Chapter 13

Amarantha's cold laugh echoed through the cavernous chamber, and Lucien grimaced as he was forced to his knees and his wrists were tethered tightly to the whipping post. He tugged fruitlessly, knowing that there was no give in the knots. "You really ought to learn your lesson, Lucien." She walked around in front of him so that he could see her without having to turn his head. "I would have thought the last time you opened your mouth in front of me that I left enough of an impression for you to remember…"

Lucien tried not to think about that lesson, but she laughed again, just as she had before she'd ripped his eye out. "I guess not." He ground out, and she actually smirked at him, before looking over his head. Lucien knew Tamlin stood there, unmoving and silent.

"How many lashes do you think?" Amarantha asked Tamlin conversationally. Lucien closed his eyes. He had known she would punish him for calling out to Feyre during her challenge, but if he hadn't Feyre would likely be dead and they would all be ruined. "It needs to be enough so that he won't forget to keep his mouth shut again… Maybe it should be the other eye…"

"Twenty lashes?" Tamlin's voice was expressionless and Lucien grimaced again.

"This is not his first offense…" Amarantha's voice was pouty, and Lucien knew that wasn't good. "Fifty, I think." Lucien's eyes flew open and he looked at her. She smirked back at him, her red lips stretching wide as she held the whip in her hands up for him to see. Shuddering, Lucien closed his eyes again. He didn't need to see it. "Come and take it." Lucien listened to the footsteps come around him toward where Amarantha had stood. After several moments of silence, he opened his eyes again and stared in horror as Tamlin took the whip from the bitch's hands.

"…Tam?"

His friend's green eyes flicked toward him, and Lucien saw the regret. He should have known that Amarantha wouldn't have just anyone administer his punishment. Straightening himself as much as he could, Lucien drew a deep breath and kept his face neutral, for once thankful for the mask he wore. When Amarantha nodded, one of her guards stepped forward and ripped Lucien's shirt open down his back. She giggled, clearly enjoying herself, and Lucien spared but a glance for her before fixing his gaze on a spot on the wall as Tamlin circled back around behind him. Staring at that spot, Lucien was determined to not give Amarantha what she wanted. She loved suffering and he wasn't going to give it to her.

"Hurry up…" Her voice was impatient, and Lucien could feel his friend's hesitation.

He heard the whip moving through the air before pain exploded across his back. Lucien clenched his teeth and forced himself not to look away from that spot on the wall.

"Count." Amarantha told him. "Out loud."

"One." He said flatly. Pain exploded again, and his breath caught.

"…if you miss one, we start again."

"…two." This was ground out between his teeth.

"Be clear."

Lucien stared hard at the wall, tears welling when the whip was brought down across his back again. "Three."

It didn't take long before Lucien's resolve began to slip and he'd begun to cry out as the whip came down on him again and again. Tamlin was barely pausing between lashes, maintaining a predictable rhythm and Lucien's screams rang in his own ears, sometimes breathless as he struggled to draw breath around the pain. He never missed the count though, and by the time he'd whimpered "Fifty", he'd allowed himself to collapse, hanging helplessly from the whipping post only held up by the rope around his wrists.

Forcing his eyes open again when he felt Amarantha bend down in front of him, he just looked blearily at her, struggling to focus. "Don't bother trying to heal yourself." She whispered, another wicked grin stretching those ruby lips, "Those lashes wont heal until I say so…" Horror spread through Lucien's foggy mind. His back had to be a mess. Fifty lashes would have left him barely any skin at all. If she was going to keep him from healing… He let his eyes close again as he willed his mind to escape. He'd rather be anywhere else. "Clean him."

Through his pained haze, Lucien was vaguely aware of a salty scent before cold water crashed down over him and he screamed.

Elain sat bolt upright with a shriek. She imagined she could still feel her back aflame from that whip, and the brain jarring agony of salt water being dumped over her. Nausea rocked her with the realisation that what she had just been dreaming wasn't some fiction her mind had created, but another of Lucien's memories. Feyre had told her that he had saved her life during her first challenge Under the Mountain, and that he had been punished for it. Lucien had been too injured to come and help her, and that had been what had pushed her to make her bargain with Rhys. Her sister had never elaborated on what had happened to Lucien, if she even knew.

Realising that she could hear Lucien's heartbeat thundering from across the hall, she bit her lip. Something was wrong. Knowing that she wouldn't go back to sleep for a good while, Elain slipped out of bed and headed across the hall. She knocked lightly on his door, but received no answer. "Lucien?"

His heart continued its wild thundering and Elain placed her hand on the door. Unbidden images flashed before her eyes again. Lucien lying on a narrow bed on his stomach, hands clenching handfuls of the sheets as he groaned in pain, his back an open mess of lash wounds. Nobody helping him. Nobody had come. Tamlin hadn't come. That knowledge made Elain's choice for her, and she turned the door handle, pushing the heavy door open enough for her to slip into his room.

She could smell him. His scent was stronger here than anywhere else Elain had been. Casting her eyes quickly about the room, she realised that this must have been his room for the decades he'd lived in the Spring Court. She took in the Autumn Colours that he had decked the room out in, and drew another breath. This room was utterly male; utterly Lucien. This had been his home for longer than she had been alive.

Padding quickly across the crimson carpet, Elain approached his bed. His sheets were twisted and messed, as if he'd been thrashing and Elain stopped beside him, her eyes moving over his sleeping form. Lucien lay on his back, the sheets kicked low around his waist and his broad chest was bare. His heartbeat still thundered loudly in Elain's head. "Lucien…?" she murmured. He didn't stir. "Lucien…" Elain reached a hand out to touch him, hesitating for a moment as to where. Touching her fingers gently to his shoulder, she knelt one knee on the mattress beside him. "…Lucien?"

His eyes opened in an instant, and then he was on his feet beside her, one arm half around her protectively. "What's wrong?" he breathed. Elain blinked in surprise, one of her hands coming up to press against his sculpted chest.

"I…"

He'd half turned, looking around before coming to the conclusion that there was no threat. The fire flickered to life in the fireplace, and his hold on her lessened, though Elain noted he didn't entirely let her go. "… You're in my room." He said softly. She could feel something stirring within him. This was his space. She'd walked into his space of her own free will, had approached him in his bed. Her own heart began to beat more quickly and she cleared her throat.

"I had a dream…" she breathed, feeling Lucien's hand tangle into her hair, holding her carefully to himself.

"What about?" he asked.

"You."

"Oh?" she heard the note of hopeful amusement there, and regretted having to squash it.

"Under the Mountain." She said gently, "During those trials Feyre had to do…"

Lucien slowly released her and sank back down to sit on his bed. Elain stood where she was, looking down at him. She felt the moment he thought he'd worked it out. "… the punishment I received?" he asked, "For helping Feyre?"

"Yes."

Horror filled his russet eye as he looked up at her. "You saw that?"

"It was different this time." She replied, "I… I was you…" She bit her lip, "Looking through your eyes, thinking what you thought, feeling what you felt…"

"You…" Fear replaced the horror, "you felt it?" his hands were on her again, coming to rest on her sides. Elain realised she was only wearing a tiny sheer nightdress.

"…Yes."

"Shit…" he breathed, "Elain…" both his eyes moved back and forth across her face, that metal eye clicking and whirring as he thought. His hands pulled more tightly at her, "Shit… shit…"

Elain stepped in to him, giving in to the pull. Lifting a hand to brush his hair back from his face, she listened again to his heart. "…you were dreaming about it, too?"

"I was." He murmured. Elain allowed him to pull her down to sit beside him on the bed. "I'm so sorry…" his eyes moved across her face again, "I … I didn't mean to send it to you."

"I know." Elain kept a hand on Lucien's arm. "Was that really what happened?" she asked. "Fifty…?" She felt her eyes widen when he gave a single nod, his eyes not shifting from her for a moment. "And Tamlin did it…?"

"Yes."

"You forgave him?"

"It wasn't his fault."

Elain didn't really want to ask the next question, but did so anyway. "He didn't come to help you after…?" she moved her hand down his forearm, "… Did anyone?"

Lucien's gaze finally dropped from her, but instead followed her hand on his arm. "Amarantha…" he breathed the name softly, "kept me like that for a week. She didn't let me heal… and anyone who had come to help me would have been punished similarly."

Frowning, Elain shook her head. "That… isn't an excuse."

"Maybe not, Petal." He told her softly, "But I wouldn't have wanted anyone else to face that. Not for me."

Elain stared at him. If the Autumn Court was as cutthroat and bloodthirsty as Feyre had told her, how had Lucien come from there? She knew her fingers were lazily tracing the skin of his wrist, but she couldn't make herself stop. When his eyes lifted from her hand to her own eyes, he looked at her in a way Elain hadn't seen yet.

"What else happened to you?" She asked, "Under the Mountain…?"

He shook his head and gave a soft sigh. "You don't want to know…"

"I do."

Lucien paused before giving her a wry smile. "Then I will tell you, but not tonight…"

His heartbeat had slowed to just about normal, and Elain let her eyes move over him once more. He was magnificent in the half-light, she had to admit. The firelight was picking up all the different oranges and reds in his hair, and his sharp features looked even more striking than usual. He was half turned toward her, and as Elain allowed her eyes to travel over him again, his free hand slid around behind her. "Lucien…?" she asked, when that hand slid up her back and then inside the top of her nightgown, moving carefully over her spine.

"Just checking…" he murmured, retracting the hand. "You said you felt it… I wanted to make sure it was nothing more than that…"

"It stopped the moment I awoke…" Elain, suddenly feeling bolder, brought her own hand back up to Lucien's shoulder before sliding it gently over and down his back. "You didn't scar…"

"No." he replied, and she felt him shudder at her touch, "I guess she figured it would detract from her first masterpiece." He gestured at his face and Elain shook her head. She could hear his heartbeat quickening, and he was looking at her more intensely than before. The heat from the fire seemed to be increasing and Elain struggled to focus.

"I… I should go back to bed." She murmured, getting to her feet. There was a moment of hesitation before he let her go, and Elain stepped back from the bed, looking at him as she did so. "I'll see you in the morning…"

"Goodnight, Elain."

Author's Note:

Do let me know your thoughts.