Title: Mourner's Dawn
Author: Kytten
Pairing: Lucien Lachance/OMC
Rating: PG13
Disclaimer: I don't own Elder Scrolls.
Summary: Without him, they'd be nothing. Without them, he would still be alive. They should have known better. Lucien does not pick his silencers idly.
Author's Note: I couldn't really think of a more delicate way to put it.
Mourner's Dawn
Chapter Seven
"I don't understand what my nightmares have to do with anything." Lucien frowned and crossed his arms, never straying far from the boy's side.
Vicente only shook his head, aggravated and distressed.
"That's because you're self centered and blind." Vicente glowered. "Sam was desperate to save an ungrateful idiot without enough intelligent enough to bloody well stay put when his own damn survival depended on it. You drifted too far away, Lucien. He had to bind himself to you to pull you out."
Lucien was totally unmoved.
"I fail to see how that is in any way my fault."
"Perhaps," Vicente said, drawing to the opposite side of the room. "But it's your responsibility."
"He knew the risks," Lucien growled, glaring. "I did nothing."
Vicente drew close, eyes flashing.
"That doesn't matter. What matters is if, for any reason, he becomes incapacitated Arquen becomes Listener in his stead."
"She has no right." Lucien barely hid his fury. "She should be dead!"
"Control yourself," Vicente snapped, seeing Sam had started his shaking again.
Lucien glared but forced the anger down, back into the abyss, to be acted upon later. Sam stilled.
"So what," he asked, keeping his tone steady, "do you suggest we do?"
"We need to hide this," a gesture towards the bed, "from Arquen."
"Shouldn't prove too difficult. She's stupid as a pig."
"Pigs have their moments of cunning. Managed to kill you, did she not?"
Lucien frowned, but didn't react.
"I sincerely doubt that hiding it is the best course of action."
"For now it is." Vicente sighed and sat down. "We need to hide it just long enough to figure out how it can be broken."
Lucien said nothing, feeling vaguely ill as he watched Sam twitch in his sleep.
Listener.
"What does this mean, exactly?" He looked up, a curious light in his eyes. "This binding you mentioned."
Vicente glanced at him, emotion flitting across his face, disappearing as quickly as it came.
He recognized it as discomfort.
"He feels what you feel," he said at last. "Awake, it shouldn't bother him. But he leaves himself open to you when he sleeps."
Lucien fell silent. So he had some strange control over his Silencer still. But obviously, some sort of plan was running through the kid's mind. Revenge, succession perhaps. Sam was intelligent. Perhaps he knew he wasn't ready, that it wasn't for him. Or maybe there was a war brewing.
Something. Sam needed him for something. He had to have a plan. Slowly, Lucien smiled. To be honest, so did he.
It wasn't much, really. Just a flicker of an idea, a possibility.
Whatever Sam had done, it'd given him control.
Arquen managed to corner May in the kitchens unawares. Finally, the chance at a straight answer.
"I notice our dearest Listener has not emerged." She said pleasantly, leaning against the doorframe. "Has he fallen ill? It's nearly time to speak to the Night Mother."
"No." May glanced at her, uncomfortable. "He's only sleeping, ma'am. He hasn't for more than a week now."
"And what's this project of his that's held him so busy? Not that corpse, I hope."
May nodded, staring down into the pot.
"Oh, dear," Arquen sighed. "This isn't good. I knew I shouldn't have let him bring it here. It's not healthy."
"It was good that he did." May met her eyes. "Lucien's wouldn't be doing so well at the fort."
A flash of fear, well hidden.
"What do you mean?"
"Too cold." She glanced back. "He'd take ill."
"Ill?" Her frustrating and alarm was visible now. "He's dead."
"No."
"No? Have you lost your mind? Of course he's dead. I killed him myself! I—"
"He's behind you, you know."
"You idiot girl!" She was becoming rather red in the face. "He can't be behind me. I know he can't be behind me. There's no way in hell he could possibly have survived what we did to him. His back was broken."
"Have you quiet finished?" Lucien asked, standing a few feet from the doorway with a look of complete unconcern. "Or would you rather carry on in your attempts to completely barricade the door with your massive girth?"
"You shouldn't be up yet," May scolded. "You need to sleep."
"Can't," he said simply, and shouldered past Arquen, fully ignoring his shoulder's protests.
"You're… alive," she whispered at last.
"Obviously."
He carried on looking for food without ever glancing back at her.
"But… but how is that even possible?"
Lucien smiled then, a discomforting thing.
"My Silencer's brilliant with his hands."
"If you are referring to Sam," she said, gathering her dignity about her, "he has since risen to Listener."
"Hardly."
"Hardly? What do you mean by that?"
"Dense, aren't you?"
"Lucien," May cut in. "You really should be sleeping."
"Did I ask for your opinion?" he snapped, tearing off a hunk of bread.
Arquen watched him, feeling miles away and wondering if she really wasn't dreaming after all.
May, for her part, had long since lost all fear for him. Seeing as how she had been the one to reattach his more masculine parts, it was bound to happen eventually.
"You owe us your life, you know. You could be a little more grateful." She crossed her arms, glaring. "I'd think you'd be proud of Sam at least."
"Proud? Of what? Of his determination to get himself killed? Hardly."
"Hardly!" Arquen's knuckles had gone white on the edge of the table. "Is that all you can say? Hardly?"
Lucien smirked and parroted her last word in answer to her question. Arquen had to clench her teeth hard against her rising anger.
"I understand that Bellamont was the one to order all those killings. But that does not in any way exclude you from suspicion," she grit out. "I believe you are a traitor still. Or soon to be, at least. And damned if I will let you take our dear Listener down."
"Listener?" He seemed genuinely surprised, a wonderful actor. "Do you mean my Silencer?"
"He has risen. There is nothing you can do."
"Actually, there is." His smile was positively wicked. "Check the code if you like. Sam doesn't rise until I dismiss him from my service."
"Or die," she said through clenched teeth.
"Or step down." Another perfect smile. "Seeing as how I am neither dead nor about to step down…" He let the statement hang, a soft threat.
"But you were dead," she insisted stubbornly.
"How can you be sure I was ever dead at all?"
"I killed you!"
"Ah," there was a glowing triumph in his eyes. "So you admit to breaking the code?
"Killing a traitor does not make me a traitor!"
"I did nothing." Lucien was enjoying this game of his. "So you killed a comparatively innocent man. Which means you don't really belong in this guild hall at all, do you?"
"What are you saying?" she asked, nostrils flaring.
"You've broken the code. By rights, you are expelled."
"I could not pass the door if I were."
"A technicality. The hand has not reformed and your Listener has been… otherwise occupied. I'm sure once I bring the matter to his attention—"
"You can do nothing! I am the mother of this guildhall. I cannot—"
"Mother?" His eyes flashed. "That title is bestowed only by the Listener himself."
"There are no other members of the Black Hand that can claim it! All others belong to a hall!"
"Perhaps," Lucien grinned. "But the code also happens to mention that guild halls must fall to a member of the Black Hand or a more experienced guild member."
"You are calling me incompetent? I was competent enough to cut your bloody dick off!"
Anger flared but Lucien kept in well under control.
"My dear, stupid child." A bitter tint to his smile. "Not only do I best you by ten years, but Vicente bests us both by centuries. It is the Listener's decision. A Listener who remains, by all rights, my Silencer."
Arquen glared, teeth bared.
"So be it," she snarled and stormed out of the room, leaving behind a rather uncomfortable murderer and a man with murder in his eyes.
