Chapter Text
Under Balon’s crushing boot, Theon learned pain may come in many forms. As distant as a disappointing eye, or as close as a callus strike to the face.
He also learned that, despite how deep the bruises bled under his skin, the blows that dealt them were quick with very little contact. It’s ironic, hardly any touching went on when being beaten by his father.
A small blessing, that sort of pain was far less intimate. Some far away thing not to have tangled up within himself; later to be undone after picking out the person who’s left their marks.
And far too many have left their unwanted marks.
Pulling his last free limb to his mouth, Theon digs his teeth onto the straining flesh of Robb’s arm. The gap of his front two incisors catching the balled-bone at the side of the wrist.
“FUCK.”
The Alpha roars, but isn’t letting go of the Seamaid’s arm. His once measured grip drops, then with a sharp pull, tries prying apart mouth from hand.
Teeth stay as long as they can, tilling a thin layer of skin back. Feeling it pile, and bunch in-betrween the gap, gives Theon a disgusting taste of retribution.
The rush is short lived, as the flat of Robb’s palm forces his face down, the rumpled skin then dislodging away with the arm as it retreats. A smearing of blood, and a few threads of hair are left behind to be spat out, back into the Alpha’s face.
“Spineless-bitches, both of you. Fuck’n cowards.” His shout burns in spirit, but is ultimately weak in sound.
Emerging from the shadows, Jon takes his arm from Robb, pulling it back to be tied just as the rest of his limbs.
Cringing at his hand, Robb steps away, tapping the flap of skin back over the glistening wound.
Theon’s cursing doesn’t end as he’s watching boxes kicked open on the floor. Robb then kneels in the dust, rummaging around until a wad of bandages is found. It crinkles and rips under teeth as he’s opening it.
“I forgive you.” He says thoughtfully, wrapping up his wrist, then wiping away at the glob on his cheek. “I know you’re only acting like this because of those bloody chains. Once they’re gone, you’ll see with a clear mind… Everything wrong that’s been done to you. Taken from you. And then, in a few days, we can go to your father and fix this fucking mess Ramsays’ made with your people. Everything will be put to rights, I promise.”
With his arms hanging off the sides of the cot, wrists and ankles pulled by ropes strapped to the floor; Theon is stretched open. Air under every hand and foot, his back solely struggling with worthless effort against the bed. His rage only speaking through his struggling torso, writhing and shaking where there is purchase to do so.
Hissing, his mouth heats up as much as his wrists and ankles do. The simple, messy knots balling behind his palms make it impossible to reach as his fingers contort and flail to scratch them loose..
“Drown God curse you. May he drain the iron from your blood… Take the salt from your sinning sweat and poison the soil you’ll be left to rot in.”
Gasping overtakes his throat as reality binds him to the ground. There is no escaping. No Ramsay bursting in to save him. He’s trapped, caught and strung like a hide for tanning, vulnerable to the wrong men.
He did this to himself. Questioning his Kraken, hesitating to obey is what led to all of this.
Stupid, stupid. I should’ve listen, should’ve been good. If he breaks my bonding chains, Ramsay’ll go ballistic. He’ll leave the conference crazed. All that work ruined and wasted because I didn’t listen. He’ll be so angry. The Houses will fight…He’ll kill Robb.
“Fuck your promises, fuck Balon Greyjoy, and fuck you!… Delusional, asshole. You’re making a mistake. I want to be with Ramsay. I chose to bond with him the Northern way—”
Robb lifts up, knocking over another box. Eyes still glowing red.
“You wanted the Ironborn way! He took that from you, just like everything else. How long was it until he twisted every one of your “no’s” into a “yes”? Months? Weeks? You never noticed did you… To swept up in his attention as he slowly boiled you alive like a frog. Now you’ve no choice but to do what he wants. Be, what he wants.”
Shifting over the cot, and weakly struggling against his restraints, Theon is aching to stop time itself, to hang on to anything he can. Sniffling and huffing, he’s trying to swallow back crying. If the worst is inevitable, then it’s best to keep what can be kept. His vulnerability belongs only to Ramsay.
Defiantly, he glares, challenging those Alpha-red eyes.
“I know you didn’t fuck your first hole until eighteen, but you can’t be this naive. Didn’t it ever occur to you, that’s what I want?” His lips are trembling, angry to share another intimate detail of himself. It’s loathsome, but he’ll try anything. “That I like how controlling and insane he is? Fuck me for being a Seamaid with a kink, I like being his. It makes me feel safe, alright? After Bear Island, I never worried about being wanted ever again—”
“Because he finally fucked you?” A snarl rips through Robb’s lips. “You’re making my point for me, Theon. He takes what he wants. Damn anyone else. The moment it becomes inconvenient, he changes the game for his own benefit. How many times did you refuse before he forced your legs open—”
“It wasn’t forced.”
Robb’s shoulders drop and shake with a sad laugh. The red beginning to glisten.
“I knew it… I should have fought harder that night.”
Theon refuses to say anything, replaying with a shake. The after math of that night is no ones business, and needs no justification.
He gave because he chose to give. Virginity holds no pedestal on the islands or to him, so it was as good a time as any.
A fitting way to restart their relationship. After their proclamations, the ritual was half hazardly thrown together with hotel flowers scattering the floor under the window streamed moonlight. Ramsay didn’t have to ask. It made sense, it worked out, it felt good. That is all that mattered.
“I don’t need saving! I didn’t then, or now. You have to let me go. This makes no fuck’n sense, Robb. If you really believe your father was assassinated, and the Boltons had anything to do with it… Kidnapping and molesting me isn’t going to win you any favors. Ramsay will kill you! I don’t want that too happen. Please, listen to me. This won’t end well for anyone, let me go. Don’t try to break my chains. Just let me go before you cause a war between our Houses! I’m a Bolton now, you idiot. Northern law will be on their side, Lord Bolton won’t hold Ramsay back if you do this.”
Chest heaving, mouth gaping, softly bobbing with his labored breathing, he thinks the argument is solid. Theon feels as though he can get through to his best friend. Lay down the smallest amount of doubt, that’s all he needs.
“He won’t have to.”
The way Robb says it sends shivers down Theon’s back. Throwing a rock-slide of boulders to his heart, bashing it in his chest. It’s hammering rhythm is so loud it’s smothering out the brothers’ circling steps around him.
It didn’t work, nothing can be said to stop Lord Stark from his righteous goal.
They’ve incapacitated his bond, they will take his chains, and it will start a fight Ramsay will be all too feral for.
This will happen. And once again, he’ll loose family.
Splat! Pat, pat, pat.
Wonderful, her steps are clear amongst his drumming heart. The sounds of wet feet hovering above him, somewhere and nowhere all at once.
“No, no, no, no.” His whines are dry and brittle. There is no where to look but the dark plane of the ceiling. “You call Ramsay a fuck’n monster when you’re the one ruining everything. Tying me down like an animal. Torturing me, poisoning me like scared little cunts… At least my Alpha has the sack to use his own fuck’n hands.”
Robb gives him his back, not responding as he begins to move around the room. Steps echoing after his. Jon is moving too just out of sight.
A small, stool like table is sat beside the cot. A long, rectangle tray placed above the circle’s top.
“I’m sorry for all the pain it’s caused you, but the serum does what it must to numb the slaver’s bond. A sign that it’s been working.”
A light clacking of glass taps onto the tray. Robb setting his vials down. And to the side, onto the table’s top, he’s laying bands of fabric. It’s color indiscernible from white or beige in the dank lighting.
Theon can barely see them, but the strokes of black ink catch his sight and alight a new layer of confusing fear.
“It took a while to find the resources in Essos. To barter under the table so my family’s name wouldn’t be whispered back to the Boltons. I had to learn fast… Hearing the harrowing paths to freedom from former slaves was an appalling look into that world.”
With sad eyes, he looks to Theon, drawing their gaze wearily. Without breaking contact, he then picks up something by the handle, looping his fingers through and continues.
“The turmoil they’d felt all stemmed from the serum working to reverse their stolen consent. Did you know that’s how it all worked? Their bonding spells disable a person’s ability to consent. That’s why slaves can’t stop it from forming nor dissolve bonds on their own. Their will has been mutilated, their chains, a perverted seal locking away their autonomy.”
Banging his head against the cot, Theon’s frustration ruptures and his eyes close with a headache inducing squeeze.
“That didn’t happen!”
His lids slip open, sore and wet. Now he can see what is in Robb’s hand.
Shears. Long, sharp blades. Closed for now, waiting in quivering fingers.
“Why… What are you—” A gasp takes Theon’s mouth as he feels his boots pulling away. His bare feet immediately bitten by the cold in the room.
Tilting his chin as far down as he can allows the sight of Jon tossing shoes to the side.
“Don’t! Don’t fuck’n touch me.” His torso constricts, straining his lower body to move away where it can’t. Then, the glinting of more metal, scissors tucked into Jon’s belt.
Thrashing at the shoulders and hips, Theon’s exhausted body ruptures into panic once again. Robb’s tempered voice then continues rambling on.
“You’re not a Bolton. The blood bond was a cover. The conference was fast approaching, legitimization out of sight and he needed assurances, leverage. Balon was a threat once he set foot in Westeros. Taking you away would be taking away his best chance. Now Ramsay has no use for you on the world stage. He’ll marry another highborn form the Frostlands to keep his name. That’s the deal Roose will make.”
Splat! Pat, pat, pat.
What a mercy it would be to pass out again, but the anguish in his belly is storming, willing him awake.
“That isn’t true! He’s my Kraken, my husband. By the will of the Old God’s, I’m lawfully married. The Ironborn accept it, my mother’s family accepts it. Ramsay is already legitimized. It doesn’t matter that my father disowned me—” He’s stuttering over the word. “I still have family. YOU. You’re supposed to be my family!”
Robb doesn’t respond. The trembling in his lips makes a mess of whatever was at the tip of his tongue. Theon hates it, another insult above him. How this Alpha stand there looking so hurt.
The sliding tear of scissors rips through the air. Theon would've fallen to his knees if he were standing.
“No. Wait, wait, wait! Please.”
He begs, resisting the urge to cry, but the resolve to not show anymore vulnerability is crumbling under the pressure of what’s to come. He must try harder, he’s already failed once. If he can get out of this with his chains intact, Ramsay will understand that his Seamaid did what was only necessary.
“Don’t-don’t. Please, Robb. I’m telling you to stop. Please. Just stop, I’ll stay in Winterfell—just let me go. Untie me and I won’t run. We can wait until the conference is done. Call on a House meeting, anything! As Lord Stark, you can challenge the validity of the union. Just please, don’t do this. Believe that I’m telling you I don’t want you to brake my chains. Please stop this!”
Robb is unmoved, retaining a torn look, then whispers.
“Of course he wouldn’t want anyone to touch you. You’ve been trained to keep it that way, but the you from before… After the suppressants; you were always so close. Rarely an arm’s length away from my side…You don’t remember.”
The Alpha’s shadow is cast over him, too close now. Hand lifting, blades ready.
“No, nonono. I do! I do remember! It’s just not the same, we were raised as family. I’ve always loved you as a brother. Don’t let this ruin us! Please, please. He’ll take me away from you and the Starks forever. He’ll kill you if you go through with this. I don’t want that! Please stop.”
The fold of his collar is pulled to the side, Robb’s readying to make the first cut as an apology drops out like a leaking hush.
Thrashing his head, Theon shouts, and snarls, cries, and begs. It’s a wave of fear he hasn’t experienced since he was ten.
Ramsay has destroyed him in every imaginable way, but this is exceptionally heartbreaking. A loved one harming him for a perceived greater good is an intimate betrayal he never knew could exist after Balon Greyjoy.
The shears stop, pausing over the hem.
Has his begging done it, is he spared?
“Jon, hold his head.” Robb commands, his voice taking the trembling his hands can’t afford. “I’m so sorry. But it’s the only way.”
Those words spoil in Theon’s ears as hands press onto his face. He can’t move, and horror fills him.
His cries fold over one another, a crooking sound echoing from squishing lips and shattering teeth. Thick streaming tears fall from bulging, pink-rimmed eyes.
Snip.
The first cut slicing through is just a nose tip away. Exposing the neck, a prickling overtakes his skin as the cool air hits.
Snip, snip, snip.
Woven threads spring apart. Cream and speckled knitting unraveling with each cut; and with it, a layer of black. His undershirt ripping open.
This is all my fault. I should’ve listened, should’ve been obedient. He’ll be so angry with me. He’s going to kill them both. I’ll never see Sansa or the children ever again… I’ll loose them all. I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry I wasn’t good.
Splat! Pat, pat, pat.
“Your apologies aren’t worth the salt in your tears.”
Her voice is close, floating in-between his ears and Jon’s crushing hand.
“Your father spared me a decade of shame. The Drowned God blessed me with your absence. This is your fault, just like before.”
Snip. Splat.
Through the blur of his tears, he can see her. Far behind and under the elbow of Robb’s working arm, she’s floating there. Just as she did in his nightmare, a corpse in the darkness, glowing a sickly green bioluminescence.
She’s right. I’ve done everything wrong.
The weight form his head lifts, but it doesn’t register as he’s forced to feel the fabric be slashed from his body, exposing his tender truths.
Snip.
His chest is bare. Naked to judgmental eyes, both living and dead.
The cold brushing against his marks make his skin prickle. Ramsay’s parting gifts still bright with their purple and yellowing strokes, hand painted bruises and mouth-lavished marks; the spattering scabs remaining proudly intact.
“Look what he’s done to you.” Robb says remorseful and just above a whisper. “Seven forgive me. It’s worse than I thought. So much worse.”
A slosh of nausea rolls through Theon’s belly, up his throat, and out his eyes. A repulsive feeling laying a slimy film over his naked skin.
Ramsay had made him feel a disgusting amount of feelings throughout their time together. Shame and pride in all its ugly shades, but this was something horrifically new.
Sinner. Adulterer. Liar.
Guilty.
He should have listened to his Kraken, a better, worthier Seamaid would’ve obeyed. They would’ve trusted the words of their husband, anticipating the urgency of such commands. He was taught better, trained better.
Selfish, faithless.
There were warnings, he lacked the hindsight to see. After that first call form Rodrik, Theon should have been more careful. He’s always been embarrassingly easy to scare. Years of hiding had made him, as Ramsay would say, a skittish creature.
Stupid, stubborn… I didn’t know, I didn’t know. Maybe if Ramsay would have told me everything from the beginning—.
“He told you enough, just as I did. But you did what you’ve always done… Betray. Ungrateful, defiant, selfish, liar.”
I repented! You forgave me! I’m not that person anymore.
“You’ll always be the self-serving waste of a child. You left me, just as your leaving your Kraken.”
The pressure is too grate, the dam of his emotions breaks, and a flood of his greatest shame overpowers him. Burning tears run from his eyes, heavy, chocking sobs smear his nostrils and mouth. His most vulnerable self, stolen, and out on display.
No. Please!
Nothing is there to reach through, he’s trying regardless. Swirling with doomed thoughts, desperate to somehow find Ramsay through the bond is all that he has left.
A hand lays over his belly, slicing him from one horror to another.
Robb’s palm is covering Ramsay’s. A mismatching of size apparent in how thinner the fingers are against the still sore, bruised ones. It’s an affront how those red eyes begin welling, horrified as they measure the shape of the hand print.
“Off, get off. Stop touching me.”
His words go unheard as Robb looks on in awful awe. The chains are like trails, leading the Alpha from one terrible mark to the other.
The lingering touch makes Theon want to vomit.
“How could anyone do this to their so-called bondmate.” Whispers Jon, shock clear in his voice behind a cupped hand. “You were right, brother. This whole time, you where right.”
No! He’s wrong. WRONG. These are my gifts. Mine. Stop looking. He doesn’t like it when others look. It’s not allowed. I’m sorry, Ramsay. I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.
Broken words mangle up in his weak trilling, repeating unintelligible sounds that miss ears and hit walls. There is no telling what is spoken out loud or internally.
His limbs stop their struggling against the ropes, however he’s continuing to reach through the bond. Best to keep his internal strength as long as he can, where Lord Stark can’t can reach him. Maybe, just maybe he can get through.
Feeling the sides of his chest being thumbed hurls a terrible new wave of sobs, distracting him from his goal. Apparently he isn’t the only one sobbing.
It’s awfully insulting to hear Robb whimper. His own tears slipping as he fingers each scab.
“I knew there would be abuse. But not like this. He’s mutilated you.” Pinching the garnet drop, he sneers at its placement. “You didn’t deserve this. Not matter what you did in the past… Nothing justifies this. It’s my fault. You were just a newly sprouted Omega. Not yet sober, naive and stubborn as all seven hells; I should have protected you. You were supposed to be mine, not his. This never would have happened if I’d been braver.”
Theon hears none of it, receding further into his mind, endlessly searching and pulling on the bond. It’s a fight to not be present within his body.
“They’re endless. Robb, the chains keep going.”
The light plains of his arm hairs bolt up, the sleeves having been cut away. Then, a disgusting shift pulls down his chest as the hands leave, just to return curiously at his waistband.
Biting his tongue is the only means to keeping an awful trill from leaving his mouth.
Snip.
No one bothers with buttons or zippers. Shears cut up form his ankles and down from his waist.
Snip. Snip. Snip.
Layers of himself peeling away, wispy threads of air glide down the creases between thigh and groin, pronouncing the spread of his legs over the cot.
He’ll be so mad. He won’t let them live after this. No one but him, no one but him is allowed. Ramsay! I’m sorry. I should’ve listened, should've tried harder. I don’t want this. I don’t believe them.
Snip.
With a few simple cuts, years of hiding, reconciling, and protecting, are all gone.
No decency is afforded. His underwear is peeled away along with the rest of his clothes. Just as his chest, he feels that foul film of air breeze over his spread open, still tender sex.
Sinner. Adulterer. Guilty, guilty, guilty.
New silver skin chills and tightens from the cold, making the freshly scratched scabs around the open labia and base of his limp shaft pulse with a dull ache against the temperature.
His knees churn with a sickness as instinct drives to close his legs, yet can’t. He can’t hold it any longer, the pain of his refreshed marks, how the soft-skin of his cunt bleakly bites against stale-cold air, all horribly emphasize that he’s failed.
“By the Old God’s and the new…”
Tears fall over his naked thighs, it burns like acid. His most precious marks now soiled.
Pushing away and keeling over, Jon falls out of Theon’s peripheral as he begins retching at the floor. Hurling sounds of gagging and spitting.
Robb throws his scissors at the wall, and a roar cracks out of his sobbing.
A meager reprieve for the Seamaid as hands finally leave his body. It’s only for a moment, but his suffering can break over his face without being seen. At least for a moment.
“He-he’s butchered you. That savage-mutt… Never again. You’ll never be under his knife again.”
Those hands return and Theon bites his tongue harder, trying to fight off the rapid pumping of his chest. But hyperventilation overcomes his lungs as Robb gropes at his thighs.
His chains make a glittering sound as they are fondled and pulled. Perverse, those sounds were so light and grounding just a day ago. Now it’s all wrong and rotten.
“Seven hells, he’s flayed you.” Robb cries, sounding afraid.
It’s repulsive, how the touching won’t stop; the pulling, and pressing of his marks threatening to crack as he’s molested.
However, the pain does something more than hurt. It jolts Theon with a harrowing reminder; these are Ramsay’s marks. He’s Ramsay’s Seamaid, the only living soul to be coveted by the Huntsmen of the Dreadfort, the wild dog of The North. The only person to survive the flaying knife.
I belong to Ramsay. I belong to Ramsay.
Through his miserable sobbing, a spark of hate alights.
“Yes, and every time… I’d get wet watching him eat my skin after cutting it off.” He spits at Robb again, this time landing on the lower part of his shirt. “He fucks me until I pass out from the pain. Sometimes I cum too… He doesn’t much care ‘bout that. My Kraken just takes, and takes… Takes my flesh, my blood, my slick…All of me… And it’s all I’ve ever wanted. He’ll never let me go. He can’t. That’s why I love him, and made him my husband… Not you.”
Robb is stunned, his face contorting with rage and hurt for a long moment before he can speak.
“Do you hear yourself? He’s defiled you. Mind and body.” He’s shouting, hair prickling up as his aura spikes with stress. “He’s disfigured you, and… Enough. Arguing is pointless, you’re not yourself, you have no choice but to see the disgusting things he’s done to you as love. The next time you wake up, you’ll suffer all over the ugly things he’s left you with. It’ll be unbearable, but I’ll be at your side. And you’ll forgive all that I’m about to do.”
Theon drowns out half the things said, there is no point in listening when the worst is cresting the horizon.
“Jon, get up. It’s time.”
More spattering of coughs, then Jon can muster the stomach to speak.
“Cover him up. I can’t look at—”
“Deal with it. We need to dress every chain.” He turns back to Theon, face still holding a grimace. “I’m sorry we’ve stripped you. I don’t mean to be cruel, but he’s wrapped these fucking things around your thighs. Not even the Slavers were this extensive with their bindings… Sadistic bastard.”
“Damn Ramsay to hell.” With on last spit to the floor, Jon returns to the cot’s side. “I’m sorry Theon, what he’s done is hard to look at.”
“A slavewhore is a terrible sight.”
Her words suck his last bit of defiant strength. Reminding him of what awaits outside these crypts.
There will be no peace, nor welcome in Eastyde. He was weakly prepared to face the ramifications of crossing one taboo, but now?
There would be a wrath of turned backs. Not even his Circle siblings could bare the weight of what he’s brought over their heads. To have bonded outside of wedlock would have surely caused a painful stir. Now that all their lives are threaten with banishment, if he were ever to return without adornments, it would be the highest insult to his people. All this trouble, and he’s without adornments to show for it? What a useless waste of choices.
“Waste, waste, waste. You denied me my true child. Soured and insulted our sweetsalt… All ruined. Rotten boy. There was never reconciliation for you. Repenting was ill work done. A no-one now, a nothing. You ruined your one, pathetic chance. No one will want you now.”
Ramsay will.
Soiled, and stupid, or sweet and bright. Clean or dirty, Ramsay will always want him. No matter how disgusting, Alpha has made him the lowest of creatures, groveling bloody and befouled over floors layered thick with old and new fluids. He’s seen everything.
Whatever form of Theon exists, belongs to Ramsay. Forever.
The thought is reassuring amongst the strain taking its toll on his body. Repeating the affirmation helps with the pain. His grinding teeth slosh with spit, mucus, and tears, the words forcing out sounds by his wet lips make a spray of droplets that hit over his chin and neck.
The sensation is a reminder of his nakedness and loosing internal battle, unable to stay away from the present.
Lights spring on above him, a halo of suns to burn his vision. The color of golden yellow scatter over his eyes through the thick globing tears which grow back as fast as blinking.
Then, a wide strip of cloth is laid over his neck, breaking his chanting with an ugly scream. It doesn’t hurt but every touch is growing and amplifying over his skin, as if meant to harm, so harm it does. Not matter how chaste their fingers are the feeling is obscene.
The cloth is dry, a plain woven cotton with worn, fraying edges that feather at his skin. The strips are lightly pressed above each line, wrapping every link.
Hands shove and pull under his back, unrolling the band over his chest and down to his groin. Every shift is sickening, spoiling his body that held so many memories of Ramsay’s touch.
Lifting, pulling, pressing. These movements both disconnect Theon from his own skin, and whip his mind into greater focus. Like his eyes have been pulled from the sockets and can see each point of contact. Forcing him to be both spectator and subject.
Heavy breathing, side-long, disapproving grunts are the sounds that fill the space above as the brothers make their disquieting work. Theon can feel every exhale over him, every blow of air, and every rumble from their throats.
His eyes are stinging now, having not blinked for however long it’s been. Loosing himself in the split light is preferable over the sights in his periphery.
Mumblings drift overhead, a garbling of repeating vowels. As soon as the sound ends, the wrappings begin to tighten. Like a snake, the cloth becomes a constricting serpent. The image is fitting, he’s been deceived after all.
Then there is a weight, it’s heavy over his chest bringing forth an aching breath of his own. Burning stabs his closing lids as his eyes are forced to shut from the pain.
More garbling words float. He can’t pick them up, his ears are filled with tears and a dizziness beginning its slow spin.
Robb’s hand moves his head to the side. Theon can tell who it is by the smell and the weight of that shaking aura. A pang shoots through his neck, making it impossible to resist.
At his lips, a rounded end is shoving through. It hits his clamped teeth. The hard thing rams to the side, wedging in-between the molars. It finds a bit of tooth to catch onto and pry. A lever now, Robb forces his jaw open and shoves the rest of the shaft in.
It’s a thick, plastic tube. Liquid then rushes over his tongue triggering a gag reflex. As fast as it came, it’s gone. Theon makes to spit it out but it’s too late, his mouth is covered.
Robb’s palm is pressing hard against his lips, making a seal. Then fingers pinch his nose, he can’t breathe.
Thrashing against the Alpha is useless, there is little to nothing left in his bones as a cold wafts of pain awakens in the marrow.
Choking cuts in and out of his throat, buying him seconds before he’s forced to swallow. Heart drumming, panic running through, but he’s spent, no more fighting can be done. All he can do is feel, and try to survive.
Bitter sludge assaults him, he knows this taste. It’s worse than ever before. A foul, herbal bitterness that stabs into the soft skin of his mouth. The poison in its purest form is a cold revulsion sticking to the palette.
“…Please, Theon. Swallow… Please, pup. Let go, just drink it…”
The sound of his voice trails in and out. Parts of words stringing a broken sentence into something barely meaningful, but Theon can still feel it desperation.
He can’t hold on any longer. The taste is horrid, and the world is beginning to really spin. One more convulsion hits his throat, and his body moves on its own. Self preservation kicking in, making way. He swallows.
“God’s be good. Thank you. It’s done now. You don’t have to drink that ever again.”
It’s immediate, like a ripple fast spreading from his mouth down to his feet. An uncomfortable ache thrusting its sharpness in-between his muscles. From there it moves up, shoving through each and every pore of his skin.
Theon is shut into silence by the pain. His mouth stretching open to scream, yet nothing can come out.
“…What do we do. You didn’t say it would come out this quickly.” Jon is frantic, his hands hovering over a strip of cloth beginning to ooze black.
“Just means he’s ready.” Robb grabs at the loop around the thigh. “Come, grab the other. We’ll pull these ones off at the same time.”
Fists clasp over the sliver, now sticky with the black, yet translucent discharge overlaying the soaked cloth. They both ready themselves, their other hand stabling their hold against a thigh.
Robb counts, Jon waits, and together they pull.
It’s just pressure at first, acutely lining the crease where the groin meets the legs. The cloth ironically working to dull the sharpness the chains would give if directly over his skin. It doesn’t last long, heat ignites like a scolding brand, and it’s scaring him.
His whole body become painfully rigid as anticipation builds, the adornments are about to snap.
Pop!
The chain doesn’t snap, it’s his skin that gives. He can feel everything as the metal rakes into his flesh.
His back arches, rupturing off the cot from the penetration. Despite it being the very chains which once helped hold up his bond, it’s now piercing him as some foreign assailant. The pain from it is unfathomable, unrecognizable.
His voice finally finds him, yelling until his lungs empty as a sawing begins to grind at his femurs. Rolling, scraping, scouring. The sensation repeating with every twist of Stark’s wrist. Over and over.
Pop!
The torture over his bone stops, just to continue through muscles and tissue. Screaming through it is all he can do, unable to form words to beg anymore.
“…Is there supposed to be this much resistance?”
Between sobbing breathes, their voice scatter, meaning barely falling into place as Theon looses cognition.
“…The chains aren’t breaking, that’s all that matters.”
“They said nothing of this! It’s supposed to slip right through his body… None of the others mentioned anything about suffering—”
Pop!
“There, see!” Bursting with relief, Robb marvels at the perfectly intact loop of silver in his hand.
Pop!
Jon find’s himself doing the same as the piece is freed.
“It’s working. There is no telling what Ramsay put into these chains to make Theon suffer so, but the deconstruction is working. He wants these off, if he didn’t the chains would've broken by now. We need to keep going.”
I can’t feel my legs.
Wailing now, his mind buckles under the overwhelming sensation of what’s missing yet hurting all at once. Like he’s been amputated from the inside, and the husk of his skin and bones are meagerly hiding up the shape of what was once there. Pieces of him are gone.
He isn’t permitted to lament for long. The chains on his waist are pulling up, tightening under his lower back. The torture continuing its procession.
No. Stop. Please, please stop taking…
Pop.
Rolling, scraping, scouring. His lumbar is being sawed off between the plates of cartilage. His belly sours, the sick and hurt balling up into one ugly form to erupt from his mouth.
Vomit shoots up, bubbling and pooling. Robb is startled by it and quickly turns Theon’s head to the side, spilling the rest of the foul liquid over the bed.
“Robb!”
A heavier liquid begins falling from the corner of his eyes, it’s hot and thick. Springing from his ears, Theon can feel it push away his tears, can feel it move away the mucus from his nose as it leaks.
Pop.
His waist is numb, another part of him gone.
“Robb, he’s bleeding everywhere! There isn’t supposed to be any… Fuck, he was telling the truth. We’re expelling a blood bond—”
I wasn’t lying. I promised her I wouldn’t anymore.
“Did it ever mean anything?”
Yes Momma, every word. Please, please believe me.
His scream turns into a trill, one so loud it’s rupturing his vision. The ghost of his mother warps, half of her decrepit face melting away, revealing the soft skin of her gentle-younger years. The very same face from those childhood memories held so dearly.
The mother of his past, trapped behind death, is looking on with grief. Finally not alone, it’s in this moment he can feel them sharing their heartbreak. His fingers stretch out, bending to meet her one last time.
Pop.
The pain of his spine being cut into quarters is too much, he lets out another quaking trill. This one stronger than the last. It shakes his world, shredding his mother’s vision into dust.
No! Come back. Momma please. Help! Momma, help. Don’t leave. Please don’t leave.
Streaming blood falls from every orifice and nail-bed, he can see it on his outstretched hand. He’s bleeding; a little pool gathering at his belly button, a small river flowing from his genitals and bottom, which quickly soaks the cot. His fingers and toes dripping from each tip, splashing onto the dusty floor.
“No. The chains are intact, the bond is breaking, he’s releasing it. Maybe Ramsay did force some blood into him when he faked the ritual, but that doesn’t matter. Keep going.”
The chains no longer glitter, making no sounds as they are fisted and pulled, forced to penetrate through his chest. All Theon can do now is cry and scream under the blood tinted light above him. The last vision he’ll accept, he can’t tolerate the faded imprint of his mother’s split face behind closed eyes.
He’d rather let the light burn him, hoping it can chase away the cold thrusting violating his body.
The light then splits like a sun-dog over the sea during winter. He hangs onto the thought as another chain is pull out. Ramsay’s garnet hanging too far away from his heart is an unbearable sight.
The last sun-dog Theon ever saw was as a child, walking along his mother’s side during an early morning on the beaches of Pyke.
Pop.
I can’t feel my chest, I can’t feel… Anything.
He prays to the Drowned, but there are no winds to carry his hymn. He’s alone, down in these crypts, begin pulled apart with no Kraken, no Mother and no God.
The semblance of some long held memory is the only thing left to carry him through the night. Time will eventually find the mercy to take his consciousness away, right as the last link of silver is torn from his neck.