Caffeine and Magix

corvidprompts:

“All in all, you truly don’t mean anything to the rest of the world. I’m the only one who truly cares for you. Not the symbol you bear, but you” the antagonist cooes, cupping the protagonists cheek.

(Tagged with dark, creepy, possessive character. And just kinda sad and scary)

Jason doesn’t remember what he looks like. The days pass by in long smears of darkness, of words grating up his throat, of his hands clenched too tightly around his sword, of lights going out and out and out. Mirrors don’t reflect his russet skin, his buzzed hair, his strong nose, his full lips. Instead they yawn in front of him, eternities of endless space with no stars and no trace of his brown eyes.

He watches the world like sand passing through his fingers and wonders why they think he can save anyone. Because he’s a prince? The prince? Because his father never wanted him on the throne–and yet here he is? Or maybe it’s because of that damned prophecy Gilbert, the court sorcerer, once whispered over his head as a baby.

The people have always loved Gilbert. Immortal and timeless Gilbert who’s been a constant leader in their lives, their parents’ lives, their grandparents’ lives. 

How much more blood would stain Jason’s hands if they knew? The Sorcerer’s Council–the highest magical body in the land– is only their ally because they think Jason has Gilbert’s full support. They provide aid to the parts of the country Jason’s limited army can’t reach, they hold the borders against the monsters and the hungry thrones beyond the sea, they do what Jason can’t since his father fucked off with nearly the entire army to fight a useless war for land.

Jason breathes deeply through his nose, eyes fluttering shut, as he tries to push the black feelings down and down and down.

His father may still be King, but Jason is the one who sits on the throne in his absence. And he’s got work to do.

————————————————————————

“The people are calling for a coup,” Gilbert says from the shadows of Jason’s office. Jason doesn’t even look up from his reports, though he’s no longer reading them. The letters had started swimming hours ago and it’s only been through sheer force of will that Jason has even attempted to make sense of the pages in front of him. “They want you to be King.”

“You know why I can’t do that,” Jason says. He signs off on a diplomatic meeting between his country and their neighbors to the south and then looks up, leaning back in his chair. “Father would just turn around and kill us all. He’s got control of the army. I thought you were staying out of this.”

Gilbert’s long, black hair slides across his shoulders  as he leans forward to tap Jason’s finished paperwork. “I’m staying out of this.” A small smile flashes across his face. “Well, until you ask that is.”

When he was younger, Jason hated Gilbert. Hated how it was his prophecy that led Jason to growing up in a tower, in exile, all alone. 

Now?

Now Jason clings tightly to his duty so he doesn’t fall into the sorcerer’s trap. Like his father did. And his mother before him. Like every member of the royal family for the past three hundred years. The compassion, the desire, is a lie designed to lure people like them, after all.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Gilbert says. “I’m being genuine, Jason. You know I am.”

“Don’t read my mind,” Jason says by habit. He shakes his head. “You were genuine with my father too. And it drove him mad.”

“He didn’t grow up the way I imagined,” Gilbert admits freely. He glides to the chair across from Jason and lounges there. Today he’s in commoner’s garb, linen pants and shirt, rather than his sorcerer’s robe. “But you’re different, Jason. Like I’ve said before. You’re special.”

Jason can’t help the way his jaw clenches at the word. Special. Different. Like that makes him worth anything. 

“Oh, darling,” Gilbert coos. He stands in a swirl of motion and is behind Jason’s chair in a second, arms and long hair sliding over Jason’s shoulders. “I’m clearly not doing my job if you doubt for a second how special you are. How worthy you are. I’ve waited centuries for you, Jason.”

Jason is frozen under Gilbert’s touch. “I told you not to read my mind.”

“Well, I have to,” Gilbert says. “You won’t tell me anything.”

“You’re not the Court Sorcerer anymore,” Jason says. His lips barely move. He feels like…prey. It’s a familiar feeling. “No matter what the rest of the world thinks. My secrets are my own.” I must protect my country.

Gilbert sighs, his breath brushing along Jason’s cheek. “So fierce. You can keep your country’s secrets, Jason, I already told you I wouldn’t meddle unless you asked.”

“I haven’t asked,” Jason says. He reminds himself, My people need me to be strong.

He’s not surprised when Gilbert laughs.

“All in all, you truly don’t mean anything to them,” he says. He sounds fond. Warm. “I’m the only one who truly cares for you. Not the symbol you bear, but you.”

“What do you want, Gilbert.” It’s not a question–it’s a tired statement. They both know what it is that Gilbert wants, but neither has said it out loud. Not yet.

“I want you to trust me,” Gilbert breathes. “What can I do to make you trust me?”

A flash of memory: Jason’s father screaming for Gilbert to appear, to lay a spell on a disobedient lord. His father mad with madness, hair in disarray, robes slipping off his thin shoulders as he bayed for blood.

A thought: His grandmother died with Gilbert’s name on her lips and a timeless rose digging its thorns into her palms.

Gilbert’s arms tighten around Jason, pinning him to the back of his chair.

“You won’t end up like them,” Gilbert says. There’s something hard in his voice, something close to the dark beast Gilbert pretends not to be. “I told you. You’re different.”

Jason looks straight ahead, across the dark room, and carefully doesn’t say a damn thing.

—————————————————

Power is a drug. There’s a reason rulers are groomed from birth. They must resist the draw of personal power and only exercise their Royal will. Every step must be for the country.

Even without the prophecy (that damned prophecy), Jason knows that.

Gilbert is an immortal. He’s spent centuries cultivating his power and then centuries more cultivating Royals. Jason’s read things that Gilbert doesn’t know about, diaries of ages long past where his ancestors knew Gilbert for what he was.

Seductive. Immortal. Powerful.

Lonely.

Jason’s great grandfather was drawn in with seduction. The promise of understanding and love and romance that his kingdom could never provide for him. Not like Gilbert.

Jason’s grandmother fell to the lure of immortality. She saw eons with Gilbert and took the thorns of time into her own heart, not realizing that the cost was her humanity.

Jason’s father fell to the draw of power (the old fool). He asked too much of dark magic, forgetting his mortal body, and it changed him. Twisted him. He’s still out there, fighting and fighting, not realizing that there’s no more power coming from his “dedicated” servant.

Jason knows what will get him in the end. He carefully doesn’t think about it, turns his mind to reports and battle plans and facades he must maintain to rule without the crown on his head.

But, deep in his heart, Jason remembers the tower of stone that he spent his childhood in, a tower that Gilbert doesn’t know about (will never know about). 

Jason knows lonely. And that’s why he’s not different or special or strong.

Because, one day, he’ll fall too.

————————————————————-

(It’s a mean fate. Gilbert covets what he can keep, until he’s allowed to keep it. Then he burns it.)

(Jason has dreamed of flames since he watched his mother die a hundred feet in the air, a hundred miles away from anyone who might hear a little boy screaming.)

——————————————————————

“You allied with Floidan,” Gilbert hisses. It’s been weeks since he’s last appeared in Court, but that doesn’t mean his presence is surprised. “Floidan. Are you an idiot?”

Jason, on his father’s throne and very aware of how alone they are, looks down at Gilbert tiredly. “Yes.”

That stops Gilbert for a moment, his robes swirling around his feet. Then his expression turns thunderous. “You know.”

“Yes,” Jason says again. He doesn’t move his hands from the arms of the throne, doesn’t appear to notice the lack of weight on his head. “They’ll supply us with winter aid. They’ll support the army’s return home. Then, when my father is buried, they will consume us.”

Electricity cracks between them as their eyes meet, calm brown to enraged blue.

“Ask me to help,” Gilbert bites out with gritted teeth. “Ask me to stop this insane path you’ve set us on.”

Jason stands, the royal cape (no crown) weighing heavy on his shoulders. “You know I won’t do that.”

There’s a flash and Gilbert is behind him, teeth bared. He takes Jason to the ground, hands fisted in the front of his purple tunic. “Ask me.”

Jason’s hands wrap around Gilbert’s wrists, but he doesn’t even try to get the sorcerer off of him. He doubts he could. “My father is dead. We can’t afford the rebellion the lords are planning and our stores are dangerously low. Floidan may be a conqueror, but they’re a fair conqueror. It’s the only way.”

“You’re supposed to be the Lion Prince,” Gilbert hisses. “You know your destiny. You’ve known it for your entire life. Why are you spitting on what you could be? What you’re supposed to be?”

“Because I’m the King,” Jason says. It’s the first time since news of his father’s death reached him that he’s said it. He smiles, bitter sweet. A life’s ambition achieved and it’s over before it starts. “It is my duty to provide for my people. To ensure their continued and prosperous future.” He leans up, using Gilbert’s grip so that their faces are inches apart. “A Prince fights for his country. A King saves it.”

Gilbert stares at him for a long, tense moment. Then he bursts into laughter. “A King! A King indeed.” He shoves away from Jason, sits down on the ground so that their legs are tangled, and grins a cruel flash of teeth. “A King. Damned prophecies, they never mean what you want them to.”

Jason sits up, rubbing his collarbones where Gilbert’s bruised them. He watches Gilbert carefully, not trusting the smile at all.

He’s right not too.

“You realize that this doesn’t mean you’ve escaped me,” Gilbert says, still smiling. There’s something flat behind it, dead and tense. Hungry. “I told you, Jason. You’re different. And with the royal line ending, you’ve quite forced my hand. I refuse to start over.”

“I wasn’t trying to escape you,” Jason says. He meets Gilbert’s eyes so he can read the truth in his. “Quite the opposite.”

Gilbert is very, very still. “Excuse me?”

Jason sighs and stands. He reaches down to Gilbert, helps him up. “Walk with me, Gilbert. It’s time we talk.”

Gilbert follows him silently.

———————————

Jason leads him off the castle grounds and to the stables. There they mount up, both silent as Jason turns his horse to the forest. Behind them, the castle goes about its day, unaware that there will soon be a Floidan lord there to oversee it all.

About an hour into their journey, Gilbert breaks the silence. “You said you weren’t trying to escape. You said the opposite.”

“I did,” Jason says. There’s tension slipping from his shoulders, something more relaxed about him in the forest. “I also said it’s time we talk.” His lips quirk. “You said that I don’t talk to you enough.”

“You don’t,” Gilbert says, eyes narrow.

“Well,” Jason says, “let me tell you a story.” He turns on his horse and smiles at Gilbert, an expression he’s never showed the sorcerer before. “Your story.”

Gilbert watches him with dark eyes, mouth pressed into a thin, thin line.

“Once upon a time,” Jason says because he can afford to joke now, he can afford to relax, “there was a powerful sorcerer. He was so powerful that it was said no man, creature or spirit could touch him.” Jason watches the tries slide past them. “Not even time.”

“Sounds wonderful,” Gilbert says with bloodless lips.

Jason hums. “It was for a time, I imagine. Youth and beauty and power. But as the decades, and then centuries, went by, he grew disenchanted with eternity. he sought ways to ease the years. Hobbies. Skills. Companionship. Companionship softened the years the most, but no matter how long he searched, he never found someone as timeless as he was, nor as strong in the face of the yawning years ahead.”

“Where did you learn this?” Gilbert asks.

“One day, the immortal sorcerer found a creature with potential,” Jason continues as if he didn’t hear the question. “Not immortal, no, but possessing the potential to become just as the sorcerer had once become. He gave to them years, but the strain became too much. They broke under his power, just as he feared they would, and he was left alone. Devastated. Until he came up with an idea. A terrible, dark idea that the man he once was would never have considered. But the years were so long and so lonely that the sorcerer couldn’t resist. He couldn’t even try.”

Gilbert’s eyes are filled with fire. “I tried.”

Jason ignores him. “He began a little experiment. He took people with potential and gave them mortal power. A kingdom. He tested their minds, gave them the strain of war and famine and plague, encouraging each successor to be stronger than the last. Stronger and stronger from generation to generation. But, still, he thought, the strain was too much as he watched each man and woman break.”

Gilbert’s reins are cutting into his hands and the horse underneath him is starting to get nervous as his anger rises. “Thought the strain was too much? You’ve seen it, Jason, it’s always too much.”

For the first time since the beginning of his story, Jason looks at Gilbert from the corner of his eyes. “No, it isn’t. You’ve been successful for the past three generations, Gilbert. My father and grandmother could bear the years. What they couldn’t bear was you.”

“Me?” Gilbert spits out, twisting in his saddle violently so he can gnash his teeth at Jason. “Me?! I gave them immortality! Power! Everything! It was their weakness that drove them to madness, I gave them everything and they couldn’t even manage to keep their minds!”

The air is hot around them, the horses restless underneath them, but Jason is calm. Gilbert is trapped here; he can’t kill Jason. “You lied to them, Gilbert. They believed you and that’s what killed them both.”

“I don’t lie,” Gilbert hisses.

Jason watches the trees thin around them. “You do. You told them that they had everything to gain from loving you. From staying with you. You told them that you needed nothing in return and that they wouldn’t lose anything.”

“They didn’t,” Gilbert says. “I gave your grandmother beauty and immortality. I gave your father magic and power. They had everything they wanted.”

“But you didn’t,” Jason says. “You were still lonely.”

The trees break and they’re left blinking into the sudden sun. When the spots clear from their eyes, they see that they’re in a clearing filled with wild flowers. In the center of the clearing is a tall, stone tower.

“Where are we?” Gilbert asks.

Jason dismounts and holds Gilbert’s reins so he can do the same. “You gave and gave, not understanding that them needing you wasn’t the same as being with you. You’re addictive Gilbert. Powerful. Beautiful. And the more you gave them, the more they needed until…well, until you ended up here. With me.”

“So it’s my fault?” Gilbert asks. His eyes keep flicking to the tower and to Jason, over and over again. “What is this place?”

“I used to think it was your fault,” Jason muses. “The prophecy didn’t help. But now I know it’s no one’s fault. Our environment makes us, Gilbert, and as much as you controlled my family’s, you never managed to control your own.” He ties the horses to a low branch and then turns, looking at the tower with soft eyes. “This is where I grew up, Gilbert. This is my home.”

Gilbert takes a step forward. Then he stops, shaking his head. “No. No. You grew up in the castle. Your father put you and your mother in the west wing–”

“That’s what he told you,” Jason says. “He’d seen how you turned from his mother to him when she went mad. He saw how you stopped giving to her and started giving to him in the hopes that he wouldn’t leave you.  And he knew that, one day, you’d turn from him to me, the little prince with the prophecy. So he locked my mother and I here for fifteen years. Until the kingdom needed a prince.”

Gilbert’s eyes rake over the old stone. “There’s no door.”

“No,” Jason agrees. “A messenger brought food for two every week. Until Mother died, anyway. Then he only brought food for one.” His lips curl up on one side. “He wouldn’t even take her body. I had to throw her out the window when it started making me sick.”

“I didn’t know,” Gilbert says. There are too many emotions in his voice for Jason to sort. Horror? Apology? Anger? “I didn’t know.”

Jason hums and leans against a tree, arms crossed. “She used to tell me about you. She thought you were the devil, you know. She brought the diaries of my ancestors when we were sent here to study you. She was determined that I wouldn’t end up like my father. Like my grandmother. I never agreed with her though. I thought you were quite a bit like me, actually.”

“Cursed?” Gilbert asks. There’s loathing in that word. Shame and hatred. It makes Jason’s heart ache because he remembers a time when he thought the same.

“No,” Jason says. “Lonely.” He pushes off the tree and comes to stand in front of Gilbert. “That’s when I decided that I’d be the one to survive. That no matter what we became to each other– family, friends, enemies, or lovers– we’d be together. For eternity.”

Gilbert’s eyes are wide. “You– you planned for this? All this time? But you–you–”

“Acted like I wasn’t going to give in?” Jason supplies. “I had to for this to work. You don’t realize it, Gilbert, but you’re like fire. You had my grandmother and my father, but you didn’t want them when they broke. You went onto the next in line every time, never stopping to mourn, just consuming and consuming. It ends with me. It was always going to end with me.”

Gilbert, for all his loneliness, doesn’t like being cornered.

“And when you break?” Gilbert asks, baring his teeth. “What then?”

“There won’t be a then,” Jason says. He’s still relaxed. Easy. 

“How do you know?” Gilbert’s hands fist and his eyes are sharp. “You’ve ended my ‘experiment’ as you say. What am I supposed to do when you go mad?”

“I imagine you’ll finally break,” Jason says, nonchalant. “But I don’t think it’ll come to that.”

“You’re willing to risk an insane sorcerer,” Gilbert says. He takes a step towards him, fierce, not realizing how close it puts him to Jason. “I’ll keep you, of course, but when you break, I will destroy your country and all this will have been for nothing. Your little self sacrifice will mean nothing.”

Jason watches him. Then smiles. “My mother tried to kill me to save me from you. I broke when I sacrificed her for us.” He looms over Gilbert, rolls his hands over the man’s shoulders until he’s caged in his arms, frozen like Jason used to be. “All I ever wanted was to not be alone. You’re immortal, Gilbert, and soon I will be too. Alone won’t be an option.”

“What,” Gilbert says, “do you want?” He’s testing the waters, looking at Jason as if it’s the first time he’s seeing him. In a lot of ways, it is. 

It’s the first time Jason’s shown him that he can be a monster too.

“So used to giving,” Jason murmurs. “Be careful; I’ll take advantage of that.” He can feel Gilbert’s muscles jump under his palms at the darkness in his voice. “As for what I want? I want you, Gilbert. I thought that was rather obvious.”

Slowly (slowly) Gilbert relaxes. Lets his fists falls.  Let’s his desire for companionship tentatively rise. But doesn’t reach for Jason, not yet. “You don’t understand eternity. Not yet. You’ll change your mind.”

 Jason hums agreement. “Maybe. But now that you’ve gotten what you want, who’s to say you won’t regret it either? I’ve been trapped with someone before, you know. It can drive you a different sort of mad than loneliness.”

“You haven’t tasted lonely,” Gilbert says. His hands gingerly creep up Jason’s back, some of his confidence seeping back in. His fingers turn to claws against Jason’t back. “Not like I have.”

“So let’s make it a competition, Gilbert. Who’ll break first? Me?” Jason lowers his head until he’s looking directly into Gilbert’s eyes, noses touching. “Or you?”

“Only one way to find out,” Gilbert says and gives Jason years and years and years.