Disclaimer: I don't own Leverage. This is for entertainment purposes only so, please, don't sue me.
Author's Note: Please, review. Getting favorite notices in my email is cool but I really enjoy hearing what it is people like about the fic and ways I can write better. How else am I to improve as a writer?
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Eliot ducked behind the tavern, glancing behind him. He'd hesitated to take this job in the first place and he really didn't want to tell his client some other bodalach had gotten to the damn spell book first. Everyone knew that the king's sorcerer had almost unbeatable wards in place. But he'd needed the money and it had been over a month since anyone had approached him for a job. To make it worse, this client was known to have a bad temper.
He could hear the soldiers break down the front door and crouched, ready to run. He listened carefully for the sound of approaching footsteps. The soldiers in the bar seemed to be all but inciting a riot. He sighed. He probably shouldn't be surprised. This was Eire, after all. That seemed to be part of a guard's job description.
Just as he decided the guards must have gone into the bar for someone else, he felt a sharp pressure to his wrists and the base of his neck. He fell roughly to his knees, all strength gone from his body. He couldn't even make his suddenly paralyzed hands catch him. He held back a gasp as he felt his wrist twist in some direction it wasn't meant to go.
"Eliot," a voice above him said. "It has been a long time, malchik."
Eliot looked up at the man. "Damien," he murmured. The last time he'd seen the man was just before he'd started working for the king. Mac an donais, he'd probably made that possible himself. "See you've moved up in the world."
"And you, apparently, decided to descend even further. Tell me, malyenki govno, have you lost your mind or do you wish to die?"
"Neither," Eliot spat. "Needed the money. Only job I could find was some loh mudak who wanted in the king's buidseach's vault. A man's gotta eat."
The man leaned down and pulled Eliot up by the back of his tunic. "Eliot, you know what I do to people who steal from me. Where is my spell book?"
"I don't have it, Damien." Eliot tried to twist away but whatever spell had brought him down had yet to wear off. "I never even saw it."
Damien's lips twisted in an amused smile. "You break into my house and the only thing missing is a rare spell book, bit you never saw it? You'll have to try harder than that, vor."
"I swear, Damien, I never even got to the vault. The wards triggered as soon as I crossed the threshold. And then another zalupa vor went in while I tried to find a way out of the wards."
"Chush sobachya! I am not stupid, my little thief. I know full well how you spin your improbable tales. Two men at the same time who are mad enough to attempt to steal from me? And my wards only tell me of one? Do not insult me! I know everyone who crosses my threshold."
"Damien," Eliot gasped as the older man grabbed his injured wrist.
Three soldiers stepped out of the pub's back door and took him from Damien. "I should hand you over to the king once I'm done with you," the sorcerer said. "You're useful but you are getting overly arrogant."
"Poshol ti nahu, wedma," Eliot spat as the guards fastened iron manacles around his wrists. "Damnú ort! Kushi govno i umri. Is go hifreann leat, cac ar oineach."
"Na kaleni, suka!" Damien roared, pulling something out of a pocket.
Eliot tried to stay upright as the guards forced him to his knees. He pulled back as the sorcerer fastened a seun around his neck. He knew a little about Damien's amulets. They tended to be decidedly unpleasant. Unfortunately, he couldn't reach it to do anything about that. He blinked as he saw two figures between him and Damien. Eliot frowned. He recognized them. He gasped. They were Aimee and Liam. He barely felt the soldiers pull him to his feet as he watched them kiss. He cringed inside. He knew Liam was good to her. He knew she'd learned to love the other man. He even found some comfort in that. At least they weren't both completely miserable. But he'd been her fiancé, not Liam, and the sight of her with the man she'd married felt like he'd been gutted like a fish.
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Alice sank into the chair with a pout. "You're so fortunate, Olivia," she said, blowing a stray hair out of her face.
Olivia looked up from her book. "What's wrong now?"
"Father wants me to meet another prince tomorrow," the older princess muttered. "Even if he's nice enough, it's not like I'll marry him. He always does this whenever he wants to form a new ally. And then he changes the treaty at the last minute to avoid the marriage."
"Athair will have to find you a husband at some point," Olivia pointed out. "He needs an heir."
Alice laughed bitterly. "At this point, I don't think I'd want anyone he picks out for me. And I don't want to marry just so he can have an heir. I want to marry for me because I love my husband. You have it so easy. No one cares who you marry. And I want Father to stop using me to play games with people. B' i sin reul 's an oidhche dhoilleir."
Olivia sighed. "What if you fall in love whoever Father picks out? Remember Aimee and Liam? She's happy with him."
"That's just my point, 'Livia. She was engaged to someone else. Yes, she's happy now, but she was crying her heart out before the wedding. I don't know what happened to her fiancé but, from what Aimee told me, he must have been devastated, too. All because Father was playing games. What if the man he finally makes me marry is in love with someone else? Will he even marry me or just the princess? Knowing Father, it'll be someone like Damien."
Olivia did not answer right away. A slight crease formed between her eyebrows like when she focused on a challenging chess game. "This prince is coming tomorrow?" she asked.
Alice nodded glumly. "Yes, a bhidse."
Olivia smiled. "Well, we should go down to the village, then. Athair should have given us more time to fit you out. You want to look your best for your prince, don't you?"
Alice glared at her sister. "No, I don't. Didn't you listen to what I just said? I don't want anything to do with this new prince."
Olivia rolled her eyes. "I know, Alice. But what would Athair want to hear? He won't think anything of us going to town to get you a new gown for tomorrow. Besides, what better excuse could we ask for to go shopping?"
Alice grinned. "You have an idea, don't you?"
Olivia just grinned.
Alice threw her arms around her sister. "What would I do without you?" she asked.
"You'd find some way to burn down the palace, no doubt," the younger princess replied. "Now let's figure out what we need to get you."
Alice frowned. "What for?"
"Well, you don't want to deal with this prince. You want to find a man who doesn't care about you being the princess." Olivia tugged gently at Parker's hair. "So we'll have to buy you clothes that you wouldn't normally wear. And we've got to do something about your hair. You'll need some kind of money to take with you or something you can sell easily."
Alice blinked. "Socair, 'Liv! What exactly are you planning?"
Olivia grinned. "You can't exactly avoid this prince here, can you? Or get to know anyone without Athair meddling? So we get you as far from the palace as possible. Don't tell me you haven't wanted to do this for several years now."
"How did you know?"
"An nì chì na big, Alice. Now, for your hair, I think we could just use a wash. It would wear off in a few days. Just don't get your hair wet until you're a couple days away from here."
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Eliot groaned. Everything hurt. He frowned, trying to figure out how long he'd been in Damien's dungeon. He hadn't seen the sun since his capture. There seemed to be no pattern to anything down here, nothing he could use to measure how long he'd been here. Just pain, seemingly endless, continuously changing pain.
He licked his dry lips and shifted against the wall. If only he could reach his face. The blood trickling down his forehead tickled infuriatingly. He pulled against the manacles on his wrists. He winced as the metal cut into the burns on his hands. He knew they weren't real burns but still. Taigh na galla do Damien, he had used some spell that not only felt like flames but left a lingering pain as if he'd actually been burned. It was cause for some hope. Surely the sorcerer wouldn't have bothered to protect his hands if he was really intended to hand him over to the king.
Eliot sighed quietly, a tear rolling down his cheek. Damien had left the damn seun druime-laighe on the whole time. It had not stopped with just showing him Aimee and Liam together and happy. He wanted to rip his eyes out of his face. He'd tried closing his eyes, but the moans and the laughter were almost worse. Even if it would ever be safe for him to visit Aimee again, he didn't think he could face her after seeing this.
The grating of the cell door drew his attention. Eliot steeled himself, determined not to show any weakness as whoever it was approached. He could take some more pain yet. He smirked as Damien walked toward him. "Back for more, zalupa?" he spat. "Thought you'd be tired of me by now."
"Past zakroi, vor," the wizard ordered, spitting out some unintelligible phrase.
Eliot found himself writhing against the wall as phantom knives slowly pierced his skin. He wondered how much of this pain was real and how much just part of the magic. He had to bite back almost hysterical laughter at that thought. "Knives?" he taunted instead. "Couldn't have come up with something more original?"
"I told you when I brought you here that you were useful," Damien said, ignoring the taunt. "I meant it. You may be arrogant, but you are useful. I would rather not have to hand you over to His Majesty, at least, not yet."
"What do you want?" Eliot growled.
"I want the Sapphire Monkey. Or rather the king wants the Sapphire Monkey."
This time Eliot did laugh. "The king must be insane. Or you are for suggesting it to him. Everyone wants the Sapphire Monkey and no one even knows if it does anything more than sit around and look pretty. Most people aren't even convinced it's real! You really want to give the king a pretty hunk of rock, go get it yourself. The Sapphire Monkey and its powers are nothing more than a legend."
The wizard leaned over Eliot, smiling. "You're not one of those, though, are you? You've seen the Monkey."
"Poshyol ty," Eliot spat. "It's a stupid-looking piece of fancy rock. And it's guarded better than your personal vault which I know is better warded than the king's vault."
Damien sneered. "And you would know this how?"
Eliot rolled his eyes. "You don't survive in my line of work if you don't learn a few things. One of which is wards. I know lethal wards when I see them."
"Be that as it may," the sorcerer said breezily. "You will bring me that Monkey or I will hand you over to the king today."
"So I die tomorrow or in a few weeks?" Eliot growled. "Let me guess, you knew this whole time that I never saw your precious spell book. This whole torture session's been about that stupid legend."
"Would you take the job any other way?" Damien countered calmly.
"Of course not," Eliot growled. "I'm not suicidal."
"Will you take it now?"
"Well, the alternative is not exactly appealing."
The wizard shrugged. "Then it was worth my time. You know I always get what I want, Eliot."
Eliot couldn't hide the glare he gave the older man. Not for the first time, he wished he'd never taken that job he'd offered back when he was just starting out. He gathered the blood in his mouth and spat it at the sorcerer.
Damien just laughed. With a twist of his hand, a chain wrapped around Eliot's neck and tightened. "You are still the same yebanko manolete you were nearly ten years ago," he said as Eliot's hands twisted, trying to reach the chain. "Perhaps, if you'd grow up a little, you'd be able to find work that doesn't break the king's laws and get you killed."
Eliot could hear the blood rushing in his ears as the chain twisted even tighter around his neck. The edges of his vision began to turn grey. "Damnú ort," he whispered as the black rushed in to claim him.
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Irish Gaelic
A bhidse sod it
An nì chì na big what the little ones see
Athair father
B' i sin reul 's an oidhche dhoilleir that were a star on a dark night
Bodalach dickhead
Buidseach wizard, magician
Damnú ort damn you
Is go hifreann leat, cac ar oineach go to hell, scumbag (literally to hell with you, scumbag)
Mac an donais damn it
Seun charm/amulet
Seun druime-laighe nightmare charm/amulet
Socair easy
Taigh na galla do (insert name) damn (insert name)
Russian
Chush sobachya bullshit
Kushi govno i umri eat shit and die
Loh mudak - very stupid bastard
Malchik boy
Malyenki govno little shit
Na kaleni, suka on your knees bitch
Past zakroi, vor shut it, thief
Poshyol ti nahu, wedma go fuck yourself witch
Zalupa vor dickhead thief