Darkness and Light

23 - Toxic Flowers

AARON

Pain greets me as I come to.

"Don't move!" Be's voice is right in my ear, her weight pressing down on me, and not in the way I like. I'm on my stomach, head turned towards her while she's crouching over me, and someone else is pulling something out of my body.

All sense leaves me as I writhe in pain under her, letting out strangled sounds muffled by the wet sheets under me. Wet with bright red liquid that isn't helping me calm down.

"Aaron," Be's voice becomes soothing as the tugging sensation and blinding-white agony simmers and finally fizzles out. I'm gasping, muscles flexing automatically as I shudder and shut my eyes. My throat's scratchy and the very center of my back burns something fierce.

"I can place a few healing runes if you'd like." Castor's voice comes from my other side, and Be's weight rolls off of me. Her hands trail from one shoulder to the other, rubbing the sore muscles there and relaxing me further. I let out a slow breath as I make a sound of agreement to Castor's words. Whatever he puts on me can always be added onto when I get home. Though since he's a Healer, I assume the runes he'll give me will be as close to whatever Celestial version I'd recieve.

Without thinking too much about it, I reach out before Be can remove her hands from my skin and grip her hand tightly. At that exact moment, Castor begins carving an intricate design into the center of my back. I let out a hiss as the radiating pain from the fresh wound and rune seeps into my body.

I have to grit my teeth to stop myself from tensing the affected muscles, knowing I'll mess up the runes lines - and making the whole thing useless - if I do. Be squeezes my hand, wrapping her other around our linked fingers. About three more lies in, I feel her breath on my knuckles - inches away from my face. My own breath hitches in my chest an I have to fight to keep my breathing normal as I squeeze my eyes shut. I'd do just about anything to look at her right now, to see that now familiar light in those electric blue depths and search every light and dark fleck within them. But if I do look at her right now, I know I won't be able to control myself.

And only the Almighty knows what would come spewing out of my mouth right now.

"Breathe, Aaron." Be murmurs to me when I forget the need to drag in oxygen. I dutifully suck in a lungful of her scent, the sweetness of her skin and warmth from her own breath. My stomach flips, the heat from the air stirring deep in my chest - making me forget about the knife carving into the shredded skin of my back. Against my will, my eyelids part, and I find myself gazing into Be's electric-blue eyes - inches from mine.

Her eyebrows are knitted together, strands of blonde hair sticking every which way out of the messy binding from earlier. With her pupils little more than tiny dots in the center of her wide, terrified eyes, I can discern each shade and shadow of light and dark in her irises. I'm so well-distracted that I feel like I spend days studying them, falling deeper with each new fleck and flare in them. Just when I think I could probably spend eternity staring into her eyes, she looks away from me.

Hands, both hers and her brothers, gently help me roll over and sit up without allowing my still-tender back to touch the red-coated sheets. My head swims as the word is righted and my fluttering heart rate skyrockets into an uncomfortable racing pace that has me feeling extra queasy.

"What's your blood type, Tutela?" Castor asks me as I blink hard, letting the cascade of black dots disintegrate from my field of vision. I grimace, glancing up at the Healer who's Be's older brother.

"You don't have it." I tell him point-blank, locking eyes with him as Be frowns beside him. Castor's already blank face seems to tense at my words, the truth of them making the muscles around his eyes tighten. Reapers, being from the earthly plane, have humanoid blood types, even if they were supernaturals before they became Reapers. My kind doesn't. Even if I bleed red like everyone else.