Devourer of Sins

DEVOURER OF SINS CHAPTER ELEVEN (NC-17)
Disclaimers Apply

A/N Goddess Foxfeather, Ted is going to smite the computer trolls for you. Dodo, Lucas, Kristen and Joris are hiding-they said you were pissed... InterNutter, TC and Maxwell Pink are fanfreakingtastic for archiving. Readers/Reviewers: Hopefully, this chapter will start to clear up some of the confusion for y'all... All work and no play makes Nemain something something....QUACK!!!

"C'mon...let me in!"
"No!" Amara leaned heavily against the door to bar Lance's entrance. "I'm busy!"
"It's been a week, Princes...what're you doing in there that I can't see?" He shoved against the door again and it budged an inch. "I outweigh you, Amara...I can push this door open!"
"But you won't," she bit out, throwing her weight against the door. Her worship was something she liked to keep private-no one had ever seen her observe the ancient rites of her people, aside from the occasional supplication to a deity. The ivalivals that reminded her of home were a private horde of memories that comforted her during the alien acts of her companions far from Nova Roma. Now, as she looked at her room, rearranged to accommodate Saturnalia1, she could not see explaining it all to Lance, no matter how much she cared for him. Evergreen boughs were tied in bunches, hangabovabove the doors and windows while even more boughs and bunches of winter plants stood in arrangements around the room. Statuettes brought from the basement under cover of night stood in places of honor and pitchers of wine and plates of cakes and fruit stood before them. Censers smoldered with burning resin and Amara sighed. _This is mine and no other... _ "Lance, just go."
"No." With one hard shove, he sent Amara sprawling and the door flying open. "Why are you being so secretive....oh."
Amara rose with wounded dignity. Lance was staring, mouth agape at the transformation her room had undergone. The beeswax tapers scattered on almost every flat surface made the room glow with gold light, scenting the air with a rich, organic aroma, underscoring the bread, wine and evergreens. "If you don't mind, I am in the middle of something."
"What?"
"Stop staring. It's rude. Please leave." She smoothed her synthesis2 over her hips and busied herself adjusting a figurine of the god Saturn.
"What are you doing in here?" he asked, not budging. He wondered to himself why she had not asked for help. "Is this some weird Roman thing?"
"Go. Now." Amara shoved him hard out the door.
"We haven't...you know...for a week!" he said plaintively.
"Get over it!" she growled, slamming the door between them. Saturnalia would not start until the next day, by her reckoning, and she had not wanted anyone to know what she was doing. _ I am not ashamed. These uneducated peasants just don't understand my ways. They aren't worthy of them._ Skinning out of her garment and into pajama bottoms and a t-shirt, she opened the door to find Lance still standing there, looking affronted. "Lance..."
"Don't shut me out, Amara," he sighed, surprising her. She had been expecting an outburst or angry words of some sort, but his tired voice took her aback.
"I'm not shutting you out...I just prefer to do some things alone." She made to step past him, but his hand on her arm stopped her.
"I'm not asking to be joined at the hip or something, but don't cut me off from your life when you think I won't understand."
"I have no idea what you mean."
"Bullshit, Princess. I know you don't celebrate Christmas or Easter or anything else that most of us do, I know you have another religion. I want to know about it, how you do things...Damn it, I love you and I want to understand!"
Amara stared at him, her mind turning over his words, looking for a loophole that would let him hurt her in some way. Finding none, she nodded curtly. "Fine. Tomorrow, I'll let you in." He let her move past him then, let her stride down the hall without looking back as he rested his forehead against the wall.
"Lance?" a soft voice at his elbow inquired.
"Huh?" Looking down without taking his head off the wall, Lance blinked. "Oh...where's the rest of you?"
Jamie shrugged. "I guess I'm all better...I woke up all alone and no one's seen me for hours..." He offered a half-smile. "Guess my fever broke."
"Guess so." Lance did not like admitting it even to himself, but taking care of Jamie for a few days had made him feel good. "You need anything?"
"Nope...just...just wanted to say thanks and all..." Both boys blushed slightly and looked away from each other. "I mean...I know you were Brotherhood and all, but I, uh, I just wanted to say...you're a really nice guy and I'd like for us to try and be friends," he finished in a rush before turning and dashing back down the hall to his room.
"This place messes with your head," Lance muttered to himself, pushing away from the wall. It was just past nine o'clock and dinner was long over, but Lance decided to raid the kitchens anyway. He descended the stairs, ignoring the buzz of conversation coming from the study and crossed into the rec room only to be met by several pairs of startled eyes. "What's going on?" he asked.
Jubilee spoke up. "Kitty, Kurt and Jean are back early. No one's saying anything but I think Kitty's hurt..."
"Why?" Lance snapped, suddenly on the protective.
Scott sighed. "Logan carried her in, right past us like he didn't even see us, and Kurt was dragging behind like he was half-dead. Jean seemed fine but she wouldn't talk to me. She's in the study now with Beast, Storm and the Professor."
"Where's Todd and Rahne?" Lance asked, realizing for the first time they were still gone.
"Dunno," Rogue growled. "Haven't seen either of 'em since they got back a few hours ago. 'Hi, babe, bye babe,' and that was it..."
"Where's Kitty at?" Lance was backing out of the room already, getting ready to dash down the hall in which ever direction they indicated.
Amara stood, arms akimbo. "Don't Lance...Just let them do whatever it is they need to do. The Professor wants us to wait here." She did not fault Kitty for Lance's feeling towards her in the past, but his continued, open concern for Kitty's welfare irritate Amara in ways she could not verbalize.
Before she could make a snide comment, Beast lumbered through and the room fell silent. He rummaged in the kitchen for a moment and came back out, ice pack in hand. "What's going on?" Lance demanded, standing in his way.
Beast sighed, rolling his tongue in his mouth to buy time. "Nothing," he lied. "Just jet lag."
"Why was Logan carrying Kitty then? And why did Kurt look so bad?" Scott asked, rising to stand next to Lance.
"They had a layover and are tired. The time differences and weather change takes it's toll, you know." Beast straightened and in his best doctor-voice, said, "Tomorrow is going to be a busy day...we still have to finish decorating and several of you are still on food pantry duty. I suggest you get to bed. Kurt, Kitty and Jean will be upstairs shortly and they will tell you all about their trip in the morning." _ God, I hope not..._
Ignoring the sudden whispers of doubt thaupteupted behind him, Beast made his way to the study and shut the door quietly behind him. The lights were off and Jean was prostrate on the fainting couch, her eyes clenched tightly closed. "Here..." Beast whispered, placing the icepack on her forehead. "This should help."
"Thank you," she murmured, accepting it with all the gratefulness she could muster.
Storm moved to stand in the shaft of moonlight coming through the window and peered down at the girl. "What's happening, Charles?"
The Professor shook his head and sighed. "Jean's having psychic backlash. Her telepathy has been blocked for some time by a force outside herself and now her mind is reeling at the sudden regain of it's powers."
Jean gritted out, "Everything...in a flood...it hurts..." Since she had gotten on the plane that Professor Xavier had chartered, her mind had been one tight ball of pain. She knew where she had seen Itzli before, she knew where she recognized Tlazolteotl from, and it was like she had some sort of psychic call waiting, all these images and words that were not her own flooded her mind, things she knew had come from other people while her mind had been blocked.
"Jean," the Professor said softly, "may I?"
"Will it make it stop hurting?" she asked with the hint of tears in her voice.
"I don't know, Jean...I can't promise you anything." The Professor had refrained from dipping into her mind until now out of respect for her privacy and a dim hope that she could sort out everything on her own. Now, he saw that she was ill equipped to do so and would most likely need help. At her slight nod, the Professor delved in. Flashes of memory assailed him as both he and Jean worked to present only the ones pertinent to the mysterious goings-on south of the border.
Beast and Storm exchanged glinting glances in the dark-they were nearly as clueless as the students as to what exactly happened to the others in Mexico. "Hank," Storm murmured, "how badly was Kitty injured? Did Logan show you?"
"Not yet...but he said it was a shallow cut. Kurt is my first concern. He's very weak. He seems to be malnourished." Beast nodded towards the Professor. "I'm going to start an IV drip to get some nourishment into him and see what I can get him to keep down. Let me know what happens."
Storm murmured ascent and crowded closer to the Professor as Beast left the room. He studiously avoided the still-murmuring crowd in the rec room and made his way to the med lab without incident. Kitty was awake and groggy, the effects of the painkiller she had been given on the plane wearing off. Kurt seemed to be in bad shape, huddled on one of the few beds and sleeping poorly, twitching and clutching his tail to his chest. "It's broken," Beast announced to the room at large.
Logan snorted. "And you went to med school...astounding."
Beast ignored the other man and gently rolled Kurt onto his back. "I can't cast it...he needs it to balance. Maybe an air cast3 would do the trick... He still needs X-rays, though."
"Kid's shedding like crazy..." Logan was holding Kitty's hand almost unconsciously, rubbing his thumb across her knuckles in a caring gesture. The red gash across her stomach was open but washed now, Kitty crying quietly when the saline solution then the antibiotics had touched the raw flesh. "I think she's gonna need stitches."
Beast gritted his teeth and moved Kurt's tail from the teenager's grasp, a stab of guilt making him cringe when Kurt mewled in pain. "His body is going into survival mode. He's shedding because his system is diverting energy to life-sustaining pursuits as opposed to the ancillary systems." Kurt's eyes fluttered open at this last and Beast smiled gently. "Do you think you can eat something?"
"Yes..." he croaked dryly, thirsty beyond belief. He accepted the can of Ensure Beast handed him and drank carefully, his stomach roiling in protest. "Kitty..."
"Is right here," Logan said quietly. He did not want to think of how he had found them, huddled in a knot of human pain in the middle of the campground they had started out from. Itzli, Jean said, had led them there and then left. He had been afraid of the Goddess, Jean said. Logan could not make sense of the story but merely nodded in acceptance, seeking to soothe the scared teens. Now, he wondered just who had been there with them. And can I find 'em to make 'em pay?
"Is she okay?" Kurt asked, trying to stand only to have Beast push him back onto the bed.
"She's fine," the doctor intoned soothingly. "Just lay back and try to rest. I need to check some things and I'm afraid Kitty will need stitches. Jean is with the Professor now. Soon, we'll have the whole story..."
Kurt shook his head. "No...too confusing. I don't even know what happened." He craned his neck to see Kitty and felt like cr. S. She was battered and bruised, her eyes dark smudges in a pale face.
"We'll see what we see, shall we?" Beast said pleasantly, injecting Kurt's haunch with a dose to make him sleep.
Kurt had time to turn a baleful glare at the other blue mutant before he slumped over in sleep. Beast sighed. "I hate to do that to him, but he'd be up all night watching Kitty otherwise. How is she?"
Logan grimaced. "She's pretty much out of it...whatever Chuck gave her on the plane is wearing off but she's still tired."
"What's she holding on to?" Beast said, picking up Kitty's left hand. She clutched a box tightly, her knuckles turning white from the effort.
"She won't let it go...I figured just let her hang on to it. Can't hurt her, can it?"
Kitty shifted in her sleep and frowned. _No, we won't hurt, will we? I'm fine...the box is fine...mustn't touch it, mustn't lose it...mine...my sins, my soul... _
1 Roman celebration of winter solstice.
2 Romans would abandon the toga during Saturnalia for a looser garment called a synthesis which was usually worn during meal times the rest of the year because the folds of the toga were so difficult to maneuver while eating. The synthesis also refers to a badge of freedom given for former Roman slaves but in this case, it's a loose garment like a long tunic.
3 Those inflatable splints