Burning Houses

Pogue came home, it was late evening and he had spent the afternoon entertaining Reid’s cousin. It had been hard to stay focused, to look interested as he showed the boy around the college, all the while knowing that his brother was at home wasting away in Caleb’s room like he had been for the last few days. He had kept up his smile and played pretend, just like Tyler had in the morning. Kyle Garwin seemed like a nice enough kid, but Pogue couldn’t say he had really listened much. It had almost been hard to look at the boy, seeing those telltale family resemblances, the attitude, the smirk, it reminded him of the tired body of his brother- of the way he had been only a month before.

He had dropped Kyle off at his hotel, with talk of meeting up for breakfast in the morning. On his drive home he had wondered if Reid would be alive for breakfast tomorrow. He sat in the driveway and swallowed at air to keep from breaking down. It was like the power was being sucked right out of him, and every day now his body was getting weaker, slowly losing its hold on its lifeline.

When he walked inside there was a moment of quiet, a moment where he might have been able to pretend that nothing had changed, and then he heard it. Tyler was shouting upstairs. The youngest had been put on Reidsitting duty for the afternoon, while Caleb was out scouring their books for answers. “Help me!” Tyler screamed and it sounded utterly broken.

Pogue was standing in Caleb’s room within the flash of eyes. Reid was lying on the floor, body jerking and teeth grit tight. The air around him was shivering with heat and Tyler was on his knees beside him, hands fisted in the boy’s shirt and desperately trying to shake him from the dream. “Wake up! Please! Please!”

Reid groaned in pain and cringed against those phantom flames, against phantom hands, his lips suddenly parting to gasp in agony as his body arched off the floor. Pogue sucked a breath, understanding the way his brother’s body bowed off the floor, the way mewling sounds of pain poured off his fire chapped lips. Tyler looked up at him, his face stricken by tears and his eyes black at coal. “It’s not working. He won’t wake up.”

In the past days they had been able to use in order to push away Reid’s nightmares when they came, though the blond had told them not to waste their power. It had been a cruel joke to have him finally worried about using, and have it be for them rather than himself.

Pogue tried to wash the nightmare away as well, but it didn’t take. He hissed and reached down, cupping Reid’s face in his palms. His cheeks were so hot that Pogue’s hands actually ached to pull away. Gritting his teeth he bent down, scooping Reid up into his arms and walked quickly to the bathroom. Another flash of black in his eyes and the tub was full to the brim with icewater.

He set Reid down inside and cringed when the boy screamed, writhing to get away from the sudden cold. The blond struggled and Pogue climbed into the tub on top of him, straddling his hips in the ice to hold his waist down to the bottom of the tub. One of his hands held both of Reid’s wrists, pushing his arms under the ice as well. One hand still cradled the boy’s cheek, keeping his face above and only inches below his own.

Pogue shivered as he breathed, cold to the bone, while he watched ice melt near Reid’s cheek.

The body struggled under him and it broke his heart to keep the boy down, to be the one pinning him. “Wake up.” Pogue shivered, his lips brushing Reid’s, his eyes closing with the small prayer. “Wake up.” What he wanted to say, to beg, was ‘don’t die’. But he couldn’t bear to say it, to let Tyler hear the fear that plagued him.

Reid’s eyes opened finally, his lips parting wide to gasp at the cold. “Fuuck.” He breathed miserably, eyes wide as he stared up at Pogue’s pain stricken face. He forced down his own fear and rage, looking up at his brother and seeing the agony he knew these days had caused them. “Po…”

Pogue opened his eyes slowly to look down at Reid, so grateful that he had come to that he almost forgot the cold.

“You’re freezing my nuts off.” Reid tried for humor, always at the worst of moments. It offered calm to his brothers, knowing that Reid was still Reid, and an out for his own fear.

Pogue forced a smile and sat up, his skin burning from the ice water. “Fall asleep like that again and you’ll be living in here.” He threatened as he got up out of the tub, helping Reid out after him.

-

It was a page that said nothing of fire or curses. Just an old warning. “Be content with one son, have no more. For the blood is strong and only one can have the power.” Caleb remembered this, remembered a time when he was young and his father was still able to speak. He had told him a story of brother’s in the Simm’s family generations back. Of how the younger had tried to steal the power out from under the older.

Caleb shivered a breath at the thought. But Reid had no brothers.

He had gone through more pages, more books, but when he drove home it was that one that still bothered him. They were running out of time, he could feel it, they all could. And when he walked into the living room and saw Tyler sitting there, staring at the photos on the wall, he wondered if his time had run out. Panic lanced his heart at he walked toward the youngest. “Baby boy-”

“We can’t wake him up anymore.” Tyler spoke but it didn’t seem to be to anyone in particular. “The power isn’t enough to pull him from the nightmares.”

Caleb couldn’t swallow, standing beside Tyler and wondering if he should reach out to him or dash up the stairs. “Ty.”

“He’s alive. Po’s with him upstairs. He won’t sit down, says he won’t fall asleep again until you get back.” A tear rolled down Tyler’s cheek as he stared blankly at the wall. “I think he’s waiting for you before… Before he…”

Caleb hissed to cut off that sentence. He didn’t want to hear it. Gently he stroked Tyler’s cheek, wanting to offer reassurance but having too little to spare. “I’ll send Pogue down. Try to get some sleep.” He whispered before going to the stairs.

Reid was pacing in the bedroom, Pogue sitting nervously off to the side. Caleb pushed the door into a swing and couldn’t help but smile miserably in response to Reid’s smirk when their eyes locked. When Pogue left, Reid stood still, folding his arms over his chest as he watched Caleb close the door. “Hard day?” The blond mocked, knowing that no matter what had happened to Caleb, he could trump it.

“You didn’t need to wait up for me.” Caleb said as he shed his jacket, shoes, and socks.

“I wasn’t tired.”

“Liar.” Caleb smiled as he walked closer. He frowned when Reid took a step back before he could reach him, his back hitting the wall and forcing a small cringe. Carefully, Caleb took that last step to have him pinned, gently lifting Reid’s shirt. The blond sighed and lifted his arms, letting the fabric be pulled off and dropped.

Caleb exhaled and Reid could have sworn it had been the dark haired boy that was hurt. He gently moved his fingers down Reid’s thin chest, tracing the spaces between the welts, bruises, and burns. His eyes went dark but the wounds wouldn’t be moved this time.

Reid smiled sadly, looking up at his brother. “Seems we’re out of room to run.”

Caleb’s forehead touched his. “Did you see him?” He whispered, hating the thought of this man in Reid’s head, brutalizing Reid’s body.

The blond looked away uneasily. “No.” His voice got quieter. “He’s always behind me.”

Caleb shivered with anger. “Could you recognize his voice? Anything?” It was practically a plea.

Reid hissed and pushed away, Caleb letting him go because he knew if he didn’t move- Reid wouldn’t be able to push him at all. “Nothing. I don’t want to talk about this. Not tonight.”

Caleb frowned, not liking the sound of that. “Why not tonight? What’s tonight?”

“I want to do what I want, spend it the way I want too.” He continued, walking a circle on the carpet that brought him back around to facing Caleb.

“What is tonight?” The oldest ground out, grabbing the blond by the wrist and pulling him forward. Reid glared up at him, eyes stern but faded in color and life. “It’s my last.” Reid knew it wasn’t what he wanted to hear, but he asked.

Caleb shivered and wanted to roar, wanted to yell and kick and scream, but instead he let go of his lover’s arm and yielded. “What do you want to do?” He was already trying to figure out how he was going to stomach taking Reid to a bar, wondering if he’d still be as magnificently devilish as he had been before.

Reid stared at him and then hesitated, actually hesitated. He shifted his weight from one foot to the other. It wasn’t like him to be nervous.

“Anything.” Caleb offered.

The blonde stepped closer, lifting up on his toes to touch their lips together. Caleb closed his eyes, happy to kiss the boy back. His arm curled around Reid’s back, careful of the burns and bruises as he pulled him closer, parting his lips when Reid’s tongue poked into his mouth, coyly exciting his own into play. And then he felt the fingers at his belt buckle, pulling it open with the same expertise Reid had always possessed. Caleb frozen, one hand grabbing Reid’s to stop his advance.

Their kiss parted so that he could stare down at the blonde, waiting for words. He knew his blond was a man of action, but every so often, Caleb needed words. After what was happening in Reid’s dreams, and how weak his body was now, he couldn’t be asking for what his body seemed to be begging for now. “Reid?”

The blonde’s lips parted, hesitated, and then spoke in the dark of the room. “I need you.” He whispered and Caleb shuddered. He’d never given those words so easily before, always making him work to get them out of him. “Cay?” It was the closest Reid had ever come to asking for help, to asking for affection.

Carefully but without pause, Caleb kissed his lover, pushing him toward the bed until he fell back onto it. Before following, Caleb stripped off his own shirt and finished what Reid had started on his pants, kicking them away. He stretched out naked over the smaller boy, kissing him as he worked his pants off as well. When they were both naked in the dark, he could almost forget how their world had changed, could almost pretend that there weren’t another man’s hands bruised into those hips under his.

It was hard to be so gentle when he was used to being so passionate, especially with Reid. He wanted to ask the blonde to tell him to stop if he wanted, if it hurt, but knew that not only would he never admit to something like that- it would also ruin the moment Reid was seeking out in their tangled limbs. Reid’s arms had curled up around the back of his shoulders when he was positioning himself at the smaller boy’s entrance, having used his powers to prepare him.

“Cay…” The blonde panted in his ear, voice laden with passion. Caleb stilled himself, ready to stop if his brother asked it. Lips brushed his ear, fingers squeezing his shoulders. “Like you love me.”

The whisper tore at Caleb’s heart, but he smiled softly in return. “I always have.” One hand fisted in the top edge of the mattress, trying to ground himself as he surged up into Reid’s body.

In the aftermath of their lovemaking, he held Reid’s sleeping form and breathlessly listened- waiting for some evil to creep into his room and snatch the boy from him. It couldn’t have him, Caleb told himself. This wouldn’t be the last night. He wouldn’t lose one of his brother’s, wouldn’t lose his family. Family. His eyes opened in the dark. Not always brother’s by blood, but brother’s nonetheless. Family.

He sat upright and crawled out of bed. He hated to leave Reid but he had to follow the sudden cold that prickled at his spine. Pulling on clothes, he Used to call out to Pogue, waking the other and asking what the hotel room number was for Reid’s cousin.


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Sorry for the wait! Hope you enjoy this chapter, I've got plans for the next one and hope to have it up soon. Thanks so much to Jenner, Teania, and charlie jae for the comments, they're really helpful and keep a girl going! As always, reviews are welcome!