Whipping Boy – Dungeons & Dragons (5e), Taz x Faith

[thecrazyalaskan]

Title: Whipping Boy
Author: fireweed15
Fandom / Setting: Dungeons & Dragons (5e)
Characters / Pairings: Taz'vroth "Taz" Kurjish x Faith; BBEG
Rating: T+
Word Count: 1180
Warnings / Notes: Written for Round XI of Hurt / Comfort Bingo: Whipping / Flogging
Summary: Surely you wondered why no one punished you after your… ill-advised escape attempts?

This ship was something of an accident but I adore it. The initial plan had been for Taz to be the one punished whenever Faith tried to escape, but then I realized that Taz had military training and Faith had the higher CON score, so I swapped them out. 
 

••• ••• ••• 

Working with mindful, deliberate strokes, Taz carved a tally into the wall with the edge of a stone. It was tedious work, the end result sloppy—but he supposed one couldn't expect artisan work, considering that everything in the cell that could be taken away to punish him already had been.

He lifted a hand to brush away the dust of the carving when there was a light, almost cordial knock on the iron bars. He glanced over his shoulder, his vision tinting red when he saw the face of their captor, a mage who called himself Cheqmir and whose alliance with a hobgoblin militia had ultimately been their downfall.

He smiled brightly, as if Taz were a close friend and not a prisoner. "Good afternoon, Lieutenant Kurjish."

"Fuck you," he spat, turning his attention back to the wall.

Cheqmir shook his head is if disappointed in a wayward pupil. "Hardly complimentary, Lieutenant," he chided. "Why loose such venom on me?"

It was a challenge, trying to look intimidating on a packed dirt floor while locked behind bars like an animal, but that never stopped him before. He drew himself up to his full height and levelled a stony glare on his captor. "I know what you're planning—and so help me, as long as I live, I'm going to fight you."

"Oh, I assumed as much—" The mage folded his hands behind his back, rocking on the balls of his feet. He was enjoying the upper hand. "Why else would you try to escape… what has it been, fifteen days in a row? What did you hope to accomplish?"

Taz remained silent, his expression stony. His lack of response prompted Cheqmir to continue, "A coup? Rallying reinforcements?"

The mage brightened. "No matter. Chin up, Lieutenant—you accomplished something."

Taz's eyes narrowed as he sized their captor up. "What are you talking about?"

"Oh, I'm sure you wouldn't like to hear it from me," he said lightly, snapping his fingers as if to summon someone.

Heavy, lumbering footfalls filled the air, and a hulking hobgoblin filled the frame of the cell; thrown over his shoulder was Faith, the back of her travel dress shredded open and exposing a network of dings and gouges in her metal and wood body. The hobgoblin shrugged her off his shoulder and roughly stood her on the hard packed floor. She swayed dangerously, trying (poorly) to hold back a groan of pain, and the light in her eyes flickered as they tried to focus.

There was something almost… gleefully confrontational in Cheqmir's eyes as he watched Taz take in the sight before him. "But perhaps you'd like to hear it from Miss Faith?"

The sight of her, damaged and pained and terrified, ignited the protective instincts in Taz that had driven him to join the army in the first place—to say nothing of the fact that he'd been Faith's protector long before he'd become her lover. His vision tinted red, he lunged at the bars, reaching for the mage with every intent to grab him by the collar of his robes. "You bastard—!! What did you do to her?!"

"Nothing she couldn't withstand, I assure you." He spoke as if chastising a misbehaving pupil. "Surely you wondered why no one punished you after your… ill-advised escape attempts?"

He wasn't sure which bothered him more, the fact that Faith had become his whipping boy or the fact that he hadn't considered that. A low snarl rumbled in his chest and throat, and when he spoke, snaps of static, the predecessor of his lineage's lightning breath, sparked in his mouth. "I'll kill you—you son of a bitch, I'll kill you myself—!"

"By all means—" Cheqmir's amiability, his amusement was gone as he lifted a hand to summon a deadly looking, adamantine coated whip. "Risk her life to claim mine."

Faith flinched back from the weapon as he lifted it, an action that quelled Taz's (justified, in his mind) murderous rage. He drew his arms back, lifting his hands passively as he stepped back from the bars. "Fine. Let her go—that's all I want."

The look on Cheqmir's face was not unlike a cat that had cornered a mouse as he looked from Taz to Faith and back again. "You would give me your compliance for your overgrown trinket's life?"

To compare Faith to a mere trinket was to deny both her skills as a sorcerer and her very soul, and the implications of the statement made Taz's blood boil all over again. Instead, he forced himself to swallow his bitter hatred and speak civilly. "Is it a deal or not?"

A long pause as Cheqmir considered it. As the seconds dragged by, it felt more and more like he was taunting him, like he was going to say no—"It's a deal." He waved a hand, the lock of the bars tumbling and the door opening as he seized Faith by the upper arm and wrenched her into the cell.

The slam of the iron behind them and their captors footfalls was loud, but neither one noticed as Faith's legs finally gave out and she dropped to her hands and knees, her whole body trembling as if the effort to stay like this was too much.

Now that they were alone, the façade of strength fell away, and Taz all but rushed to her side. When he knelt beside her, his hands hovered, wanting to touch her but afraid of inflicting any more pain. "Ohh fuck, Faith…"

"I'm okay, really—" she protested.

"Look at what they did to you!" he countered, reaching over and finally helping to ease her into lying down on the packed dirt.

"Shhh…" she soothed, shifting as if she meant to turn on her side.

"Just—" His hand on her shoulder stilled her. "Just lie still. Fuck, where's Ell when you need him?"

Faith chuckled without humor. "His spells wouldn't have an effect on me—"

The fact that Faith was, technically speaking, a construct over which healing magic would wash over as harmlessly as water hurt less than had he been backhanded. "Let me—just let me think—"

"We need tools to fix me, Taz," she gently stressed. "Tools we don't have."

"What am I supposed to do?" he groaned. "I can't fix you and there's no spellchuckers—"

"Shhh…" Her hand slid forward on the dirt floor, cold metal wrapping around scales and claws and gently squeezing.

"Faith…" He squeezed her fingers in return, feeling small and vulnerable in the face of her suffering—doubly so knowing she'd borne it in his place. "Tell me what to do. Please."

"Well, I'll…" She paused, audibly wincing and she turned, slowly, onto her side to look up at him. "I'll settle for a gentle touch and a kind word for now."

It took some doing, but after a fashion, he managed to draw her into his lap, protective and secure, to wait out the night. If nothing else, Taz mused, his chin resting lightly on the top of her head, their need to escape their captivity was all the more serious.