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It is a pain that is cruel, ripping through him almost entirely as the name suggests; betrayal.
Of course, that’s not what this truly is. James cannot help it, Will thinks — begs himself to keep remembering. The Collar is hot and tight on the man’s seductive neck, and he is showing it off — proud of it. It glistens in this dawning sun, the rubies and gold garish, now, Will unable to see any value in them at all.
He is basically prostrating himself. He leans back on his hands, shucking his hair out of his face, clearing it so that Will can see the light in his eyes. The light. He’d had it, once and then again, and now— taken as brutally and callous as he might have been, once. He is looking up at him with nought but pure anticipation, waiting for his next order to follow.
An order. Take it off, he wants to say, but he is not that foolish. The Collar bends him to his — the Dark King’s — every whim, but what if he could not follow it? Would he punish himself, go writhe with upset? Or perhaps, go at any length to complete the order. Again, Will feels vomit rise in his throat. There was only one way to do that. The sweetness in those beautiful eyes only tells him that he would decapitate himself if he just asked — Will would not even need to say please.
“Master?” he whispers, this boy, this poor boy. “Would you prefer it if I did not remember?”
And what can Will even say to that? Yes and no. He deserves to remember, after all. Deserves to know and retain every sordid detail that Will has managed to scavenge and more. What he has done to him in their past lives; what he has made him; that it was him — no matter how far removed he wishes to make himself.
Is the best way to just play along, he wonders? To not confuse him further? His heart is heavy in his chest. He hates to see James so weary, wondering if he’s done something wrong.
For now, there is nothing that he can do. Until he comes up with a plan (and it is just he, as he has no hope to be helped by his — friends — now) to take off the Collar without hurting him, he wants him in comfort.
James seems to sense his compliance. Again, he speaks. “My King?”
Helpless, somehow, in a world which everybody wants to give him, Will sighs as he nods. “Anharion.”
There is pleasure in his pretty blue eyes. He says, “Let me serve you.”
You don’t want this, he wants to say to him. Hit me. Throw me to the ground with your magic. I deserve it.
“Who put this on you?” he asks instead.
“You,” he says, smiling. Of course.
“No.” Will shakes his head. “This body. Now. This day.” Though he feels he knows the answer.
“Sinclair,” he tells him, confirming all of Will’s despair. “Pretending as Sloane.”
Will has to fight to get out his breath. He looks over the man, still on the ground, his brows furrowed with worry. He takes three steps forward, then stops. He doesn’t trust himself to get closer to him. He asks, “What did he have you do?”
And James looks so confused again. “Nothing. I am yours to control,” he says. “I severed his head from his body for attempting otherwise.”
Will drops to his knees. He hadn’t wanted James to have to kill again. And poor Sloane, still. Sinclair would barely even have been slowed down, he’s sure. He would feel the pain, the sharp edge of James’ weapon, side by side with the sting of betrayal; the Collar not working.
“Master,” James whispers, crawling forward on the ground towards him. He slips a hand beneath his own half-parted shirt, pushes it down over his shoulder. The shoulder that Will had stabbed. James would remember that. James would remember that he had done worse than that, to him.
Even the Collar, with its jewels and its wealth and its unnatural draw, is not prettier to Will than James’ naked flesh. His eyes are magnetised there, his mouth beginning to salivate even with the distaste in his mouth from the situation. He yearns to touch him, to remove the rest of his shirt and then more. To take what is his. His.
And yet the thought disgusts him. He is not owed this by any standard. It had been why he had sought to wait — to wait until James knew him and forgave him and thought of him as more of a fellow boy than a King. He can still taste the heat, the sweetness of their long-coming kiss on his lips, even through the more recent spit-ups of vomit. He wants to kiss him again. Needs to. Knows that he could, if he just moved forward and succumbed.
James pushes down the other side of the shirt, and it slips so elegantly down his frame. Will cannot breathe. He can see his nipples now, so pink and perfect against the rest of his complexion — complementary, like everything else that is about him. Will’s mouth hangs open like a fish, stupidly bewildered, enamoured with his— With his…
“James,” he hums, and the golden boy moves closer still. His shirt sleeves pool over his fingers, but the tips of them still peek out. He is so close now; intoxicating. His fingers drag over his own skin, up his arms and then his chest, lingering over the pink before gravitating to the gold.
It is so gorgeous. James’ nimble fingers play over the rubies like it pleasures him to do so. It is lewd, the movements, as he circles them as he might actually do his nipples. Will’s head is devoid of blood. It has all gone south. He cannot even remember that an army exists.
“My King,” he whispers again. “King Sarcean. Let me please you. I remember how you like it.”
And somehow those words are worse, knowing that this body — this reincarnation — has never been touched. He is Will’s. He has been waiting for Will. He is asking, now, for Will. He cannot speak right away.
The silence urges him on. He takes one hand and drapes it down Will’s front, stopping short before his crotch. The tenting there is obvious, but it seems like James won’t continue without explicit permission. Or, perhaps, can’t — the Collar prohibiting from acting on his own whims, too.
“You’re so tense,” James tells him, and his face is suddenly so close again. Flashes of their kiss, only moments ago, fill his mind. Then more — years worth. Centuries. Kisses and bites. Moans and tongues. Them and them and them — in every single lifetime. Can James sense it too, Will wonders? The intensity, the heat, the overwhelming drive to pull him in. Will’s fingernails dig hard enough into his palms to draw blood.
“James,” he says again, because he is finding it so difficult to say no. In him, there is a part that is furious at himself. He is split in two, for too many long moments, heart in his throat. He breathes, “James,” like he’ll be the one to make him stop. To save him from himself.
“Say the word,” James tells him. “Tell me what to do, and I’ll do it. The shadows are released. Your re-ascension is confirmed. Won’t you ask me to help you relax?”
He squeezes his eyes shut, forcing himself to separate from the lure of the man and his Collar; of its promise.
He had said, Are you telling me what I want to hear?
And James, in his forced honesty, had said, Yes.
Will bites the inside of his mouth and forces himself to his feet. In a way, it is worse, when he looks down and sees James on his knees before him from this angle — so close. He is just thankful that his resolve is so strong.
“Stop that,” he demands, because it is what James must hear now. An order.
James’ eyes grow wide with uncertainty, but he pulls his shirt up at once, slamming his lips shut to hold back anymore seduction. Will feels terrible at the sight of him — discarded and unwanted, or so he must feel. But it’s how it has to be. It’s how it must be. There is not even a hint of him wanting to fight back, wanting to disobey. He’d never betray him now — that was the aim of this nasty Collar, after all.
“We’ve a job to do. Stand,” Will says, and James does so at once. “We must find every body touched by the white death. We must stop the shadows from coming back. We can’t allow anymore Returners.”
And though his confusion remains — though he can’t fathom the reasoning, because this had been the plan, because this is what is needed to get his army — James nods. He does as he’s told, and readies himself at once to head out.
And it breaks Will’s heart.