The Prince and The Assassin chapter 04 part 02/10

[alexjanna91]

*

Duo paced nervously as he waited for Heero to appear. He had never been so nervous in his entire life. The butterflies were practically choking him.

He had asked Solo to fetch Heero from the Inn and bring him to the forest so that they would have some privacy when he dropped the bomb. It was a good idea, but the wait and the build up of anticipation was agonizing.

He had spent the last hour with Quatre discussing how he should approach the subject and both young men agreed that the best way to break bad or good news, depending on the out come, was to just blurt it out in the most succinct and organized way possible.

In this situation it would sound something like, “Heero, I’m the heir to the throne of the most power kingdom on this hemisphere.” Ok maybe not being so blunt was a good idea too, but Duo just couldn’t quite stop the rise of bile in his throat ever time he tried to practice so he decided to just wing it.

Heero was happy but confused when Solo had showed up at the Inn explaining that Duo wanted to see him. They had planned to meet in another couple of days and by then the assassination would be over and they could begin to plan their lives together. Duo’s sudden need to see him and the fact that he didn’t come to him himself was puzzling.

It was worrying as well, but Heero refused to think on that. He refused to think that maybe Duo was rethinking everything. Rethinking their love, rethinking leaving the castle to spend the rest of his life with him on a sizable farm with a good head of cattle and a cozy farm house.

God! Heero placed a hand over his mouth; he could almost feel the bile rising up his throat at that thought. Now that he had him, he couldn’t possible imagine life without Duo. It was sickening and empty.

Solo stopped a yard ahead of him and turned to face the pale and slightly sweating man. He didn’t know what the deal was, but he sincerely hoped neither man hurt the other. Heero was good for Duo and he could guess that Duo was exceptionally good for Heero.

“This is where I leave you.” He puffed on his pipe and pulled it from his mouth to exhale the smoke. “Keep walking straight and you’ll run right into him.”

Heero nodded and felt Solo pat his shoulder as he passed him.

Duo looked up as he heard the leaves crunch under feet. A shaky smile rose to his lips and the butterflies couldn’t decide if they wanted to fly out of his mouth all together or settle down and behave.

“Hey.” His voice sounded quiet even to his own ears.

“Hey.” Heero didn’t know why he was so nervous. This was the man he loved with all his heart and soul.

Taking quick steps he wrapped his arms tightly around Duo and pressed their lips together desperately. Duo responded with every fiber of his being and their tongues twisted almost violently together.

Gasping for breath as they separated Heero buried his face in Duo’s shoulder and inhaled the scent of lavender. “I missed you.”

“Mm.” The butterflies had quieted and Duo was enjoying the warmth radiating off of his lover. “Me too.” He refused to think that this could possibly be the last time Heero would willingly hold him in his arms.

“What did you want to see me about?” Heero smirked against Duo’s creamy neck. “Or did you just miss me that much.”

Duo shut his eyes in nervousness before opening them and pulling gently away from Heero. “I have to tell you something, love.”

Heero stroked his hands up and down Duo’s back trying to sooth away his own nervousness. “Actually I have something to tell you as well.”

“You do?” Duo tilted his head in surprise then gave him a small smile. “What do you want to tell me?” He saw an opportunity to delay the inevitable he was going to grab onto it with both hands.

Heero glanced down at the ground. “I wasn’t quite as truthful with you as I should have been.” He was determined not to look at Duo as he told him this. Seeing his disgust and fear was going to rip him apart. “I’m not really a traveler. Well, I mean, I do travel for my job, but I’m not a true traveler.”

Duo smirked in amusement. “Is that all? Heero, that’s not-”

“No.” Heero interrupted him. “That’s not all.” He took a deep breath and decided to be a man and face whatever the consequences were head on. Raising his head he looked Duo in the eyes, his beautiful deep violet eyes. “I’m not just a traveler. I’m an assassin.”

Heero watched as the color slowly drained out of Duo’s face and he grew ridged in his arms. He barreled on, determined to get everything out as quickly as possible so that he could work as hard as he needed to keep Duo as his own.

“I was approached by an assassination agent about two months ago with a job offer. I was to travel to Peacemillion, infiltrate the castle and assassinate a member of the royal family.” Feeling Duo slowly trying to pull away from him, he clutched at his shirt desperately and began to feel well and true panic.

“No! Duo, wait!” He pleaded. “Before I even met you I had decided that this was probably going to be my last job. I’m getting paid a ridiculous amount of money, even for an assassination, to do this and when the job is over I’ll have enough money saved up to buy us that plot of land on the edge of Peacemillion.”

Heero could almost feel tears pricking at his eyes as Duo successfully pulled away from his embrace and stared at him with wide almost unseeing eyes. “Duo please.” He didn’t know what he was pleading for, but he would keep doing it if it kept in him one piece.

Duo had a million things running through his head. Heero was an assassin paid to kill someone in the royal family of Sanq. Generally speaking he was a cold blooded killer and Duo just couldn’t wrap his mind around that.

The man that had held him so tenderly and loved him so thoroughly was there to murder someone.

Then it hit him. He felt his chest freeze in ice and his heart crack down the center as an almost unthinkable thought flitted through his mind.

Pressing a clammy shaking hand to his chest, Duo asked in a raw chocked voice, “Who?”

Heero jolted out of his pain and looked back up at his shocked lover. “What?” His mind couldn’t comprehend the words coming out of his lover’s mouth.

“Who?” Duo asked again, the word felt like thorns in his mouth. “Who are you going to assassinate?”

Heero lowered his head again unable to face his lover in his pain. “The crowned prince of Sanq.”

Duo felt like the air had rushed out of his chest. He couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, he couldn’t even feel his body. His vision narrowed down to a point.

Everything was quiet.

Suddenly Duo felt air being sucked back into his lungs and he nearly staggered as pain washed through his soul. “I- I can’t-”

Heero’s head shot up when he heard Duo gasping for breath and became more frightened than he had ever been in his entire life. Duo’s face was ghostly pale, his body shaking uncontrollably, his eyes wide showing the whites around his contracted irises. “Duo?!” He began to rush forward and scoop him up in his arms, but Duo almost fell trying to dodge his out stretched hands.

That hurt even more than his lover’s initial reaction. Duo didn’t even want his touch.

Duo looked at the ground, the sky, the trees, everywhere but at Heero. He just couldn’t. “I’m-” He chocked. “I’m sorry.” He pushed passed Heero and broke into a frantic run. He had to get away and think, had to deal with this revelation alone; without Heero.

Heero watched as his lover, his heart and soul ran away from him. He didn’t follow, didn’t think Duo would want him to follow.

Falling to his knees Heero clutched at his chest as he felt his heart crack down the center in his chest. He sobbed almost uncontrollably, his tears falling unchecked to the forest floor.

*

Duo didn’t know how he made it back to his rooms, how he climbed the wall, the fountain, his balcony, but when he finally became aware of his surrounding he was wrapped tight in Quatre’s arms wailing like an ocean storm.

Quatre didn’t know what to do. Duo was unresponsive. He wouldn’t answer his questions, he wouldn’t talk about what happened, he just cried and cried, no words, just tears.

“Duo.” After ten minutes of it, Quatre had begun to cry as well. “Please stop!” He begged his friend. “Please stop crying. Tell me what happened.”

Duo suddenly felt how his own body was shaking against Quatre’s, heard his cries, and understood Quatre’s begging.

He made a conscious effort to loosen his tightly wound muscles and calm his breaths. He was near hyperventilation and it took some effort, but with Quatre stroking his back to help calm him he managed to ease the aching in his lungs.

“I’m-” He gasped again and swallowed to wet his dry throat. “I’m alright.”

“Oh God” Quatre sighed and tightened his hold on his still shaking friend. “I was so scared Duo! I didn’t know what to do. You wouldn’t talk, just cry.”

Duo closed his eyes and buried his face into Quatre’s damp shirt. “I’m sorry. So sorry.”

“Shh. It’s ok.” Quatre wiped at his own tears. “Tell me what happened. Please.”

Shaking his head Duo tightened his hold on Quatre not willing think about what had happened. “No. Just hold me for a while will you, Quat?”

Not willing to press the issue Quatre simple nodded. He maneuvered them till they were laying comfortably on the bed, legs tangled and arms wrapped tightly around each other. “Just sleep, Duo. We’ll talk about it later.”

Duo didn’t respond, simply pressed his face more solidly into his friend’s shoulder and allowed the rest of his tears to flow silently. He wasn’t going to discuss what had happened in the forest with Quatre. He didn’t even want to discuss it with himself. When he woke up… when he woke up he would think about it, he would deal with it. But for right now he wanted to feel his pain and cleanse it with his tears. Just about the only thing he could do.

*

“I just couldn’t get him to stop crying! He wouldn’t move, speak, or even breathe! Just cry.” Quatre felt the tears streaming down his face as he leaned heavily into Trowa’s side taking comfort in the older boy’s embrace.

“I don’t understand.” Wufei protested. “How could someone reject him like that? He believed that this man’s feelings for him were so very pure.”

“Duo didn’t talk about what happened, Wufei. We don’t really know what happened back there.” Trowa was just as disturbed by this turn of events as the other two were. “For all we know a lion could have jumped out of the bush and eaten him.”

“That’s highly unlikely.” Quatre sniffled from behind Trowa’s pristine white handkerchief.

Wufei stood up and passed back and forth across the floor of the laundry room. He just couldn’t make sense of any of this. “But did Duo tell him?”

“I don’t know!” Quatre exclaimed. “He wouldn’t say a word. When he finally started to respond it was like he had just woken up from a bad dream. He wouldn’t tell me anything!”

“Hush love.” Trowa ran a comforting hand up and down Quatre’s arm. “It’s not your fault.” He knew his lover and right at that moment he was blaming himself, logical or not.

“Trowa is right, Quatre. You couldn’t have stopped any of this from happening.” Wufei stated as he continued to pace. “We all know that even if you had forbid Duo to see him in the beginning he still would have snuck out and done as he pleased.”

Quatre nodded at their reassurances and blew his nose rather loudly in Trowa’s hanky. “I know it’s just he was hurting so much. And he has never refused to tell me something.” Quatre gestured frustrated with his hands. “He tells me everything!”

Wufei paused in his steps and stared at the floor in contemplation. “Something just isn’t adding up. There must be something unexpected going on here.”

“I agree.” Trowa was schooled in military tactics. He was trained to pick apart situations, to see what actions created what reactions. Something about this whole ordeal just was not adding up. “We are missing a major piece to this puzzle.”

“And we cannot proceed until we have uncovered it.” Wufei nodded than resumed his seat on a barrel of laundry soap.

Quatre looked down at his hands, silently staring unseeingly. “It was like his whole world had been ripped out from under him. Like, he just couldn’t deal with life at that moment.” A shudder took his body and Trowa tightened his hold on his lover in comfort.

“We’ll figure out how to help him, love. I promise.” Trowa propped his head on top of Quatre’s and closed his eyes.

Wufei sighed and leaned his chin on the heel of his hand. “But the problem is how we’re going to do that.” The small group drifted into silence, each thinking about their friend’s predicament.

*

Duo sat in his study staring out the window, tear tracks still blaringly visible on his pale cheeks. His eyes burned and his throat was sore from near continuous sobbing the night before, but now he was silent.

There was a small ache in his chest near the vicinity of his heart, but it wasn’t broken. No, Duo realized, his heart wasn’t broken.

The night before Duo had felt betrayed, abandoned, hurt beyond repair. He felt as though his world had been ripped from him and he had no legs to stand on.

Now that his tears were all cried out, his legs had returned to him, and his mind could function in the light of day, he realized that none of this was true.

Heero hadn’t betrayed him or hurt him on purpose. Heero was trying to be honest, and tell him the truth about whom and what he was.

Duo closed his eyes in the pain of remembering.

And he had run away; turned his back on the man that held his heart in his hands and run away.

That perhaps hurt more than the knowledge that Heero was being paid to murder him. Of course Heero didn’t know that it was Duo that was really the crowned price of Sanq, but that revelation hurt none the less.

Duo pulled his braid over his shoulder and twisted its end around his fingers.

Heero was an assassin. That had been a terrible surprise to Duo. For some reason he couldn’t reconcile the memories of his kind, gentle, passionate lover to the meaning of what an assassin was and what they did. But that wasn’t really the problem, now was it?

The problem for Duo now, was how on this worldly planet was he going to ever repair the hurt he had done to Heero?

He had stood there, laid bare and vulnerable before him, and Duo had reacted with fear and flight. That was unacceptable.

Duo had run from him like you would from a vicious animal. Heero wasn’t a vicious animal and Duo could feel the ache in his chest for the pain he had unnecessarily caused his beautiful lover.

Suddenly he realized that they were both hiding what they were for fear of the other’s reaction.

Heero was hiding from the blood staining his hands and Duo his prisoner like life and heavy obligations. They were the same even in that and Duo couldn’t help but feel just the slightest bit better with that realization.

But even as he discovered the points of error and the still ever pressing need to be truthful, Duo still had not solved his own problem. How was he going to atone for Heero’s pain?

Smoothing a shaking hand over his aching chest, Duo knew what he must do. He must go to Heero and beg his forgiveness, plead with his lover to take him back and explain everything.

The butterflies took flight in his stomach once again, but he ignored them as he outlined the things that needed to be taken care of if he was going to make good on his promise to love and be with Heero for the rest of his life.

Documents needed to be drawn up, the advisors needed to be informed, and his uncle needed to be dealt with. Duo shivered.

He would have to deal with Dekim tomorrow. As for today he needed to get everything done and there was too much to be done in one day.

Seeing as Heero hadn’t assassinated him yet, Duo knew he would still be at the Inn and resolved to have his business finished by the next night. Then he would sneak over the wall and go to his lover. Then he would make everything right.

*

By the time Heero had finally managed to pull himself together enough to stumble his way back to the Inn, the sun had been burning for half a day.

He was covered in mud and leaves from curling up on the forest floor. He couldn’t remember falling to lay there and cry, but he woke up there and he didn’t feel the need to question it.

The Inn keeper gave him a weary look. “Bath’s free.”

Heero didn’t even acknowledge him just took to the stairs and stared straight ahead. He couldn’t think and preferred not to when all he could do was watch Duo turn and run from him over and over again.

God! A spike of pain made his heart falter in its steady beating. He clutched at the railing on the stairs and gasped for breath. The pain was immense and he just couldn’t deal with it.

Falling back on his old training, Heero became completely numb, like he used to do in his early years of killing for hire. It was a trick every assassin picked up and eventually didn’t need anymore as the killing became almost second nature, but today and most likely for the rest of his cold hollow life, Heero would need that early training just to be able to continue on breathing.

No, he decided as he stripped while the tub filled with scalding hot water. He wouldn’t think. He wouldn’t feel anymore.

He knew he was just running away and hiding from his pain, but in his opinion it was preferable to the feeling of having your guts ripped from your body and your skin pealed from your bones.

He ceased to think as he worked automatically washing the sweat and mud from his skin, and rinsing the bits of leaves from his messy hair. Only when he climbed out of the dirtied bath water, dried himself and wrapped a linen towel around his waist did he even draw an uneven breath.

Pulling the stopper from the drain, Heero turned away from the tub and pushed the door open only to come face to face with the agent.

He growled deep in his throat. “Get out of my way.”

The agent’s forked ginger eyebrows raised in surprise. “I have been sent to ensure that you are prepared for the completion of your job.”

Heero was jolted by the spike of pain that statement caused in his chest. Tightening his hands into fists so tight his nails drew blood, Heero fought to maintain his numbness. “I said the job would be completed.”

“As I’m sure it will be.” The agent nodded and folded his hands behind his back. “It would seem that my client is getting rather impatient, Mister Yuy.”

“Your client should be dealing with his own problems, Agent.” Heero wasn’t in a very charitable mood surprisingly enough.

The agent let an amused smirk play at his aristocratic mouth. “If that were the case, Mister Yuy, you would be out of the job.”

Heero scowled at the agent and pushed passed him continuing on bare feet to his room and getting increasingly more annoyed as the agent began to follow him down the hall. Turning on his heel when he reached his door he glared bloody murder at the other man. “Is there something else, Agent? Or do you enjoy imposing yourself upon your clients?”

The agent stopped short in his stride and bowed a head. “It was not my intention. I wished to simply inform you that immediately upon completion of the job you will receive the other half of the money owed for your services.”

Heero’s eyes melted with pain for a split second before they hardened once again and he pushed his door open and stepped inside, saying over his shoulder, “Thank you for that information, Agent” before nearly slamming the door in the other man’s face.

The agent stood in the hall for a moment before mockingly bowing to the door and stating in a falsely polite tone, “It has been a pleasure doing business with you, Mister Yuy. I hope to meet you again in the future,” before turning abruptly and striding silently down the hall.

Inside the room Heero slide down the door to sit on the floor, unexplainably tired. He knew he should be standing, getting dressed, picking the poison from his collection and cleaning his backup weapons in preparation for his job that night. But he couldn’t force himself to move from his slumped position on the cold wooden floor.

Perhaps just for a moment he would let himself hurt. Just for a moment. Then he would have to rebuild his walls and finish the job he started before he could disappear into the folds of the land like he always did, like he is cursed to always do.

~*~

TBC…
Chapter 05