Of One Mind

Tovvy tightened his fist, pulling on the tawny locks, and Caris was forced to tip his head back, to look up into his half-brother's face. "This is how it's going to be, little brother," Tovvy said quietly. "We're all going to go home, now. If you both come quiet, I'll even forgive the way you rudely ran off, and we'll start over, clean slate. Give me any trouble, and you'll wish you hadn't, understand?"

"Yes, Tovvy." Jereth's heart broke over the tears in Caris' voice.

Tovvy shifted his gaze to meet Jereth's. "You," he said, not bothering to disguise the menace in his tone. "For Caris' sake, I can't kill you -- but he won't die if you're only paralyzed for the rest of your days. I know how to break a man's back and keep him alive, so don't try any more of that running shit. You get me?"

Caris had closed his eyes, but the anguish in his face told Jereth all he needed to know about the sincerity of Tovvy's claim. "Yeah," he said softly. "I get it." There had to be some way out of this. Some way to alert... someone. Would the police go into Little Town even to rescue them?

Tovvy narrowed his eyes. "I don't think you believe me."

"I do."

Crack! It was like being hit with a baseball bat, even though Tovvy hadn't closed his fist. Jereth's head rocked so far back with the blow that his neck creaked, and he gasped at the pain. The world spun around him. Dimly, he was aware of Caris whimpering wordlessly. "Don't argue with me," Tovvy said evenly. "You don't believe me, or you think you can get away again. I'll show you different."

"Tovvy," Caris said. "He believes, he does! Don't--" Tovvy swung a similar blow in Caris' direction. Jereth cringed with the blow, though Caris took it silently. He only looked at Jereth, his eyes sharply green with fear, pleading for... something. Jereth did not know what.

"You're going to drop your shields for me," Tovvy told Jereth. "I'll show you, and then you'll know."

Horror slithered through Jereth's innards. Reveal his innermost thoughts to this? Not possible.

Tovvy grinned at Jereth's reaction. "You will," he promised cheerfully. "Everyone knows that a good fuck will open your doors, but enough pain will do the trick just as well. You know that?"

Jereth was trembling with rage and terror. He felt nauseous. "Don't."

Tovvy snapped his arm as easily as a twig. Searing, white-hot pain shot through Jereth, blinding in its intensity, washing all his shields and protections away. Caris shouted.

Tovvy's presence in his mind was even more loathsome than he'd expected it to be. Twisted and filthy and misshapen, it rasped through his thoughts so roughly that it nearly drowned the continuing shriek of pain in his arm. Tovvy threw images at him, one after another. Too fast for him to fully process, they nevertheless completed Jereth's understanding of Tovvy as utterly lacking in mercy, compassion, or sanity.

Get out, Jereth begged.

Tovvy threw an image at him: Ramie, his gentle features covered in blood, his limbs twisted. The soft exterior of his mind had been flayed away to reveal a core of pitted steel: his certainty that Caris had escaped. Tovvy had laughed as he quashed that certainty, snapping Ramie's mind before finally allowing him to die.

Anger stirred, and let itself be glimpsed under the morass of fear. Get OUT, Jereth snarled.

Tovvy laughed and showed him another, older image: Caris, bruised and bloodied, sobbing as Tovvy peeled through the layers of his mind like plucking the petals from a rose. Furious, Jereth shoved at Tovvy, and felt the bigger man's surprise at being moved. Heartened, Jereth drew himself inward for another push. Shrewdly, Tovvy twisted his broken arm. Jereth screamed.

Everything pulled into sharp focus, just for an instant, and then, mercifully, went black.