Daydreams And Nightshade (DaN #1)

Chapter 31: Pirate loving turnip

Noah felt everyone's gazes on his back. The soldiers had thought it a great idea to remove his shirt and give him a good old whipping like any decent torturer would, but they'd all gone quiet as soon as the shirt came off. Noah was quiet as well. He'd learned to suppress what his back looked like long ago and was not thrilled about digging into those memories again.

Much to his dismay the soldiers soon laughed, and he lowered his gaze to stare at his mud stained knees. Of course they'd laugh. He never would if he'd been in their position, but they clearly had other ideas of what counted as funny.

"Hey, come over here!" Calvez called over to the rest of the soldiers and Noah closed his eyes in resignation. Perfect. Everyone would get to see it.

"What the fuck?" Marteau laughed. "Did you do that, Calvez?"

"Nah, been healed for a long time. I told you fancy boys would be into fucked up shit."

Noah didn't care to defend himself. He wouldn't give them the pleasure of humiliating him more.

"Hey, how did this happen?" Calvez kicked Noah surprisingly gently in the side.

Noah gave him a brief, strained smile.
"You may not have noticed, but I'm not much of a talker." He could sense Winton wanted to object to this, but of course he said nothing. "Especially not about that."

He received a harder kick, causing him to wince.

"He's being nice." Marteau took over the interrogation. "Not even asking about your friends' location, so why don't you humor us? At least tell us who wrote it."

Noah said nothing, eventually leading to Calvez crouching down and forcing his head down on the ground.

"Why not tell us this probably humiliating story about those scars, and I won't beat the shit out of your friends." Calvez gestured at Winton and Cassius.

Marteau frowned.

"Calvez..."

Calvez looked up at Marteau with a shrug, saying something in Farcillian and Marteau rolled his eyes.

Noah looked at Cassius and Winton. He'd hate to tell the soldiers about that part of his past, but it would buy them time. Did he really have a choice?

Marteau eyed his soldiers and then let his narrowed gaze land on Noah, resting there for a bit while he seemingly pondered over something.

"Fine, you can tell your story."

Winton and Cassius looked equally surprised. Noah nodded, begrudgingly, and tried scratching his cheek against his shoulder while figuring out where to start.

"Can I... Cover my back again?" He figured that was as good of a start as any, but Marteau scoffed.

"No. Not until we know."

"Figures..." Noah muttered without looking up from the ground. "I was around eighteen I think. Yeah, or maybe a bit earlier. Somewhere around that age. But... First I should probably tell you about Finn."

Out of the corner of his eye Noah could spot Cassius perking up at the mention. He wanted to stop talking. Even though he'd planned on telling them about Finn, he'd also planned on leaving the last, shameful parts out.

"He was... Uh, Finn that is, he was... Someone I liked."

Calvez' grin widened as Noah searched for words.

"He was actually my sister's fiancé, although I was interested in him before that was decided."

"You have a sister," Calvez noted. "A good looking one?"

Even Marteau rolled his eyes at this.

"She's a sister looking one," Noah replied dryly. "At first I'd barely spoken to Finn, but it just felt like we connected somehow. Once I began attending school I saw him a lot more though and..." Noah chewed his lip in thought. "... I suppose I may have made sure we'd run into each other more than we probably would have. He's two years older and studied different subjects so I had to figure out when he'd be where and... And so on."

"You were a creep," Marteau confirmed, and Calvez grinned at his superior.

Noah couldn't deny it, regardless of how hypocritical it seemed for someone like Marteau to be telling him that. His behavior had seemed fine to a love-struck eighteen year old but it had gradually dawned on him just how weird it'd been.

"Yes, well... I got to pay for it a bit at least. The further into the school year we got, the more I was noticed by two other boys. Lawrence, the son of a judge, and Duncan, the son of our local butcher. They were in the same class as Finn and weren't quite so oblivious to my affection towards him so... They let me hear it a lot. Amongst other things they liked to tease me about that is."

"Such as?" Marteau wanted to know.

"My weight for a start. I had an affinity for sweets... Still do, but not quite so much. Err, and I guess they low key implied I'd be a worthless town chief.  They pushed me around, trying to get me to stand up for myself, but as soon as I tried they'd beat me up, so that was... Interesting. Things like that anyway."

"Were they the ones who carved those words into your back?"

Noah had already managed to suppress the reason he was telling his story and frowned.

"I'll get to my scars. I just want Cas and Winton to know why certain things happened before that." He took a deep breath before continuing. "So regardless of their bullying, I did grow closer to Finn. We, uh... Mostly talked about our families and the people in town at first. It turned out we didn't have too many interests in common but I enjoyed his company, and he was one of the few who didn't make fun of me. He didn't even seem to care about the rumors going around in town about my oddity, and I could only ask for so—"

"What oddity?"

Noah looked up at his audience, everyone having either tilted their heads or knitted their eyebrows. Even Deshayes, who'd adamantly stayed by the horses, was curiously gazing in their direction.

Noah wanted to groan.

"It's... Not important. I was considered odd by most of the townspeople, let's leave it at that. Anyway, Finn wasn't one of them, and his company was refreshing." Noah smiled. "I still remember the first time he walked with me after we'd been to school. It was Ilara's day and he offered to keep me company to the sanctuary."

"Does this even have anything to do with your scars?" Calvez looked uncannily frustrated by now, and Noah figured he'd have to blend in some rather humiliating things now and then to keep the soldiers satiated. If he managed things well, he'd be able to keep them calm for a long time, considering how many humiliating things he'd been through.

Still, he wished to be lucky enough to not have to talk about it.

He sat up more comfortably and, lacking other options, tried to send a telepathic message to Alexei. Something along the lines of 'get your butt over here and save us you pirate loving turnip'.

Then he turned to face Calvez again while mentally preparing for a long day of embarrassment.