by Mike Shade
The man's arm was stick thin under his dirty clothes, the cry that came from him, surprised. "What? Who are you? Leave me be!"
"Where's Quinn?" he growled, certain of himself. If Quinn wasn't here, this man would know where the magician was. The only time his instincts had led him wrong had been when he'd let Quinn live the first time.
"Eh? Who you looking for?" The man's walking stick rapped his ankles, his toes.
Bram set his mouth in a line. "Quinn. I know you know where he is. And I don't get my jollies out hurting old people, so why don't you just tell me?"
"Sonny, you ask anyone. Old Rog goes to market ev'ry T'ursday. Market then home. See?" A ragged bag with a half loaf of stale bread and two potatoes was shown to him. "Nothing else to tell.”
"Right. Take me home with you then, old man. And we'll see just what you know." He glared down at the old man, hand not letting go of the thin arm.
The old man muttered, but allowed himself to be moved out of the warehouse, into a street busy with merchants and children milling around as the market closed. Then the fighting started, the old man crying out, struggling, calling for help. "He's hurting me! Trying to steal an old man's bread! Help me! Someone!"
Bram rolled his eyes. "I'm Emperor's Guard, Rog, you really want me flashing my insignia?"
"Better that than your cock." The voice was dull and empty, surprising him long enough that the hard blow to the stomach with the end of the cane doubled him over and he lost the hold he had on the thin arm.
Then Rog straightened and took off, running like the hounds of hell were after him. Or rather, Quinn took off. Fuck, the man was getting better with the disguises.
Bram took off after Quinn, ignoring the way his abs ached.
The magician was getting better at running and hiding, too, seeming to disappear into one alleyway, only to be heard the next alley over.
Bram kept on Quinn’s tail though -- he wasn't going to lose the man this time. It was a matter of pride.
It was also a matter of life and death. His own. The Emperor had been very clear about that.
He ran Quinn to ground in the arts district, the sun gone down, the streets quiet. He saw the magician slip into a store, the heavy cloak left behind. He followed, slipping in like a shadow and making sure the door didn't make any noise as it closed behind him.
Fuck.
Fuck, there were bits of mirror and glass everywhere. The gods only knew if Quinn was still here or if he'd pulled a magic disappearing act again.
Bram took a few steps away from the door, waiting impatiently for his eyes to get used to the darkness.
He could hear footsteps. He knew he could. He headed toward the sound of them, eyes narrowed. A piece of glass crashed at his feet, the sound covering any others.
Well, Quinn had learned a few things in the last weeks, Bram had to give the magician that.
His eyes were adjusting now, though, so he scanned the room, searching for any shadow that might be Quinn. Nothing. Not a motion, not a breath. Nothing.
"Give it up, Quinn. I've got you cornered and you know it."
"No. I haven't done anything to you. Leave me alone." Another series of mirrors crashed down around him.
He was able to get a general direction based on where the mirrors had come from and he slowly began to walk toward it. The mirror bits crunched under his boots, shards turning to fragments.
"You're a traitor. Treason is a crime against all of us."
"A traitor? For doing what? Living?" Another chunk came at his head, footsteps sounding.
He ducked and sped toward the footsteps. "I just carry out the sentences, Magician."
"I just live my life, Assassin." That voice led up a set of stairs, a heavy door slamming closed, locking.
He ran up the stairs and found a lockpick in his pocket, working with it quickly to open the door. "If you were innocent, you wouldn't be running." He could hear doors opening and closing down the hallway.
Damnit!
He ran down the hall, opening doors and checking the rooms out.
"Come on, Quinn. Why postpone the inevitable?"
He got another door open, coming face-to-face with Quinn -- bald and bruised and gaunt, standing in front of a round mirror placed on the floor.
"Lord, that's a grim disguise, Quinn." He moved slowly, reaching to jump and tackle Quinn, go through the mirror with the man if he had to.
"Stop right there." Quinn shook his head, eyes burning and glittering. "Don't come closer."
"You're not going anywhere without me."
"You're going to kill me, remember? I'm not going to let you."
"I'd like to know how you think you're going to stop me." He kept his eyes on Quinn, hyperaware of every move the man made.
"Go away. I didn't ever hurt anyone." Quinn took a deep breath, shook his head. "Just leave."
Bram shook his own head. "I have a job to do." And if he didn't do it, he signed his own death warrant.
"Do it somewhere else then." Quinn didn't flinch, just took a deep breath and stepped into the mirror.
Bram leapt, fingers closing around Quinn's hips, falling through the mirror with the man.
They landed hard, Quinn scrambling away from him, limping badly, leaving a sparse trail of blood.
"You're hurt," he accused, giving chase and catching the magician easily.
"Don't touch me." Quinn pulled away, thin shirt tearing in Bram’s hands.
He snorted and took hold of Quinn, fingers running over the skinny body. "I can kill you anytime I want."
Quinn was pale, shivering, but the man didn't beg, didn't do anything but watch him, that mind just whirling.
He'd forgotten about the tingle. It hadn’t been there through Quinn’s clothing. All right, he hadn't forgotten, but he'd convinced himself it had all been in his imagination, all been a part of Quinn's magic. Quinn didn't seem up to too much magic just now, and yet that tingle was still there, sure as he was standing there. It was like them facing each other, talking to each other, had made it catch hold again.
"Show me your injury."
"Why?"
"Would you rather I just kill you?" He should. He didn't know why he wasn't doing exactly that. It was what he was here for.
Quinn pulled back his robes to reveal one leg, blood dripping down from a shard of metal piercing the muscle. Bram bent, hands gentle on Quinn's leg as he examined it. It had to be painful, but besides the muscles trembling, the man didn't show a thing.
"I'm going to take it out," he told Quinn, looking up into those odd, pale eyes.
There was both silent pride and defeat in Quinn's face, the pale eyes huge.
He looked around with a frown. "Where are we? Do you have a place near here?" Quinn was going to need to sit after he pulled out the shard, it was rather large.
"I don't know. I haven't been home in weeks."
"Your home?" It just might work, hiding in the last place anyone would expect him. "All right. How far?" He was not going to examine why he was suddenly bent on saving Quinn. Again. No, he wasn't.
"You're going to kill me in my home? Why? Everyone who loved me is dead. Don't bother."
"Shut up and take me there. Like I said, I haven't killed you yet. You may just survive this."
Quinn limped to a window, looked, then slowly moved back toward the mirror.
He grabbed hold of Quinn's hand. "No. No more mirrors unless you tell me what you're doing."
"I want to go home."
"Okay. Let's go."
The pale eyes filled with tears, a soft spell whispered, dust falling against the mirror. "Let's go."
He took a step with Quinn, both of them falling through the mirror. He wrapped around the slight body as they landed, absorbing the shock.
Quinn was still and quiet in his arms, eyes rolled back, pale as a sheet. The place was dusty, quiet, but very much like the room he'd seen that first day -- colorful and interesting, mirrors covering the walls.
"Do yo
u have any medical supplies?" he asked, standing, hauling Quinn into his arms.
He didn't get a response, Quinn's head lolling against him.
Well fuck.
The man he was sent to kill was dying...
He growled. No, the man wasn't. No.
He didn't think about it, he just went to work to get rid of that shard and fix up whatever else it was that had Quinn looking like a corpse.
***
His head pounded. Ow. Backlash headache. Ow.
It wasn't the first time he'd done it, spent everything he had, but every time he swore it would be the last.
He tried to sit up, swaying, trying to get his bearings.
A low growl sounded, large, warm hands sliding over his arm and back, easing him back down onto the soft pillows. "Easy, Quinn."
"I hurt." He couldn't quite manage to get his eyes open; he curled into the heat of the body with him.
"Then just stay still, yeah?" Those warm hands kept moving, soothing, easing.
"'kay." He frowned, trying to think, trying to remember. "I can't think. I..."
His forehead was stroked. "You don't have to think, either. You're safe now."
"Promise?" He relaxed, the touch easing him.
"I do." The voice was low, quiet, and he could hear the truth in it.
He nodded, hand wrapping around a warm hip. "Okay."
A shiver went through his companion, a low purr sounding. "You're not even trying, are you?"
"Trying?" He snuggled in, nuzzling, wrapping himself around that warmth.
"To make me feel good, feel those tingles. You're not doing it on purpose."
"No. No, that is us. Your energy calling to..." He frowned, something tickling his mind. "I... Are you... I need to remember something about you..."
One of those warm hands slid along his back. "No, you're safe now. I won't let anything hurt you."
"Really? I'm so tired. So tired." He could cry, if he wasn't too tired to.
"You've been sleeping for days."
"I used my reserves. Could be a month before I can gate again."
"A month! Will you be able to get out of bed before then? Walk?" The body around him had gone tense.
"Sure. I just have to be careful and build my reserves back. I spent them all..." Doing something. Doing what? Doing what?
"That's all right then. I don't think we're going to be able to stay here a month, but I'm used to not having magic to get around, so I imagine I'll be able to keep us out of harm's way."
Us? Who was us? And why couldn't they stay? "Am I at home?" He managed to get his eyes open a crack, look around. Okay, it looked like home.
"You are. But they'll look for you here sooner or later. I've bought us some time, but not a month. We'll have to disappear altogether. Maybe beyond the mountains..."
His head was tilted, his eyes meeting green ones in a square face.
Everything shifted, twisted and then went icy-cold and clear. Assassin. This man was. But he didn't understand, didn't get it.
The arms around him tightened. "Shh. Shh. I've got you, Quinn. I'm not going to let anything hurt you."
"Wh...why? I don't... I thought you wanted to..." Lord and lady he was confused.
"I didn't want to; I was supposed to." The big body shrugged. "I couldn't. I tried. I couldn't."
He didn't know what to say about that. Not at all. It was all just too big, too much to think about.
Bram's hand started moving, sliding along his back. "I don't understand any of this, Quinn, but... well, I can't deny there's something between us."
"If we don't understand it, then how do we know what to do?"
"I don't know, Quinn, but I'll tell you that I do know what not to do. I won't kill you. I can't. That means we're on the run and that I do know how to deal with. I'm usually the hunter, I think I can stay ahead of another hunter. Especially if they don't even know they're needing to hunt yet."
"More running?" He looked up into Bram's eyes, heart sinking. He was exhausted and hungry and so tired. "Apparently I'm not very good at that."
"I was the Emperor's best. As soon as he finds out I didn't kill you and I'm not coming back, they'll be after us. We have a few more days we can rest here and then we need to leave. Go far away."
"I can't gate us far away. I don't know where we'd end up."
"Then we'll just have to go the old fashioned way." Bram grinned, the look in his eyes fierce. Quinn got the distinct feeling Bram was looking forward to it.
"The old fashioned way?" He was going to need better shoes.
Wait. Wait, what was he thinking? How could he trust this man? What was wrong with him?
"Yes. Without magic. I'm actually looking forward to the challenge." Bram smiled, kept touching him.
"I can't think like this. Your hands -- they're just like..." Magic, but not. He pushed closer, drinking in the warmth, the energy created between them.
"It tingles where our skin meets," Bram told him. "And why would you need to think? You said you needed rest. You can have it."
"It does. Energy. We build it together." No fair, confusing the issue with logic.
"Energy? So it's not because you're a magician? I'd convinced myself more than once that you magicked me. But you were unconscious and weak, dying even, and I couldn’t finish you off, I had to save you." Those green eyes looked into his own, a soft confusion there.
"It's us. Together. It doesn't happen with anyone else." He touched the center of Bram's forehead, rubbing tiny circles, hoping to ease the worry. "Why did they send you to kill me? I'm no one."
Bram hummed slightly at his touch. "Your group committed treason. I was to kill you all. The Magician's Council was dissolved over this, all the wizards rounded up, processed so the Emperor would always know where you were, what you were up to."
"I didn't hurt anyone, Bram." He hadn't. He'd just done as Kan asked.
Bram shrugged. "I didn't put out the warrant, Quinn. I was just sent to carry it out."
He shivered a little, closed his eyes and sort of hid inside himself.
Bram tugged him close. "It's okay. I'm not going to let anyone hurt you, Quinn. You're safe now."
"I..." It ached, being without the magic, being so empty. Being scared. "Am I ever going to come back home again?"
Bram shook his head. "We have to find a new home now, Quinn. And before you get mad at me for forcing us to go on the run, I want to remind you that it was that or dead for you."
"You act like I did something wrong. Like I deserve this."
"That's not what I said." There was a hint of growl in Bram's voice.
He growled back, bristling, tired of running. "All my friends are dead. I didn't do anything wrong."
"The Emperor says you did. And that's all that matters. Because if you stay here? They'll send someone else to kill you and they won't wait around to listen to your arguments, now will they? You want to live? You'll come with me."
"I want to live. I could have given up anytime." He pushed himself out of the bed, tumbling to the floor with a surprised cry. Ow! His leg! Lord and Lady, it hurt so.
Bram growled and hauled him back up onto the bed. "You had a nasty piece of glass in your thigh. I doctored you up. Thought you were dead there for awhile."
"You found my supplies." It must have taken a few hours. His home was full of things.
Bram snorted. "Eventually."
Lady knew what else Bram had found -- books, toys, letters, mirrors. "They were where they belonged."
"You're a packrat," Bram told him. "An orderly room is a sign of a ready mind and body."
"Or a severe lack of imagination."
Bram put his head back and laughed. "Order is more important than imagination in the Guard."
"You're not in the Guard anymore. Not if you're running."
"No, I guess I'm not. I still like order."
"I should look through my books. My papers. Keep what I need."
"Don't keep more than you can c
arry, Quinn. My pack will be full of necessities." Bram might not be in the Guard anymore, but he sure was good with giving orders.
