—Chapter Eleven: Reville's Reluctant Backstory—
Author's Note: Warning! This chapter is VERY LONG and focused entirely on Reville's backstory and Raven's observations thereof. If you do not like OC backstories, feel free to read the first and last sections and continue on to the next chapter (whenever it is posted). I have the full backstory written, and if anyone is interested I'll go ahead and post it as a oneshot.
Reville silently follow Raven down the quiet hallways towards her room. Neither spoke a word in the entire two or three minute walk, making the time seem to pass even slower.
They finally came to Raven's door. Raven pushed the door open and entered, leaving the door open behind her for Reville to follow. The empathic boy frowned, looked up and down the hallway for a way out, but seeing none reluctantly entered into the dark room.
The room was rather large, and filled with mysterious objects, huge, overflowing bookshelves, a bed hidden behind a canopy, and a huge window blocked out by drapes. Deep shadows clung to the corners, giving the impression that the walls were not truly the end of the room, and that far more than could be understood lurked… somewhere. Reville swallowed. He'd never seen anything quite so… creepy.
Raven gestured Reville to the empty middle of the room and had him sit down in a meditative pose, frowning the whole time at the alarm crawling around in the back of his mind. The idea of having her invade what he guarded so possessively deeply disturbed him, and while his posture remained neutral, those large black eyes flickered in fear as she sat across from him.
He absolutely did not want to show her anything. It was personal. It was… shameful. Pathetic. At least in his mind.
She was going to hate him. He just knew it.
Raven frowned at the emotions coming from Reville, but raised her hands and set the tips of her fingertips against his temples. He closed his eyes with a wince, and she could actually feel subconscious shields go up in his mind, blocking her normal entrance. She could still force her way in, sure, but she'd rather not hurt him if she didn't have to. She had a feeling whatever he had to show her would be quite traumatic enough.
"Open your eyes, Reville. You need to relax," she whispered. He blinked open his eyes, took a deep breath, and met hers. She locked them with her own and gazed deep into them, keeping her own face strictly neutral. As she felt him relax, she began.
"Azarath. Metrion. Zinthos," whispered Raven ever so softly.
Hot. Hot. So hot… whispered a small child's voice in Raven's head.
Or rather, whispered a voice within a small child's mind – that Raven happened to be in. She opened her eyes and saw a huge black room. This wasn't where the child was; this was inside the child's head. She turned and saw a sort of gateway, and through it she saw through the child's eyes.
Flames.
As she watched, the gateway expanded and filled the room, wrapping around her, until she was actually in the child's body and mind, seeing everything he saw, feeling everything he felt, his every thought echoing in her own mind.
The child, Reville, for it was his mind she had entered, was curled up in the corner of a rapidly falling apart room, surrounded by flames getting closer by the second. Raven felt tears streaking down his face, the burning pain from the approaching flames on his skin, and panic setting into his mind.
Hot… I have to leave. I could die… but mommy said to stay here. She said absolutely not to leave until she and daddy came back… Why haven't they come back? That was hours ago… Hot, so hot. It hurts… It burns. I'm going to die! Where are you, mommy?
CRASH! The door fell in. The young boy screamed and stumbled backwards as the flames suddenly doubled in size and rushed at him.
Have to leave! I don't want to die! Mommy wouldn't want me to die, she wanted me to hide! I'll have to go somewhere else to hide.
The door had actually smothered the flames directly in front of it, leaving the smallest of paths through it. The child licked his chapped lips, and crawled on all fours out the door.
The floor was burning hot, and soon the child's hands and knees were blistering. The child fought back tears and kept going, even when the path seemed to all but disappear. The child was very small, and could crawl under most of the smoke, but there was still enough to clog his lungs and make breathing the hot air even more painful.
Mommy, where are you? Daddy, help me! It hurts! But… but… I'll find you. I can do this. I won't die.
It was probably inevitable. The house started to collapse before the child could get out. Raven screamed herself as the boy whipped around and he saw, SHE saw, the huge beam falling down on them. Her scream blended with the child's as it fell right on top of them, only just not crushing them because a piece of a rafter that had been tied to it kept it about 8 inches off the ground.
No… where's mommy? Daddy? Help me! Someone help me!
The child took a deep breath, realized he was not crushed, and started forward. Raven felt a yank around her waist, and realized something that the child had gotten stuck on something.
Come on! Come ON! I have to get out of here! SOMEONE HELP ME! I'm going to DIE!
He couldn't get loose. Hot tears again poured from his eyes, and fought to turn around to see what he was caught on. But he couldn't, not with so little room underneath the huge beam.
The fire was closer than ever, and surely the child's skin was burned badly just from his proximity to the open flames. The smoke was worse than ever, and the child started coughing painfully. Raven felt the pain as if it were her own, burning her lungs, crawling up what felt like a bleeding throat, ripping chapped lips and a swollen mouth.
I'm going to die… I don't want to.
With the last of his strength, the boy managed to turn over. Something ripped his side, but now he could look for what he was caught on. His eyes were dry and burning, even with the hot streaks of tears pouring from them, and he fumbled for whatever was holding him with his blistered hands. They closed on something familiar. A chain. A long thin one, but intricately woven and very strong. The metal burned charred marks into the child's hands, but the child ignored the pain as best he could.
I know this… It held mommy's chandelier. What happened to the chandelier? Not important… Have to get free! Quickly!
With shaking hands, the child loosened the chain from where it had gotten caught around his body, but something was still pinning him down.
What am I caught on NOW?
He felt around again, and came to a series of spikes. Nails. A huge one was punched through the last link of the chain, attaching it to the beam, but ones nearly as large, and for architectural and structural purposes beyond a child's comprehension, were sticking in all directions. Raven could tell another rafter or something must've fallen from the beam, tearing the nails halfway loose, but she knew this information certainly wasn't important to the child.
Now that he had located what was pinning him, quite literally, he set his tiny hands over the huge nails and pulled and pushed and twisted and bent. This metal also scarred into his hands, but the small boy kept on, growing in desperation as more of the house collapsed around him. All his efforts were for naught.
The fire crept closer. The smoke got thicker. More pieces of the roof and walls fell, the crashes echoing, the vibration sending a painful ripple through the child's body.
I'm going to die.
*No!* cried out Raven, forgetting this was a memory, and that the child certainly couldn't hear or respond to her. *No! You have to keep moving!*
I'm going to die.
The child's body was getting heavy, his head ached, and he felt darkness closing in on him with each painful breath of polluted air he took.
Suddenly, a new sound started. A whoosh of water, the flap of heavy blankets or something similar, sounds of dozens of strong, healthy men. *What?* thought Raven.
The boy was past trying to think of what was going on. He hurt. He still thought he would die. Hope was here, but he figured it was too late for him.
A shattering sound, a wall falling outwards, and a rush of fresh, cool air.
Air…
The child blinked open his eyes and took a deep breath. The cool air worked wonders and his mind cleared enough for him to start struggling again. Raven gasped in relief as the pain in her own lungs and mind subsided.
Maybe… maybe I won't die. Live! I want to live!
"That strange ringing in our heads was definitely coming from this room!" called out a deep voice, and a man in some sort of heavy leather overalls came into view, coming through the busted wall, a sword in hand.
Soldier. Fire squad…
"Help…" whispered the child, in a cracked voice that certainly couldn't be heard over the crackling fire and crumbling structure. He whimpered and tried again. "HELP!" he cried out, in a scratchy voice, breaking but audible.
The man rushed over.
"Counselor! I found him!"
Time seemed to rush forward. In a blur, Raven observed Reville being put in an absolutely enormous room, and left entirely alone. Days went by, only interrupted by that man, Counselor Aleman, bringing in food and roughly seeing to the child's wounds. There was an attached bath to the room that the child used to clean up, once he could walk steadily again. Once the worst of the burns were gone, the child was dressed up and presented to the king. Afterwards, the child spent every day at the king's side, and every night locked up in the room, chained to his own bed.
Of course, it was only a matter of time before the child grew desperate. By now he'd been forced to the realization that his parents really were dead, but his mind drifted to a Grandmother Celina he'd met a couple times. She was also an empath, but it was a big, big secret. But, if he could escape quietly, and get to where she lived in Damarask Forest, she would take him in and keep him safe. He'd overheard his parents actually talking to her about it before one time when they thought he'd gone to bed.
Raven couldn't help but admire the confidence the small boy had that, one, he could escape a castle filled with soldiers where he was watched constantly, and two, that he could make a journey to wherever his grandmother lived without being caught. Not that he was foolish, absolutely not, for his mind was filled with plans and insights and clever schemes. Every day he would study the watch patterns of the guards, practice his empathy on those around him, and pay strict attention to conversations about travel and politics.
Soon months had passed, and Raven started to observe a sort of malicious joy in Counselor Aleman when he would take the child back to his room for the night. The man started talking to Reville, and the conversations were not pleasant small talk. The child would tremble, and sometimes even whimper and cover his ears. Raven could understand enough, even with time flashing by so fast, to know the man was cheerfully telling the young child all about prisons, torture sessions, and executions. And occasionally reminding the child how his parents were dead and his hometown destroyed, all because they'd tried to hide an empath from the king.
The speed of Reville's memories sped up until they were whipping by in a blur. Raven wasn't able to make out anything but the vague impression that the boy had gotten away, though not in the way he had hoped, and was in a much better situation, though still not ideal. Such a strange child. Was he an optimist or a pessimist? He had elements of both, yet was far from balanced or stable.
He hadn't made it to his grandmother's, that much was certain. He seemed to be in some sort of… gypsy camp? There were tents and visions of a large, powerful man, and flashes of happy times with a man and a woman that seemed to be thieves.
After a while, things slowed down to a reasonable pace again.
Raven watched as a Reville that looked about thirteen led the two thieves she'd glimpsed earlier to an unguarded section of wall and they began climbing, with absolutely nothing other than their bare hands and feet.
*They're not thieves,* thought Raven, impressed as they scaled the equivalent of a three-storey building, with the only hand and footholds the smallest of incongruities, none jutting out more than an inch, between the large stones that made up the wall. *They're ninjas.*
The threesome made a trip through the castle that would have had Robin impressed. Maybe even Batman. That three-storey wall was only the first of four outer walls. Then they scaled the building itself in order to enter through some sort of servant's quarters. Through the castle itself, ducking into rooms with snoring occupants whenever an awake guard came in their direction. Up several staircases, and outside onto a balcony again. Then it was merely climbing another storey up the outside of the castle, along what appeared to be a perfectly smooth surface.
*Yep, totally ninjas,* was Raven's conclusion. And she found herself quite impressed with how easily Reville was handling himself. He was only panting slightly, and he had been the one in the lead the entire time, making use of his abilities to keep them from getting caught. He was quite proud of himself too. He knew he was good, and he was confident he would complete this mission flawlessly.
He reminded her of Robin. She remembered the present-day Reville was lame, and suddenly understood his jealousy. *If he could once move like that, but lost it all…*
Events continued on. The two thieves kidnapped a girl, a princess, and then the three of them headed back to their camp. Time seemed to speed up again, too quickly to follow very well, and when it slowed down Reville appeared to be on some sort of guard duty over the girl.
The girl confused Reville. He was confused what he felt for her, since it didn't make sense that you could like someone you just met so much, and she herself was giving off a confusing mix of emotions. Mostly fear, though. A fear so strong it sent shivers down his own spine.
The Princess grabbed his arm, this time with both hands.
"Help me," she asked, eyes wide and pleading.
"I won't. That would be betraying the clan."
"Kajor is going to torture and kill me."
She meant it, and she was terrified. Her eyes were beginning to tear up.
Reville tried to shrug it off, but Shara could see in his black eyes that she was getting to him.
"Do you know what he does, Reville? He burns people alive. He has a room built of stone, filled with pools of oil and open fire pits. He lights the pits and pools, throws a prisoner in, and locks the metal door. Sometimes he lets them out before they die, sometimes he doesn't."
*Oh, not good*, thought Raven, the memory occurring to her the same instant it came back to Reville. Burning alive. He knew very well what that felt like.
I don't want to die… whimpered the child's voice inside Reville's mind. He gulped.
"I don't want to die," whispered Shara, hugging Reville's arm, the tears falling. "Please, Reville. No one else here will help me. You can escape with me. I promise my father will protect you; he's a just man. Please."
She started out as trying to persuade him, but now she was just begging. As she went on, her voice grew choked. Her fear traveled through her arms wrapped around Reville's arm and almost knocked him over by the time it reached his mind, which was still fogged with memories of being surrounded by flames and smoke, of feeling his skin burn all around, his hands and knees blistering as he crawled, the beam falling and pinning him down…
"I'll do it," he decided.
This is stupid, part of his mind lectured himself, a part that sounded remarkably like the present-day Reville Raven knew. Naphdar WILL catch me, and he WILL punish me. Severely. He may even kill me. I will lose everything I've gained. Madeline and Drake, the respect and listening ears I've always craved, a place to belong to. For what? A princess who'll go on to marry her prince and forget about me?
For some reason, the idea of her forgetting about him bothered him very much. To Raven it made perfect sense, especially for a thirteen year old boy towards a pretty girl, but to Reville the feeling was completely alien.
"I'll do it," he repeated, and grabbed her arm, almost dragging her out of the tent.
"Wait, where are we…?"
"Be quiet," ordered Reville. A half-second later, a clansman passed the tent. The man's eyes caught on the white ribbon around Reville's waist, a sign of his position in the clan. The clansman bowed slightly and continued on.
Reville explained quickly, all the while pulling her along with him towards the edge of the camp. "We have to go now. If we wait even ten minutes, someone else will come, and Naphdar is planning on moving camp towards Kajor in a matter of hours, so things are about to get very busy."
"Thank you!" whispered Shara, her emotions revealing her heady happiness and excitement, though she certainly was confused at the cold boy's sudden seeming change of heart.
He hurried her to the edge of the camp, using his abilities to dodge aside whenever someone else approached. He was too far to the edge of the camp to make any sort of excuse why he had the prisoner with him.
A shout rang out. Reville grabbed her hand tightly and started running, hauling her along. Behind them, shouts rang out. Reville flinched and stumbled as angry waves started radiating from the center of the camp, getting strong by the second. He caught his balance and shoved the princess behind a large rock with a slight overhang.
"Hide here. Don't move." He pointed south, south-west. "Jarked is a four hours run in that direction. Most of the clan will chase me, and you need to run home as fast as you can once they disappear from sight. I can't keep them busy for more than twenty minutes. And I have a grandmother."
"Huh?"
"In Damarask Forest. Not anytime soon, but find her for me, would you? Tell her I'm sorry I never went to her."
"What?" Shara grabbed Reville's arm as he turned to leave. "Wait! Tell me why! You're going to be okay, right?"
Reville tried to shake off her hand, but the girl had a frighteningly strong grip, which only tightened when he didn't answer anything.
Her eyes widened. "You're not going to die, right?" she whispered.
"I don't know," said Reville. "But you just focus on getting home. You still have a home." The last part had come out almost spitefully, but somehow the princess knew the anger wasn't directed at her.
*If anything, it's directed at himself,* thought Raven, frowning. Even all these years down the line, Reville still saw that house that burned down, that city he had lived in with his parents, as his home. And that blasted Counselor had succeeded in convincing the child that the destruction of that home was the boy's own fault for being an empath.
The shouting from the center of the camp was getting louder. Reville was beginning to have a hard time focus, as one word began chanting in his head.
Traitor. Traitor. Traitor…
"Let's run together!" she whispered fearfully. "We can make it!"
"No, we wouldn't," said Reville matter-of-factly, and finally managed to free himself from her grip. Before she could protest further, he took off in a different direction, as fast as he could possibly run, knowing that the girl's life depended on this.
Sound faded, and all Raven could hear and feel was the pounding of Reville's heart and the aching of his mind and body as the rage from betrayal pounded into him from the direction of the camp. He ran far faster than he ever had before, straining every muscle to its limit, and even then he heard the most elite of the clan's trackers and hunters right on his tail, and gaining fast.
He managed to just barely stay ahead of them for about the twenty minutes he promised, but he had no way of being sure.
The color started to fade to a blurry gray and white, and Raven found herself suddenly separate from the young Reville, as if watching from the outside. Apparently Reville had not been able to completely deal with what had happened, what was happening before her eyes, and was now, unconsciously, trying to keep Raven from seeing what had to be a very private moment.
Being beaten unconscious by people who had held you in the greatest esteem had to be quite the bad experience. Especially while being an empath and feeling the brunt of every passing angry thought and emotion.
Raven had seen worse, but it still was quite ugly to see the boy kicked and punched and thrown around until he fell unconscious. But this was a memory and it's not like she could change the past.
Naturally, Reville being unconscious, everything went white for a few minutes before resuming. She was back in the thirteen year old's head, and able to feel the pain pounding his body as he woke, confused, alone, and surrounded by negative intention. And his hands were shackled together and chained to the central pole of the punishment tent. Not that it was surprising, but his white ribbon was gone.
The only positive thing his senses told them was that they had not managed to find Shara. While that was quite strange, it at least meant his efforts weren't in vain.
Madeline and Drake, the two thieves that he had lived with, that had gone on the mission with him to capture the princess, came and said something. Raven wasn't sure what, mainly because Reville refused to be comforted. He had committed the gravest sin a clansman could, and of his own free will. The two thieves tried their best to convince Reville of something, while in the meantime they took care of his bruises and wounds.
Raven frowned thoughtfully when Reville's eyes glanced over a particularly disgusting wound on his right leg. Had that been what caused his lameness? It didn't seem quite that serious.
Reville seemed to be in a bit of a funk. Certainly the lack of sound was not from lack of importance or attention, as the boy spoke freely and without impediment with Madeline and Drake. Time seemed to move at a normal pace, and feeling was muted, but the pounding pain was too much to hide even in a memory.
After a few hours, Reville was taken to Naphdar, the chief of the clan. He was yelled at, scolded, and thrown around heedless of his wounds. Madeline and Drake tried desperately to argue in Reville's behalf, but were shut up again and again, until an enraged Naphdar actually punched Drake in the face and coldly ordered them to leave immediately until he summoned them.
After stating the same thing to Naphdar that he'd said to Madeline and Drake, namely that yes, he had willingly set the princess free so she would not have to face King Kajor, Reville stopped talking. Ultimately, he was chained to the central pole of Naphdar's tent as an uncooperative and irredeemable traitor. Days went by.
"You are of no use to me, Reville. You refuse to explain your behavior, and you refuse to do anything to correct the situation. My honor has taken a blow. I have never failed before. You are now a liability."
Reville lowered his head, eyes closed, feeling the full weight of the accusation and his own guilt. What could he say? It was all true.
Events again sped up, only to slow down as a huge, military-looking king entered Lord Naphdar's tent.
"WHY YOU LITTLE…!" roared King Kajor, the king Shara had been so terrified of. He fisted an enormous hand and took a step forward. Reville couldn't help flinching away, but suddenly Kajor froze. Reville's eyes widened as Kajor's mind flowed into his. He paled and began to shake.
The man wanted him. To torture him. To use his abilities.
"How much?" asked the violent king.
"For what?" asked Naphdar, smiling slightly.
"For the BOY, of course!"
Naphdar folded his arms and tilted his head, as if deep in thought. "I don't know, Kajor… You were willing to give the Great Diamond of Marmak for a mere princess, with little more value than a bargaining tool. An empath, however… Ah, there are perhaps three empaths in the known kingdoms, and out of all those, Reville is the only one younger than 70. Reville's power has always been quite strong, and he's brilliant at interpretation and incredibly perceptive. His abilities can only increase in worth, as he gains more power and control, along with experience. To add to his value, for some absurd reason he is incapable of lying..."
"The Great Diamond…"
"More. The Great Diamond, yes, but also the Crown Ruby."
Kajor took all of two seconds to think about it.
"Done. But only if you can prove his worth."
"Feel free to examine him."
Kajor approached Reville with the grace and power of a lion. He grabbed Reville's chin. The boy was shaking.
"Look at me," he demanded. The boy's panicked eyes flicked open and met King Kajor's bright green ones.
The king smiled. "Eyes blacker than night, indeed. I can't even make out a pupil. Not something one can hide, and quite remarkably unique."
Reville shivered and trembled, unable to hold back his reactions to having such a wicked, sadistic man's touch on his bare skin.
Kajor's eyes held his own, as hypnotic as a snake's.
"What of his powers?" asked Kajor, not breaking his eyes' hold on Reville's.
Naphdar smirked. "Think of something dreadfully violent."
The affect on Reville was immediate, drastic, and not something any amount of control on Reville's part could have prevented.
Reville gasped, suddenly unable to breathe as violent images flooded his mind. The blood dropped out of his face, he broke into a sweat, and he tried desperately to yank himself from Kajor's grasp.
Raven felt quite sick at the visions herself, but had unfortunately seen worse and long since conditioned herself from allowing such things to affect her state of mind.
The king smiled in absolute delight and took a firmer hold on the boy, this time pinning his shackled hands by the chain with one hand, the other hand grasping the boy's neck. He continued 'thinking'.
Reville's eyes shut tightly from the pain, and he couldn't suppress the pitiful whimper that escaped his throat.
"P-please," begged Reville, in a manner his normal personality would burn in shame at. "P-please s-stop…"
The king finally looked away, his mind now swirling with excitement.
"What was that, Naphdar? I have never had an empath react to my thoughts before. Only my anger, my irritation, my power – emotions, you could say."
"Reville has always had a deeper sense than normal empaths," replied Naphdar, smiling. "And that extra sense will continue to get stronger and stronger. As you just saw, he can already read minds, though he can't control it yet. If he had not betrayed my clan, I would never let him go. He's worth far more than any two gems, no matter how priceless. Getting such a prize for the Great Diamond and Crown Ruby is greatly undervaluing his worth."
Kajor smirked. "We have a deal, Naphdar."
Kajor fetched the gems from his party waiting outside the camp. He brought them back to the tent, and handed them to Naphdar. The clan chief unlocked the end of Reville's chain and handed it to Kajor. And thus Reville became the property of the King of Marmak.
"Ah, careful of his leg," said Naphdar, as if the matter only just occurred to him. "He was beaten when he was captured after freeing the princess. Apparently he led my trackers quite the merry little chase, in a very different direction from wherever the princess set off to. He should heal in a couple months."
"Handicaps are quite useful features," said Kajor, smirking and pulling the chain roughly. Reville stumbled forward and landed flat on his face, unable to use his bad leg to regain his balance.
Strangely, a flicker of embarrassment and shame came from Naphdar, but the man said nothing. The boy had betrayed him, and what happened to him was no longer of any importance.
Kajor yanked on the chain, pretending to be impatient, but really just enjoying watching Reville struggle to climb to his feet while being tugged forward.
"Your majesty?" asked a soldier, one of very high rank, probably some sort of commander, for he had no fear in approaching such a cruel man. "What of Jarked's princess?"
"Got away, but I got something better. Ralt's empath, would you believe?" replied Kajor, handing the end of the chain to the man. "Get him on a horse and let's get out of here before that fat clan chief comes after me for more gems."
Kajor swung up on his own horse, and the man, having noticed Reville's limp, actually lifted the boy up and set him in the saddle. Sensing the boy's embarrassment at being treated like a small child, he patted the teenager's shoulder.
He was a good man, sensed Reville. A family man, with four kids and one on the way, who cared for his widowed mother and only worked for such an evil king out of loyalty to the crown of the kingdom he was born into. And he thought Reville looked like a good kid.
They would arrive at Kajor's castle all too soon.
Reville shrunk away as far as he could, still being chained to the wall. "P-Please," he whimpered pathetically. "P-please don't!"
Kajor reached out and grabbed the chain, dragging Reville forward. Then he shoved the boy face-down to the ground, a large hand on the back of his neck, and thought.
Visions of people being burned alive on stakes, in prisons, and in that special furnace room flooded Reville's mind, all with far too much detail to be imaginary. Reville's whimpers soon became cries of pain and fear as he actually felt the flames from the visions burning into his skin, himself being put into those terrifying images.
Raven had to separate her own mind from Reville's memories, sparing herself from experiencing the boy's ordeal.
Eventually Kajor got bored. Unfortunately, the entertainment value of torturing Reville's mind had last a good couple hours. The boy was a sobbing wreak by the time he was finished. Raven tried to reconnect with the boy's mind, but in all honesty there wasn't much there, and what was there was disjointed, traumatized, and spinning in self-destructive circles. Eventually, the boy realized he was no longer pinned, and curled into a protective ball, shielding his head with his arms, not that such a gesture could help him at all.
It took him about an hour to recover. Slowly, so very slowly, his thoughts and emotions stopped spinning, his sweat dried, his breathing slowed, and his shivering stopped. He managed to sit up, though he leaned in complete exhaustion against the wall. In that time, Kajor left, had his dinner, and returned.
"Feeling better?" he asked casually.
Reville didn't even try to lighten his glare at the evil man.
"Now, now, stop that. My revenge is complete and I've already moved on, so you should as well. You're going to be working for me, of course, so I have no intention of breaking you."
"Breaking?"
Kajor smiled just so, pulling a vision of the last man he'd 'broken' to mind.
Reville flinched. "Stop that."
The evil king laughed. "You'd best get used to it, boy."
Reville opened his mouth to respond, then suddenly a look of surprise came over his face as, being past the worst of his mental torture-session, his abilities again began to stretch outward, sensing everyone within the palace and finding two very familiar presences.
Shara? Grandmother?
It had to be them. Shara's pure, bright mind was unmistakable, and he'd never forget the soft, gentle, yet firm, responsible touch his grandmother's mind had held the few times they'd met so very many years ago. What on earth were they doing here?
Of course! Naphdar's men never found Shara, because she didn't go back to Jarked! She went to my grandmother and… oh, no. NO! They came to rescue me!
*Stupid princess,* thought Raven, already knowing where this was going. *Running into the lion's den after all Reville did to spare her, as if she could help him. Stupid, stupid girl is just going to make things worse.*
He licked his lips and closed his eyes, focusing on the new presences in the castle, and specifically the two he sensed alongside Shara and his grandmother.
Not good. They're not alone. He would recognize those other two minds anywhere, though the owners of them had mastered the talents of almost completely disguising their presences, and had the rare ability to keep their emotions and thoughts completely neutral when on a mission, allowing them to hide even from most empaths.
Madeline and Drake. They came for me… They abandoned the clan and came for me… Why?
They were still too far for him to read their thoughts or their motives, so any reasons as to why the four had come to save him was beyond his comprehension. He was a fool with a bad personality and incapable of taking care of himself. Other than his powers, he was useless, and because of his powers, his very existence put others in danger. Got others killed… like his parents. His city…
He was so overcome with confusion, surprise, and fear, that he completely forgot Kajor was in the room with him, until the man bodily lifted him by the neck and slammed him into the wall, instantly jolting him back into the room, black eyes wide and staring into Kajor's furious green eyes, narrowed and suspicious.
Bad. Very, very bad.
"What is going on?" demanded Kajor icily.
This is going to hurt.
Reville clenched his jaw, shut his eyes, and waited for the pain to start.
I can't say anything. No matter how much it hurts. He'll kill them. He'll kill all of them. And it will be my fault.
"It's that blasted princess, isn't it?" asked Kajor's voice, right next to his ear. The voice was trembling in excitement.
No!
Reville's eyes opened quickly and he opened his mouth to scream the denial out loud, but nothing came out. Why? Why couldn't he lie? Lives depended on him telling Kajor that the man was wrong! Four lives, the only four people in this world he had left, that he cared for, that actually liked him!
Tears came to his eyes as he desperately tried to get the word out, that one simple word, but it didn't. He couldn't even shake his head. His powers forbade him from giving any form of untruth, and any attempt to persuade Kajor he was wrong would be an untruth, a lie.
"Oh, how fun! Aleman, quickly!" called out Kajor excitedly. The counselor rushed in, the same counselor that had delighted in brainwashing Reville so many years ago in Ralt's castle.
"Shara is in the castle right now! Isn't she, Reville?"
I have to warn them! My grandmother is an empath, shouldn't she be able to read me? GET OUT OF HERE!
Their presences only continued deeper into the castle, closer towards the throne room that Reville was chained in.
No, no! My grandmother shouldn't be weaker than me! Why isn't she responding?
As they came closer, he sensed how troubled they all were, his grandmother especially as she 'read' Reville's presence, but there was no panic or trembling in her mind, like there should've been if she had the same powers as Reville. Raven could tell easily that the old woman was nowhere in Reville's league, a simple empath and nothing more. No wonder everyone thought Reville such a prize.
Reville's mind, whirling in panic, again shifted away from the room and his own situation.
I have to save them! I have to get free!
Kajor frowned, reading the panic and desperation on Reville's face even without empathy, and drawing the correct conclusion as to what was going through the boy's head. He threw Reville to the ground.
Reville was jolted back to the room as he crashed painfully to the ground, landing hard and jarring his bad leg. He clenched his teeth to bite back the cry that rose to his lips, not letting more than a whimper escape.
"Planning to escape? Thinking of saving that princess again? Now, we can't have that," said Kajor casually, setting a foot on top of Reville's bad leg.
Wait…
*Oh…* Raven readied herself, and it was hard not to close her eyes and look away.
Before Reville could protest, Kajor shifted his weight and smashed his foot down on top of Reville's wounded leg with an ear-splitting CRACK, shattering bone and tearing through already torn and damaged muscles and nerves like parchment.
Reville's mind blanked and he screamed, completely convinced his leg had been severed and he would never walk again.
"Can't escape with only one leg," said Kajor casually after Reville's scream came to a breathless halt, stepping down from where he'd been pressing his foot on Reville's now destroyed right leg.
"Excellent idea, my king," commented Counselor Aleman, just as casually. "An empath doesn't need to walk anyway."
"Stop. Please stop," begged a voice directly into Raven's mind. It seemed to come from present day Reville, but he shouldn't be able to communicate with her while she perused his memories. They couldn't stop yet anyway. She sensed there was still more to Reville's unstable mental state. Just a little more.
Counselor Aleman stayed to watch over Reville while Kajor went to personally alert his guards and search for the princess.
Turns out they were underestimating the wrath of an injured, desperate empath-telepath.
Raven knew how this was going to turn out from Reville's mental and emotional state, and finally understood his self-hatred. She had long since hated herself for the same reason.
He was going to use his powers to destroy someone's mind. To hurt someone.
Reville, sweating buckets, mind spinning and emotions in a turmoil, managed to drag himself over to the wall and sit upright. He looked down at his leg, which barely looked like a human leg anymore, but at least was still attached to him, then glared in absolute hatred over at Aleman.
He didn't know how he did it. He didn't even know he could do it.
Aleman screamed and fell to the ground, clutching his head.
"Release me at once," demanded Reville in a cold voice that sounded nothing like the boy Raven had come to know, that she'd accompanied on his journey thus far. With his powers, he'd somehow completely encircled the man's mind, his very being, holding it hostage to his whims.
Aleman trembling, looked up and over to the black haired, black eyed boy, his eyes seeming to be far blacker than anything he'd seen before, and completely empty of any emotion other than hatred and rage. The man was absolutely terrified.
Monster… whimpered Aleman's thoughts in Reville's head, as, shivering, the man unsteadily pulled a key from a pocket and started over to the boy. He reached the teenager's side and held out the key, flinching as the empath's fingers touched his as the boy yanked the key from his grasp.
Reville quickly unlocked the manacles from his wrists. Before he could get any further, not that he had any sort of plan, Kajor returned.
"WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?" demanded the king, mood switching from casual to furious in seconds.
Reville's grip on Aleman's mind slipped, and, sensing the change, Aleman lunged forward, pinning Reville to the ground beneath him.
"He did something to me!" quickly explained Aleman, fighting with the desperate empath. As if to prove Aleman's point, the man suddenly screamed, clutching his head and falling away from the boy. This time the screaming continued even after Reville tore his mind away from the counselor's and mentally lunged for the source of his pain, the evil king in front of him.
Kajor was ready with a grin. It was like crashing into a wall. Reville mentally attacked the wall, desperate to smash through it and hurt Kajor as much as the man had hurt him, but suddenly was blasted back by visions of fire.
Reville whimpered, and suddenly everything seemed to come crashing down around him. He found himself back in his own mind, reeling with pain from his useless leg, and completely shocked as to what he had done to Aleman and tried to do to Kajor. Aleman's screaming had degenerated into senseless sobbing and crying.
Kajor's green eyes were wide and greedy, and Reville knew why. The man had just found his tool could double as a weapon.
A weapon? A monster? No! I'm not! I won't!
The king clapped his hands, and Shara and his grandmother, an elegant woman with long silver hair and blue eyes almost as dark as Reville's, were pulled into the room. Their arms were bound behind their backs and their mouths were gagged. Both sets of eyes fell on Reville, filled with concern and… affection? For him?
"Can you do that on purpose?"
No. Absolutely not.
Kajor gestured and a guard pulled Shara forward and raised a knife to her throat.
"Kill her," he ordered.
He wouldn't!
The guard raised the knife and was about to lower it.
NO!
Not knowing how, Reville again lunged forward with his mind, smashing into the man's mind and sending him reeling. The man screamed.
And Reville realized it was the commander that had been so nice to him earlier. The family man who'd felt pity for him. He fell backwards quickly, releasing the man.
The commander recovered and glared in hatred at the empath, all gentleness and pity gone.
Monster! thought the commander, looking away in disgust, still trembling in pain, and on the alert for another attack from the dangerous creature in the same room as them all. Who, the man was sure, could and would kill them all in the blink of an eye.
That word and all the emotions behind it stabbed deep into Reville's heart, creating a wound that might never heal. Because he deserved it.
He was a monster. A pathetic, useless, dangerous monster who only brought ill-fortune on anyone stupid enough to care for him.
"No more," whispered Reville in a half-choked voice. Raven realized with surprise that it was the current Reville's consciousness speaking, breaking through the trance.
"No more, no more."
Everything faded to black, then back to the present, and Raven found herself sitting across from Reville, watching the now much older teenager, tears leaking from his eyes, broken. All hopes and dreams shattered.
"There's still more, isn't there?" asked Raven softly.
He didn't answer, and that alone was enough of an answer from someone incapable of lying.
"… You had to face that furnace room after that, didn't you?" she asked, her voice it's normal flat, blank tone, which was oddly comforting to the current overly emotional Reville.
"Kajor wanted to ensure that… that I'd never disobey him…" he whispered, barely audible.
Raven took a deep breath, and let it out slowly, before continuing.
"But you escaped in the end?" she asked softly.
Reville swallowed his sobs, ashamed and embarrassed of showing himself in such a state. He impatiently wiped his tears. "Yes. Eventually. It took Madeline and Drake a couple months…"
"I assume your leg was not treated in that time?" asked Raven.
Reville shrugged, trying desperately convince himself it wasn't a big deal. "It was past healing by the time we reached Shara's father's castle. He took us all in. As for my leg, it just… is. Since it's technically not injured anymore, I doubt even Lore could do anything about it. Though I admit I was… hopeful, when I learned of his ability. But I quickly realized he was reacting to pain he sensed in others."
Raven had noticed the same thing, and it was one of the reasons for her concluding Lore's powers were the result of a unique aura, and not some miraculous superpower or magic.
"And he never reacted to you."
"No. He didn't. I… waited. Nothing."
"But it's amazing you can even walk."
Reville had no comment to that, though Raven could sense there was a painful story about suicidal thoughts and years of pushing himself beyond his limits, all on his own, to get to where he was now. In a world without physical therapists, that was incredible.
"And so, with your hopes dashed, you became jealous of Robin and Artemis?"
"Mostly Robin," said Reville, not able to meet Raven's eyes. "I used to move just like that. I can still remember the freedom, the ease of it all. Now, I can't even walk straight."
He shook his head, suddenly on the verge of crying and hating himself for it. Wanting desperately to be strong and emotionless, to not have to think, to shove his memories back in the past and NEVER think about them again.
"I don't know what Robin thinks he knows about me, about why we were sent here, but I will not be any help. I cannot fight physically, and I will not let myself fight mentally ever again." His voice choked and he stopped.
"I can't do this…" he mumbled. All the emotions he had held before seemed to overwhelm him, and Raven set a hand on his shoulder and used her own powers to try calm him down. Instead of helping him to come to grips with his situation, being forced to relive his memories had made his state far worse.
"I cannot help you," she admitted.
"I never thought you would not be able to."
"But I would like to tell you a story. Of a young girl, being raised by her single mother, on a world called Azarath…"
Author's Notes: Okay, that's enough of Reville's backstory. Don't expect me to do that for the other characters, at least not in this story. I won't be retelling Raven's story, since I assume all you Teen Titans fans already know, and next chapter we get back to the plot! Uh, hopefully… I'm sure some reviews would help me focus!