"Come, child. Let me help you to your bed and have a bath prepared. Do you wish to have a maid help bathe you?"
"No." The last thing he wanted was another pair of hands on his body, especially since he could still feel the evidence of the guard's intrusion sliding out of him. If anyone else bathed him, they'd know what had happened.
"All right. I shouldn't have been so harsh to you. Had I known you were really ill, I wouldn't have been."
Maybe you should listen when I try to tell you something, old man.
But he never did.
"Father!" Ryssa snapped as she saw them on the stairs. "How is he to learn any lesson while you coddle him so?"
"Enough, kitten. Your brother is severely ill. I can feel his fever radiating through his clothes and mine. You should have pity for him."
"What I pity is this empire when he sits on your throne."
Styxx glared at her.
"Father, he's threatening me again."
His father paused beside her. "How so?"
"The way he looked at me just now. Like he could go through me."
"You would do well to remember that one day, he will be your king, kitten. And he conducted himself with honor today. He walked to the scold without aid and gave no complaint." Looking down, he tightened his arms around him. "I'm proud of you, Styxx."
Great. After all I've done to please you, it's my rape that makes you proud.
Bloody figures.
Styxx couldn't meet his father's gaze. Not when he could still feel the scold's groping hands. He tried to pull away, but his father tightened his grip. It took every ounce of will not to break at the memories that stirred.
"Please, Father, I need to lie down for a while." He choked on another spasm.
His father finally quickened the pace and got him to his room just in time for him to reach the chamber pot.
"Should I send for a physician?"
"No ... I'll be fine. I just need to be alone." Styxx started to sit then thought better of it. Between the beating and other matters, he wasn't sure if he'd ever be able to sit again.
"Let me know if you need anything." Finally his father retreated.
Styxx crawled onto his bed and slowly lowered himself down. Closing his eyes, he tried to imagine another life. One where he was welcomed with a loving hand that never turned violent on him. One where no one hated him without cause ...
In his mind, he saw the image of a woman. She would be as sweet as the morning sun, with the voice of a songbird. And she would smile whenever he approached her. A real smile that said she enjoyed his company ...
Not his title.
But he knew that dream would never come to him. Commoners married for love. Princes married for alliances. His marriage would be negotiated and he'd be lucky if she tolerated him long enough to conceive his heir. The only real friend he'd ever known in his entire life was locked away in Atlantis, suffering endless days like this one.
How do I get us out of this?
There was only one answer. If he could heal enough to ride by the morning, he would be able to get to Atlantis before Estes did. Hopefully his uncle and his friends would take their time returning home.
He could free Acheron and then they'd ... do something. It didn't matter what. The goal was to get them both out of this torment and find a place where the world would just leave them in peace.
But even as he had the thought, he couldn't help wondering if such a place existed.
September 8, 9533 BC
Damn it, Estes, how many rooms are in your home?
The number seemed to be infinite. His uncle's villa was even larger than their primary palace in Didymos. Worse, Estes had a full staff of servants and guards Styxx had to avoid. Since it was well after midnight, no one should be awake. Yet there were a number of maids and men walking about.
But what sickened him was the reason for all the rooms. The majority of the ones he'd searched had been set up as sex playrooms with different themes and props. And every time he opened one, his heart broke more at what had been done to Acheron.
I hate you, Father.
No human being should be reduced to this. Especially not his brother.
Styxx snuck to another door and pressed his ear against it to listen. He didn't hear anyone inside it, either. Looking right and left, he slowly, carefully pushed it open. When he didn't see anyone, he slid inside to double-check. Like the others, it was set up with sexual holding racks and a large bed near an oversized fireplace.
He approached the bed then froze. There in the center of it lay Acheron, peacefully sleeping on his stomach. That sight slammed him back to their childhood when he'd sneak into Acheron's room at night to talk, play, or sleep. Whenever he was alone in his bed, Acheron slept in that position. But he'd never slept like that when they were together.
An overwhelming urge to curl up at his brother's back and press his feet to Acheron's went through him. And in its wake was a brutal pain for what they'd both lost these past years.
Innocent brotherly love.
Friendship.
Two things he didn't know if they'd still have or not. But the one thing he couldn't deny was how much his brother meant to him. How much he loved Acheron.
Forever and always.
Yet the man on that bed right now was a complete stranger to him. The changes in Acheron's body slapped him with a harsh dose of cold, disturbing reality. Funny how, even though he was well aware of the changes in his own body over the years, he'd come here expecting to see the same young brother who'd been taken.
But that wasn't what he found.