Broken Road, part 2
“You need rest.”
Flint’s eyes remained on the floor of his office, “I’m fine.”
“My eyes are as good as ever, Flint,” Kingsley warned, referring to the dark circles forming under the younger man's eyes and the paleness of his face. “You’re no use to anyone at the moment.”
Flint rubbed his eyes and sighed. He’d been partnered with Kingsley for the past six months, ever since Moody had been reassigned for Potter detail, and aside from it being an honor to train under him, the man could be insufferable at times; like right now.
“I’m not leaving.”
Kingsley made a sound deep in his throat, obviously knowing Flint would refuse the order. Of course he would, Flint’s mind grumbled, the first thing he learned about his new mentor was the man was damn good at reading people; he had learned to see past the majority of Flint’s defenses within a month and Flint didn’t know if he should’ve been impressed or apprehensive of it.
“I didn’t say leave.” Kingsley stated, his voice as even and deep as it always was, “I will wake you in a few hours.”
Flint listened to his footsteps as they turned from the door of his small office until they disappeared into the hall. Once they were out of his hearing, Flint inhaled a shaky breath.
Merlin, he was tired, so damned tired. Every bone ached, every muscle was over worked, his stomach rumbled from his lack of solid meals for the past day and a half. The discomfort in his body hardly mattered. His mind registered it, but refuses to bend under its pull.
He needed to keep going, needed to stay awake and keep searching. Nothing else mattered, not his needs, not the pain in his body or the panic growing inside of his mind and chest.
Nothing mattered until he found Oliver.
He may have gone without sleep for the past two days, but was still at the top of his game. Despite what Kingsley and the rest of the Aurors thought, he was still able to function and his mind was as sharp as ever.
Besides, even if he was dead exhausted, there was no force on Earth that could make him go back to the flat tonight, if ever again; not since he returned home the night before last and found the place in complete ruin. The door had been hanging by a single hinge, all of the protective wards had been removed, the table in the front room blasted to splinters and Oliver had been nowhere in sight. There was no Dark Mark hanging in the night sky that night, a small glimmer of hope Flint took comfort in, but the cryptic messages scrawled onto the wall in blood, quickly stomped it out of existence.
Mudblood.
He remembered feeling his heart stop for several beats and then move into his throat.
Frantic moments were spent canvassing the flat, tearing every room apart looking for something, anything that would tell him what had happened and where his partner’s whereabouts where.
He froze in the doorway when he reached their room. All of the moving pictures Oliver had mounted on the wall had been pulled off and smashed, the moving figures of Oliver’s family stared at him from under piles of broken glass.
The bold red letters painted on the wall made his blood run even colder.
Blood traitor.
There was no doubt in his mind that had been left on the wall for him. A cryptic message condemning him for the unforgivable sin he committed against his birthright, against his blood. Many knew of his pure heritage, but few knew of Oliver’s muggleborn blood. Both he and Flint had gone to great lengths to conceal it. To no avail it seemed.
Feeling his head and limbs become even heavier, Flint sighed in defeat and slid away from his desk. With a brisk wave of his wand a small bedroll appeared on the ground by his feet. The floor was cold and hard under him as he toed off his shoes and settled into it. Sleep didn’t come easy. Every time his eyes closed images of Oliver played behind their shut lids, imagining him being held in the worst places his mind could fathom. The nerves in his body continued to wind tighter and tighter until he feared he would burst apart at the seams.
A lump formed inside of his throat and no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t swallow it down and be done with it. Instead, it escaped from his lips in the form of a frustrated and fearful whimper, a sound where, under any other circumstances, he would have been ashamed of. His fingers trembled as they rubbed the cloth on his wrist, hoping with his entire being he could rub some of its unbelievable luck free from its fibers.
Merlin please let Wood be ok. Please…
He wasn’t a man of prayer and he didn’t rightly believe in it- nothing ever came from wailing about your troubles to some invisible force that simply was not there despite the lies you were told-, but tonight he was silently praying to any unseen force that would listen.
Please let me find him.
His fingers kept diligently stroking the soft fabric long after his heavy eye lids had fallen closed.
Please let me find him alive.
A day later he was half out of his mind from panic and exhaustion.
Nothing. Blimey, he had nothing! None of his neighbors had seen anyone go into his flat three nights before. No reported sightings of Death Eaters. No rescued muggleborn captives. No activity of any kind.
Bloody hell, this couldn’t be happening.
Flint sagged heavily against the pale bricks of the ministry building. After another long morning of pursuing cold leads, he was in desprete need of some fresh air. Around him, people were moving and London was its usual hive of busy everyday life. No one paid him a second look as they past, leaving him to drown in own mental pit of despair.
Three days… three fucking days and no word. He didn’t want to think it -almost refused to bring himself to- but the chances of finding Oliver at this point were growing smaller and smaller; almost becoming nonexistent.
Inhaling one last breath of bitter morning air, Flint pushed himself away from the hard wall and commanded his feet to take him back to the ministry’s entrance.
He took no more than five steps from the building, when a small, sealed, roll of parchment was dropped on the cobblestones in front of his feat. A flutter of wings echoed in the air above his head as a weather-beaten screech owl settled on the street lamp closest to him, hooting impatiently when he didn’t immediately retrieve it’s delivery from the ground.
Eyeing the owl, he crouched down and retrieved the letter. His dirt covered fingers trembled as they broke open the seal. His strained eyes struggled to read the thin pointed writing, recognizing Kingsley’s familiar scrawl almost immediately.
St. Mungo's.
The name creates an imaginary weight inside of his gut.
St. Mungo’s Hospital…
-
A pair of feet shuffling around the bedroom slowly roused him from his sleep.
The blurry figure of Oliver came into focus, standing at the foot of the bed, naked from the waist up. A towel rested on his shoulders and the smell of steam and the all too familiar fragrance of the soap the Keeper has used for the past two years reached Flint’s nose.
He drank in the view of the former Gryffindor's back, starting from the hem of his jeans and slowly working his way up the plains of strong muscles and taunt skin. His eyes slid to a stop when their gaze reached Oliver’s left shoulder. The skin there is not the glorious, sun kissed, bronze color the rest of Oliver’s body is. Instead, even after two years, the flesh is a sickly, pink color with flakey red patches. Resting in the center of the unsightly discoloration is the most upsetting sight of all; two words carved in jagged lines from the tip of a hot knife.
Stretching from the curve of his shoulder and ending just shy of his scapula is the word that makes Flint’s blood boil whenever he hears it; Mudblood.
Under it is an even more upsetting word, carved deep enough to forever hinder Oliver’s playing ability; Filth.
Flint’s always been torn between tears and bone curling rage every time he sees them. He wants to tear anything he can reach apart and never let go of Wood at the same time. The death of the man who committed those acts is little comfort to him. The damage was done and both of them had suffered greatly and had been crushed under it.
Feeling the heavy stare on his back, Oliver turned and met Flint’s face, “Sorry, did I wake you?”
Flint shrugged and waved an arm half heartily. Sleep was a luxury he didn't get much of for the past two years from spending too many long nights shacked up in dirty pubs or hole-in-the-wall places out in the country he wouldn’t bring a dog to.
And of course, there was always the lack of a warm, Scottish body to keep him warm and comfort him during those nights.
Shaking the last traces of sleep from his system, Flint gingerly rolled to the side of the bed and slid his feet to the floor. The lack of pain in his side was a relief. A glance downward showed the wound in his side was almost completely healed except for the thin, red line marking where the mouth of the cut had been.
“Are you in any pain?” Wood called over his shoulder as he searched for a shirt.
“A bit,” Flint mumbled.
He stood; his legs shaky and wobbling under his weight. Wood was at his side in a blink, ready to steady him. When the Irishman remained standing on his own, the Keeper moved to check the wound on his side.
A shiver rolled down Flint’s spine when he felt Wood’s fingers trail down his side ever so lightly.
“That hurt?” Wood’s eyes moved to his face. Obviously the Keeper had taken his flinch to be caused by discomfort.
“No,” Flint rasped, deep and throaty, and reached for the Scot’s hand. “Do it again.”
Oliver’s eyes went dark, “Flint.”
Flint’s hands moved to his face, fingers gently tilting the Keeper’s head back. He kept his movements slow and easy for Wood to predict- easy for him to move away if he felt he had too. Not that he was expecting Wood to; the Keeper had stop shying from his touch long ago and often welcomed it whenever he didn’t want to thump Flint upside the head. Over the past two years both of them had learned to take what they could, when they could. No fears, past experiences or tempers were allowed to come between those moments.
Flint brought their mouths together, gently pressing his lips to the corner of Oliver’s. Wood stilled under him, taken back from the sudden touch, before parting his firm lips when he felt Flint’s slick tongue seeking entry.
Flint couldn't help his moan. Merlin he’s missed this. The last contact he had with Oliver was four long months ago- one lousy night where he had risked it all to stumble back here, half dead from a curse, and hand fallen asleep with Wood’s sweat slicked body pressed against him.
Blood hell he wanted that again!
He pulled Wood closer, crashing their bodies together and making his intentions perfectly clear.
Wood pulled away and sighed, “Ya know, just once, I’d like to be able to do this without worrying about your health.”
Flint couldn’t help with chuckle; “It’s bound to happen someday, Wood." Smiling, Flint leaned closer and kept his voice soft, “Someday soon.”
He glimpsed a small flicker of hope in Oliver’s eyes before it was blinked away. Instinctively, Flint pulled the other man closer. His breath caught in his throat when Wood didn’t pull away. The other man melted into his embrace, his arms coming around Flint’s strong back and holding tight.
It had taken two years for them to reach this point. Two years of patience, of careful touches and chosen words. Two years of Flint assuring Oliver that he wasn’t anything like the man who had tortured him, two years of long nights spent alone while Flint hunted that bastard down to the ends of the earth, vowing he’d pay for the pain he had inflicted.
The man’s identity wasn’t too hard to learn. Even though Wood never uttered a name, Flint knew, deep in his chest, who had abducted him, who had tortured him for three long grueling days. Who had broken him in so many ways.
He knew, he had always known.
Every time Oliver shied away from him, flinching from a simple touch to his arm. Every time Wood had awoken screaming from a nightmare and spent the following day avoiding any contact with him. Every time Oliver looked at his wrist in guilt. All of it further cemented the man’s identity in Flint’s mind.
At first, Flint was willing to do his part. He kept the touches innocent and few. When the nightmares came he slept on the damn lumpy couch in the living room and stayed at his office late, knowing his presence wasn’t wanted. But it eventually became too much. He couldn’t take seeing the pain on Wood’s face and the gap of space between them that continued to grow.
Something had to be done and after two long, painful years, Flint had taken care of it.
They were both free now, his father was dead. The nightmare was over.
Moving his hands away from Wood’s waist he ran them slowly down the keeper’s strong arm. His fingers grasped Wood’s hand as he moved to sit on the end of the bed. A soft tug pulled the other man towards him as he scooted back. Oliver took the hint and climbed on the bed, settling his strong body on top of him.
A weary look crossed the Scot’s face and Flint almost laughed from it. He didn’t allow Wood to take the reins often and when he did, it usually ended up with Oliver fighting him for every pleasurable inch of it. Flint enjoyed the exhausting battle because it always made things a hell of a lot more interesting.
Right now though, he didn’t have the need for it. He just wanted heat, closeness and those damn strong yet such soft touches the Keeper’s hands could give.
Oliver obliged, his hands trailing Flint’s bare torso in soft trails that left goose bumps in their wake and long kisses that left them both panting and struggling for air.
Flint was more than content to drown in the hot warmth that was Oliver. Every painful memory of the past handful of years, every injury, every cold night spent alone seamed to fade from existence as the Scotsman’s body pressed against him.
Well… all but one memory, one that was far too important to forget. One that took place before all of this shite started.
-
Part Three