It was well past midnight when the knock came.

Daemon was sitting up, reading, and the moment he heard it he was on his feet and at the door, tugging it open. Because there was one person who knocked like that, and one reason why he'd be here now.

"Bastard," Lucivar said wearily, listing sideways against the doorframe. "Hope I didn't disturb your beauty sleep."

"Prick," he said dryly, already running his eyes over his brother, cataloguing the damage and ignoring the comment. It didn't look good, judging by the little droplet of blood that he didn't seem to have noticed on one shoulder; purple and black bruises already beginning to rise on his right shoulder that made Daemon wince.

"Mother Night," he murmured, guiding Lucivar further into the room. "What happened to you?"

Lucivar winced at the hand on his shoulder, almost but not quite leaning into Daemon. "Nothing unusual. Just got a bit carried away, that's all." The tiredness in Lucivar's voice suggested otherwise; the way he was walking that he'd just come down from a very long evening with safframate. The rage burned for a moment before he smothered it. Now was very much not the time.

"Huh," he said simply, skeptically, and shoved him gently at a chair. "Sit down. You're tilting. I'm going to go get something for those cuts before you bleed all over my nice furniture."

A snort. "Sorry for the trouble."

Daemon allowed himself a little bit of a smile. "Don't worry about it, Prick. I've come to expect it." And it was no more than Lucivar would have done if Daemon had come to him during one of those brief times they weren't separated. Because they had no one but each other, even if sometimes there was fury and hatred between them. But that part, he didn't say.

Lucivar sat and Daemon went to the bathroom, fetched the ointment he used, wincing at the use – but not much. And bandages. For the other wounds, there was only time and whatever comfort a brother could give.

"Sit on the footstool so I can see your back." When Lucivar obliged, Daemon sat behind him and examined the wounds from the brutal whipping he must have received, bleeding sluggishly, most of them already scabbed over. At least they were clean. Some of them would scar, no matter what he did, but there was nothing to be done for that. "Tell me what happened." Deceptively calmly and smoothly as he uncapped the ointment and began rubbing it onto Lucivar's back, ignoring the winces as it bit into gashes in the skin.

"Nothing," he maintained stubbornly.

Daemon stopped, rested his nails on his brother's shoulder, and crooned in his ear, "And that's why your scent reeks of safframate?"

Lucivar shivered and tried to twitch away, his shoulders tensing. "One of the bitches pushed me too far. I killed her. I was punished. That's it." Flatly, but Daemon knew what 'punishment' meant for males like him and Lucivar – even more so Lucivar. Murder wasn't against the law, but there were ways a pleasure slave could be punished nonetheless. He deliberately didn't wonder if the whipstrokes were from before or after they'd dosed his brother with that vile aphrodisiac that heightened senses and drove men mad with unattainable pleasure.

"Daemon," his brother said in a half strangled voice. "Get your hand off my shoulder. You're going to give me frostbite."

Daemon pulled back his hand quickly, aware of the chill and pulling in the cold rage. "Sorry, Prick." When he was sure he had the bite of cold anger under control, he went back to rubbing the soothing ointment into the wounds. As the initial bite passed, Lucivar breathed a sigh of relief and his eyes closed, the closest he would ever get to admitting the pain he was feeling.

Too softly, "They used the Ring?"

A snort. "Of course they did."

Daemon let his nails bite into his palms, restraining his rage, not letting it touch Lucivar. "And how many of them?" Still too softly, in that too quiet voice, because he didn't like that Lucivar hadn't noticed the tone the first time.

He leaned his head back wearily. "I didn't count. Mother Night, Bastard…" A sudden pause. Yes, he realized. He was just too tired, too exhausted.

"You know how much shit you're going to be in if they find you here?"

"They don't care where I am now as long as I'm not doing anything. They're done with me." A slightly bitter laugh. Daemon gave up and put his arms around Lucivar, pulling him back into a hug.

"Prick."

"Where's the scolding for giving in?" Lucivar said, roughly. "I was all prepared for it, too."

Daemon's jaw shifted, set, his eyes glazing slightly. It was fortunate that Lucivar's eyes were closed, couldn't see the change. "They'll get what's coming to them," he crooned. "When Witch comes, they'll all burn in Hell."

Lucivar coughed briefly, his breathing slightly ragged. Fingers on his brother's pulsing heartbeat, Daemon could feel the pain he was suffering, lingering effects of the safframate, simple exhaustion.

"Killed Zuultah yet?" He asked.

"That bitch? No. Gotten around to Dorothea?"

"Not quite."

A half smile between them – an old exchange, half joke and half nasty, sharp-edged reality. Lucivar shivered briefly.

"Thanks, Bastard," in a slightly hoarse voice.

"You're welcome, Prick." Smoothly, pressing his brother's hair back from his forehead, the skin slightly too warm and sweat sheened. "You should be asleep."

"Yes, mother." A snort. "Want to get back to your beauty sleep?" But it was a little off, a little too slow for Lucivar. Daemon gave him a chilly smile.

"Go to sleep, Prick. You're going to need it if you're planning on discussing wine in the morning."

His mouth twitched in what might have been a smile, but the brief warmth in his golden eyes was what Daemon was watching for. "Sure. As if you could beat me on a good day, Bastard." He spread out his wings and folded them in, standing without a wince even though Daemon could almost feel the tug of fresh wounds.

"Just keep telling yourself that."

Lucivar went to the door, paused, turned back. "You know if you need anything – while they've still forgotten we shouldn't be in the same Court…"

"You're down the hall." A smile, and while he meant the next words to be joking, he couldn't keep the anger from forcing them out in a viciously sweet voice. "Don't worry, Prick. I only get caught when I want to."

Lucivar shivered. "Mother Night, Daemon," he whispered, in that same hoarse voice.

Daemon looked directly at his brother and Lucivar turned and strode down the hall, wings folded tensely around him. Daemon turned back and shut the door softly, putting away the ointment. He let one finger trail on the blood on the back of the chair where Lucivar had rested, lifting his fingers away and staring at his brother's blood on his fingertips.

He didn't know the witches who'd hurt his brother tonight, but he knew where the rules came from, and he swore with every fiber of his being that the price would be paid.

Everything has a price. The price for Lucivar's pain would be their lives.

That he swore for Lucivar, and perhaps even for himself.