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Feyd doesn’t move, feet spread in a defensive stance, arms crossed, watching the two familiar figures carefully.
“Well,” Paul says, exhaustion clear in his voice and in the lines of his brittle shoulders. “This is certainly more excitement than I was anticipating this evening.”
A stab of worry cuts through Feyd’s confusion and apprehension. He wants to move towards his husband. To steady him. To touch his hand where it trembles slightly on his cane.
The child - perhaps six, if he had to guess - is backed into a corner, thumb crammed in his mouth, eyes glazed, tiny body tense, fingers scratching rhythmically at his neck. Was he really ever that small?
Feyd can’t move. It would trigger a response. From both of them. His gaze shifts to the boy.
He won’t be a boy for much longer. Feyd recognizes that inflamed mark on the fresh skin of his upper arm. Remembers receiving it like a goodbye kiss only a few days before his eighteenth birthday. Before he became a man. Not a boy anymore. Remembers the mingled fear and relief knowing that it would change things.
Feyd examines the bulging muscles, the feral expression on his young face, the black teeth bared at him. Not at Paul. Because Feyd knows what he looks like now at almost sixty four. He no longer fears and resents what he sees in the mirror every day, but it took time.
He doesn’t look like an exact copy, of course. The weight he’s gained around his middle that refuses to budge, is nowhere near as dramatic.
That doesn’t matter.
To the boy and the child opposite, he looks close enough.
Feyd swallows, resisting the urge to turn and run. To find one of the many hiding places in the palace of Arrakeen that he’s cultivated through the years.
But he’s not going to run. Because he’s not that trembling child anymore. He’s not even that boy warrior, practically foaming at the mouth for a fight that Feyd is not going to give him.
“If you come near me, I’ll kill you with my bare hands,” the boy hisses.
Feyd winces at the phrase. Paul sighs like the murderous youth in front of him is not as dangerous and volatile as an uncaged tiger. Bloodthirsty and frightened and ready to pounce.
He doesn’t know you yet, Paul. He won’t hesitate to hurt you.
But Paul knows this. He’s just— He’s Paul.
Feyd’s shoulders start to relax, the worry starting to abate. It’s okay. It will be okay.
The boy must see something in his expression. The weakness that Feyd hasn’t bothered to hide for years now. A weakness he thinks he can exploit.
“Do you fuck him?” The boy asks Feyd meanly, a sneer twisting his young face. “That’s it. He’s your bitch? Couldn’t afford a younger, less broken one who knows its place? Why the fuck is he talking for you?”
Feyd keeps his face blank.
“Oh, I know,” he continues, voice louder now. “You’re his bitch. He fucks you. He fucks you in the ass.”
“Feyd,” Paul snaps, just as Feyd replies evenly: “Yes.”
“Feyd,” Paul says sternly, like he isn’t speaking to someone who could fucking kill him in an instant. “Stop it. You’re scaring him.”
Paul gestures to the frozen child huddled in the corner, blood now under his nails as he continues to scratch at himself.
He’s not scared. He’s not even here. Not really.
“Fuck him,” the boy spits, not even sparing a glance at his younger self.
Anger wells in Feyd’s belly. It’s not his fault. You know it’s not.
“Stop,” Paul says forcefully. He doesn’t use the Voice. But they all respond anyway. Responding to orders. To the person in charge. To Paul.
Feyd lets out a breath, relieved at his tone. The child’s fingers stutter on his neck. The boy pales in fear. Everything is fear for him. Everything. It hurts like an old stab wound to remember when it was like this. It’s been such a distant memory for so long. Feyd looks over at Paul again. At the spots of color on his gaunt cheeks. It's been so long for both of us.
“Can we figure this out in the morning?” Paul says. “I suppose I cannot convince you both that you are safe from harm here with us, but I will convey the sentiment nonetheless. We will provide you with rooms, food, and clothing. Then we will resume this— this discussion tomorrow.”
There’s a tense silence following his words.
“Follow me,” Feyd grunts, beckoning at the boy.
He walks towards Paul, lowering his voice: “The little one won’t move from this spot.”
Paul’s brows furrow in concern, looking skeptically at the small living room.
“But—”
“Assign guards to watch the door. You won’t be able to get him to move without someone losing an eye.”
Paul’s lips thin, but he doesn’t protest.
“I’m not going with you, you fat fuck,” Feyd calls across the room at him.
“Fuck if I care,” Feyd snaps back, hand landing on Paul’s sharp hipbone, comfort leeching into his body from just the simple touch. He wants to lean forward. To press their foreheads together. To lean his head on Paul’s uncomfortably bony shoulder. To be on their bed, Paul reclining on a few pillows so Feyd can get him in his mouth. Just to have him here. Inside. Safe inside him.
“Please,” Paul says, eyes on his younger self. “The child needs rest and so do you.”
Feyd snorts, black teeth that he hasn’t worn in years, bared in a false smile.
“He’s not going to rest, old man.”
And neither am I, Feyd finishes for him in his own mind.
“I don’t give a fuck if you rest. But you’re going to leave him alone and go to another room for the night,” Feyd tells him.
Paul leans heavily on his cane, one hand slipping into Feyd’s arm as they move from the room, listening to the panther-like steps of Feyd as he reluctantly follows.
The small child in the corner doesn’t move.
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