This is the third installment of Given and Taken.
Feedback is always appreciated. Thank you.
-thegirlinthecrowd
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Finally everything made sense to Elijah. The horror of the mountain was indeed a beast, a deadly one that could easily rape and pillage the town. The sacrifice was meant as a way to feed it. When one died, they brought him another one. Eli stopped himself. Not him. It.
He was the sacrifice. He had been over this countless times in his head... but he had never considered the fact that the beast would... f...f....feed on h....him.
Eli had no tears left to shed, so he just lay there, pressed up against the wall of the tunnel hyperventilating. He had reached a dead end before he collapsed, utterly lost in the intricate design of the passage ways.
He thought back to his previous life. He thought of his mother and father, caring, loving and guarding. He was their only child, and yet after just 18 years he was pulled from their grasp. He thought of his friends, of his childhood in the village and of his small, warm house...
There was a sharp contrast between that memory, and the cold, damp loneliness of his current surroundings.
Slavery. That's what it was. He was slave to the cold, slave to the damp, slave to the hopelessness that this would be the rest of his life. He couldn't do this. He couldn't say in this darkness for the next 50 years or longer until he died... or until the beast got bored of him and killed him. His life would be hell... Eat, sleep and get bit, over and over, day after day... the thoughts drove him mad. What of this "sexual submission" as well? He thought back to what had transpired between the two of them only minutes previous. That was only the beginning. The beast would rape him, fuck him, beat him, torture him... it made him want to shiver, scream and cry thinking of what would be like. He couldn't take that.
Eli was blindly seeing his situation. He was blind to the gentleness of Alistair, blind to his patience and blind to both of their emotions. He felt shame at the way he shivered under Alistair's touch, under his care. He felt sick when he thought of how good it made him feel... He was blind to his need, simply because he didn't feel he could fulfill the need of another.
Eli saw only one other way out.
"Kill me" he said, his voice surprisingly without falter. "Kill me" he repeated louder, somehow knowing Alistair was somewhere within earshot. He considered adding 'fast' in his demand, but at that point he wasn't thinking clearly... nor did he really care how it was done, he just wanted it over.
Those words brought sharp pain through Alistair's veins.
The blanket he held dropped to the floor at his feet.
Elijah wanted death over him.
Alistair took a step back, and leaned against the wall opposite the boy. He needed the support, and needed to hide in the darkness that lingered there.
Eli looked up, hearing the movement. He couldn't see anyone there. He let his eyes adjust and they were drawn to the blanket that lay a few feet in front of him. He was cold, and reached to grab it but froze as he saw something shift in the shadows. He ignored it, draped the blanket around him, and sat up against the wall staring into the shadows.
