a reason, and it wasn't fair to leave Bain in the dark. "I would not want to stick you in one of those," he slowly replied as he stepped to the side. Bain, for his part, didn't approach any closer; his attention was on Deacon. "They're full. All of them are full of past experiments. Dead ones... he's kept them for... for reference."

"Before me?" Bain frowned as he stepped past Deacon and leaned over the edge of the pod. He peered in through the lingering fog that it contained, and a yelp echoed throughout the laboratory as Bain stumbled back away from it. "Who in the hells is that?" he demanded, as one finger shot out to point at the pod.

Deacon paused before he reached into the pod to retract it fully. The occupant spilled out onto the table as the fox took a step away. The gashes were familiar. The lacerations were familiar. The holes - no longer so bloody - were familiar. The fur, the face, the form... all familiar. "You know who that is, Bain," he muttered. All familiar. Too familiar.

"Of course he knows who that is," came Oswell's voice from behind the pair. The elder magi stood in the doorway, his robes torn and bloody and seared as bad as the flesh and fur beneath. He stood tall, and the smile on his muzzle held no mirth. "How could you not, Bain? Hmm? You recognize the face. You know.

"It is you."