Growing Pains: Chapter 5

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The rattle of the bars roused Milarose enough that he opened his eyes, but he did not stir. He hadn’t been asleep—he hadn’t slept in what felt like weeks, but could only have been days. His exhaustion had left him weak, but his thoughts would not allow his mind to rest. He hadn’t seen Icarus since the kainu was led down the hallway, and wasn't entirely sure he had seen him at all. But every time he pictured the scene, he remembered the anxious disbelief that he’d seen in Icarus’s eyes and was convinced anew that he had, in fact, seen him here. 

At first, Milarose had been convinced Icarus was here to save him, but that had been a desperate hope—a child’s wish, useless to him here in the real world. No one was coming to save him, if he was to leave this place he would have to do it by his own merit. But then a thought occurred to him, a terrible thought that he had dismissed out of hand, but he could not forget having had it. Did Icarus work for these people? 

He hated to even consider it, because he had put so much trust in the kainu by letting him get as close as he did. But Icarus spent his life travelling from place to place, keeping record of all the drakiri he came into contact with. Wasn’t that what Icarus had told him? That he kept journals? What if those journals hadn’t been for his own personal use, but rather ledgers for a place like this? He’d seen the crossbreed with the horrifying teeth in his throat and belly with a ledger, was it so much of a stretch? 

“Get up,” growled a disgustingly familiar voice. 

“I will not,” Milarose said, his voice low and unaffected by emotion. They weren’t worth what little he had left. 

“Then I will drag you by your throat,” Lamashtu growled. 

“By all means,” Milarose said with a lazy twitch of his hand. “You’ll not get me out of this cell otherwise.” 

The door slid open and Milarose expected to feel the sharp pain of teeth in his hide once more. Instead he heard the gentle scrape of claws against concrete, smelled the scent of dracus and warm fur. He looked up once more to see Esperanza in the cell with him, standing closer to the door where she had to place her feet carefully. There wasn’t much room with the two of them in there, as the cell was hardly big enough to fit one dracus. 

“Then I shall come to you,” the dracus said. She settled on her haunches and placed her hand on his flank, running her fingers through his fur and sliding them up over the ball of his shoulder where the white fur was clumped and matted with dry blood and scabs. “You will stain your pretty white fur this way.” 

“Is that how yours got the red ticks?” Milarose said, studying the dracus warily. He didn’t trust her as far as he could throw her, but she was the only one who had shown any interest in keeping him healthy. Even if it was simply expected of her. 

“Ah you noticed,” she said with a smile, her accented voice sweet and uplifting. “I was born with it, it is a marking they call mane tips, not very imaginative in my opinion but it is descriptive at the least.” 

“They’ve named markings?” Milarose asked, grimacing as she passed her fingers over the wound on his shoulder. 

“They’ve done more than you could imagine,” Esperanza said in a voice that sounded almost reverent. It unnerves Milarose and he wanted to pull away from her, but laid out on the floor with the other dracus hovering over him, there was nowhere for him to go. “I can take the pain away. Would you like me to?” 

Milarose was quiet for a long moment, blue eyes meeting those of the healer. “There’ll just be more,” he said. 

“There will always be more pain,” Esperanza said, reaching out to guide his whisker away from where it was kinked under his neck. He hadn’t even noticed that half of it was entirely numb until the blood rushed back into it, causing a pins and needles sensation. “But I can relieve what there is now. If you stop fighting it will be easier.” 

“If I stop fighting, I will be dead,” Milarose countered. 

She smoothed her hand up his neck and then back down to his shoulder as she considered what to say. “Is that not what you have wanted?” she asked. “A dracus does not so easily invite death when he faces adversity. Thrice now you have asked for death. Would it not be easier for you to give in and die in this way? Or do you only accept death on your terms?” 

Milarose let his head rest back against the cold concrete, the will to argue seeping away into it as fast as it stole the warmth from his body. He said, “Do what you will. I can’t stop you.” 

Esperanza closed her eyes and sighed slowly, but she reached forward to place her hand over Milarose’s chest. Her touch stung him, as her fingers rested against the ruined skin where his scale had been. He closed his own eyes and lifted his nose so his face was turned away as far as it could go. 

Even through his closed eyelids, he saw the violet light. It was bright enough to hurt his eyes and he felt a rippling, agonizing prickling sensation under his skin that made him tense. His heartbeat quickened, his legs strained as he tried to back away, though he only found Esperanza’s body to rest his feet against to try to push himself across the floor. It didn’t work, and he took a gasping breath before he grit his teeth and leaned his head back. 

The exhaustion was worse than the pain that lingered after the light died away. His mind felt numb, his body leaden. He couldn’t have stood now if he’d wanted to. His arms and legs fell away from Esperanza as she leaned over him, put her mouth close to his cheek until he felt her warm, sweet breath tickle the fur inside his ear. 

“We must talk in private. I will request an examination with you in one of the private rooms, do not refuse,” she breathed, her voice hardly audible even that close to him. 

It was all he could do to keep his eyes open and breathe properly, let alone react to the idea of a covert meeting. 

Esperanza pulled away from him and ran her fingers over his chest. It didn’t hurt this time, and in fact felt as Milarose had expected it would. 

“Your scales are healed,” she said. “I told you before they would not grow back right. Not without my intervention. This magic has saved lives…do not take it for granted. Do not discard what it has done for you. It has saved your life, do not throw it away so easily.” 

She was gone as quickly as she had come, and Milarose watched out of the corner of his eye as Lasmashtu locked the door behind the dracus and followed her down the hallway. 

His head spun as he finally sagged against the floor. The pain was gone, and when finally he found the strength to lift his hand, he touched his chest and found the scales that had been damaged and gone had grown back as if nothing had ever happened to them. He was surprised, and he felt along his shoulder expecting to find the ruined flesh there, only to find smooth scales and skin. Even his hind leg responded when he moved it. Like nothing had happened…

He could hardly believe that magic like this still existed. He knew so little about the magic his people could do, hell he knew precious little about his people in general. Milarose had spent his life running from his family, from his past, but it always seemed to come around and bite him when he least expected it. 

Milarose finally slept after that encounter, but it was an uneasy sleep full of disturbing flashes of ivory teeth and the gleam of eyes watching him from the darkness behind his eyelids. His dreams were short-lived, as if they began but were plucked away like feathers from a bird. 

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