Title: Snuffed
Author: elfin
Email: elfin@b...
Homepage: http://www.sundive.co.uk/
Rating: NC-17
Fandom: Forever Knight/The Serpent's Kiss
Pairing: Chrome/Fitz LaCroix/Chrome (kinda)
Archive: just ask!
Warnings: RAPE WARNING
Summary: Scared of being revealed, Fitz imprisons Chrome
Thanks to: Tomy for beta reading after my usual notice!
Disclaimer: characters are beloved creations of and copyright James D. Parriott and Barney Cohen (Forever Knight) & Tim Rose Price (The Serpent's Kiss)

Fitz had kept him a prisoner in our home. I had no idea why. But where I had once harboured romantic motions for my cousin, I was now terrified of him. But with Thomas away, I was powerless to do anything to stop him, as much as I wished to. Night after night, that cursed man would go down into the dark recesses of the house and torture young Chrome until we could hear him screaming.

Sometimes, I would catch a glimpse of his laundry before the servants had time to wash it. It would be stained with blood, and other bodily fluids I just couldn’t bear to think about. For weeks, I only heard Chrome, never saw him. After everything I’d heard, I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to look him in the eyes again. My dreams turned to nightmares, haunted by his terrified cries and agonised yells into the dark. I could only guess what Fitz was doing to the young man I’d loved and I hated myself for not doing anything. My cousin was a cruel man. He was capable of much violence.

He had taken over since the storm had all but destroyed the garden. I had started to worry that Fitz was holding something over the great garden designer, but the harder Chrome had worked to restore the garden, the more jealous Fitz had become until that terrible night. I heard a commotion on the stairs, and when I went out to investigate, I saw Fitz dragging Chrome along the corridor by his hair. The young man was fighting, kicking and punching his kidnapper. But Fitz was strong and determined, and that was the last time I saw the beautiful young Dutchman. For weeks, we suffered. Anne was being torn apart by the screams of the man she too had fallen in love with. And yet, there was no one else in the house I could turn to, and Fitz kept Chrome locked up at all times.

And then, one night, as Chrome’s bright cries echoed through the house, the heavy front door swung open and crashed against the wall. A man stood in the doorway. Tall and pale, he was a frightening silhouette against the black sky outside. I stood, rising from my chair in front of the fire and venturing out into the hallway.

“Good evening, Sir, is there something we can… do for you?”

But already he was moving, almost silently, through the house to the door at the back. Throwing it open, the now muffled cries became louder, closer. I shivered, and followed him.

“Sir?” I tried again, even now, knowing that I would get no answer from him.

We climbed down into the damp cellars of the house, and as we went the terrible cries got more pitiful, more painful to hear. He hurried on, going straight for the wooden door at the end of the long corridor. From the sound it made when he opened it, it had been locked from the inside. No bolt was going to stop him. As the candlelight flooded the long passage, I saw them there in the room, and my nightmares turned into reality before my very eyes. On the hard, bare wooden table, my cousin was sodomizing Chrome.

The young man was lying on his front, his wrists bound at the small of his back. His shirt was torn and bloodied, wounds on his once-perfect body had been inflicted weeks ago and were infected now. His face was red with blood and tears, new and old. He looked, to me, limp upon the table, moving only with the force of his rapist’s thrusts. The expression on Fitz’s face was one of ferocious delight at the pain he was causing.

His head snapped up when the tall stranger hurled open the door. And I saw with triumph the fear in his eyes, saw it start to override the sick pleasure of taking another against his will. The stranger flew to Fitz’s side and pulled him away from Chrome. Pulling his head back hard, I watched as the pale man sank his wicked teeth into Fitz’s neck and… drank. Fitz screamed and struggled. But his fight was in vain and his cries soon turned to gurgles. I didn’t understand what was happening until the pale stranger lifted his head and let the body of his victim crumple to the ground. The amber light from the candles caught on the drops of blood that clung to the points of his two elongated teeth.

I felt my pulse start to race at that sight, and I know I didn’t imagine it. But in the next moment, as he untied Chrome’s bounds with ease, he looked human once again. Shrugging off his long, thick coat, he covered the inert form on the table, before lifting Chrome into his arms with infinite tenderness. The chestnut-blond head lolled to the tall stranger’s shoulder and I watched as once-sparkling blue eyes opened to look upon the face of his rescuer.

“Please… take me… away from here.”

The patrician head nodded.

“Don’t worry, mon cher, I will look after you.”

And holding his ward as if he were the most precious cargo on God’s Earth, the stranger carried him up the steps and out of the house, away from us forever.

fin