Vulnerability was a weakness. That was the doctrine of Rana's mercenary life. Survival meant that for not even a heartbeat should any living creature show the soft white of its underbelly, and she lived by and demanded from her subordinates the strict adherence to such natural laws. In their occupation, there was no room for mistakes. No room for mercy. No room for weakness.
And yet--- she couldn't hate his vulnerability.
She tried to beat it out of him with trials that would shatter any other human. Mortals were only meant for so much, after all. They needed to learn quickly for the sake of their own survival, just like wild dogs, just like how nature intended. Rana believed that humans were a pitiful yet honest race, unlike the theatrical jinn. He should have grit his teeth and endured, and he did. Rana was proud of his momentary strength. Rana was proud of his loyalty. Rana was proud of the perfect human she had cultivated with her own two hands; it was her form of salvation, both for him and herself.
Yet still, she could not punish him now. Not at this moment. Rana was very well aware of her own monstrosity, but she'd once been a feeble girl as well; this sort of pain was a rite of passage. She couldn't blame him for this small window of vulnerability.
...
The bedsheets were coarse and cold, but Faris had awakened from the murky nothingness of his fitful sleep to an empty room and a fluttering feeling of relief buried deep within his heart.
It was over.
He brought a weak hand to his sore throat, tracing along the warm bruises that colored his skin. Faris had passed out along the latter half of it---a blessing in disguise---and called little to none of what happened after those hands clasped around his neck.
Rana wouldn't kill him. That was comforting enough. Even as he gasped out and cried for even a breath of respite, even throughout his terror and the simulation of the love potion, Rana was always there. She wouldn't let them kill him. That was because---
Faris let out a shaky sigh.
He was her property. Even beyond lovers, they will never be equals.
Still, they were harsher than usual today. Faris looked down to examine the swollen scratches around his hips and lines of dried blood, dark as rust, that ran down his inner thighs and pooled to still-damp splotches upon the bedsheets. He tried to sit up but found himself numb from the chest down. Most of the love potion must have worn off, but Rana had added a paralytic component to it--- that must still be in effect. An expressionless mask, or perhaps it was acceptance, defined Faris' features. It must have been recent. Blood and ejaculate still stained his skin.
He glanced up at the sound of soft padded footsteps and made out the blurry figure of a woman.
"Don't talk," She commanded in a low tone. In her hands was a basin of cold water and a clean rag, which she set beside the raised cot on a wooden stool. The woman reached into the breast pocket of her coat and pulled out a small glass vial of bright green fluid, which she quickly uncorked and brought to Faris' lips.
It tasted revolting. He didn't have the strength to protest and simply laid limp as she fed him the vial's contents.
"He's fucking banned from touching you again," she said in a hiss under her breath, to particularly no one. Narrowed were her eyes, a shade of dark wine, as the woman reached over to wring violently the wet rag now in her hands. "Banned. Can't follow my orders for shit, and now I have to deal with this mess. I'll fucking kill him if I see him even looking at you, you understand? Faris?"
A weak nod. She hated having her questions unanswered.
"Good. I'm glad you understand, at least. I'll have to be here next time. So that no other son of a bitch tries anything dirty."
The woman roughly brushed aside her bangs and started scrubbing down his body. First along the mouth, then to the neck, quickly past his chest, and down towards his pelvis. She unceremoniously shoved aside his legs, pausing for a moment to glare at the marks upon his skin, and cleaned off whatever fluids still remained.
"R-Rana..."
"I told you to shut up."
"It hurts."
Almost begrudgingly, she softened her motions to just a firm wipe. "Are you complaining now? I thought this was so we could temper your weakness. Well, whatever--- this wasn't what I intended anyway." Rana tossed the rag aside and stood up to change the dirty basin water. "You need to be ready by tomorrow morning. If you still can't walk by midnight, I'll bring the healer over, but I hate talking to him. Don't make it too difficult." She turned to leave as quickly as she came in. Dry wind from the open tent chilled Faris to the bone.
His thoughts were all a haze.
She was...
Faris closed his eyes. She was finally here. He wouldn't have to brave it all alone anymore.
There was no reason to complain; he was simply weak. She had survived more than this. Of course, Faris wanted to be here--- didn't he? So she wouldn't have to be the one to endure it.
There were more bandages around her arms this time, he'd noticed. Her bloodied fingers had nothing to do with cleaning up his filth. The jinn, for all of their pride and celestial inheritance, felt the same pain as humans---yet she'd silently suffered in his presence and felt anger not for those who'd wounded her, but the man who hurt him beyond his boundaries.
Ah.
Droplets of tears fell from his lashes down to the bedsheets. He just felt so dirty. For betraying her expectations. For making her angry. For even believing for a moment the delusion of her contentedness with him. Who would come to love this?
This wasn't him being used; Faris physically enjoyed the humiliation. He fucking came at being beat. Not with Rana, but some stranger who paid to have a load off---a tool for Faris' own masturbation. And yet it was his own messes that Rana was cleaning. It was his ruined state that she had to deal with.
Faris thought of himself as unbelievably cruel.
---
Yeah this was short asf but hey!! New Faris content!!
EarthPhantom02
