(MxM) Tales Of A Shifter (P1) - The Meeting

Chapter 45 - Scars

Brandon waited for Ezekiel to speak, but for the longest time the Shifter only examined his wound, so when he did finally speak again Brandon was pulled out of the darkness he had begun to slide into.

"I don't understand this..." Ezekiel sighed to himself.

Brandon exhaled feeling frustrated and sleepy all at once. "What's there to understand? It's a few cuts...."

"Not that...." Ezekiel chuckled dropping his hands from his side. He steeped behind Brandon out of his periphery view. Brandon forced himself to stand and just as he opened his mouth to ask Ezekiel what he was doing he felt Ezekiel hands on the back of his head. His cool fingers caressed the base of his skull where Brandon knew a three pronged scar disappeared up into his hair line.

"This is what I don't understand." Ezekiel told him. "It looks like someone tried to break open your head. Why would someone do this to you?"

"Leave it alone Ezekiel. I. Don't. Know! I have no Idea what you're talking about!" Brandon growled at him. And moved his head slightly away from his touch.

"Right." Ezekiel told him softly. "Or is it more like you don't want to talk about it?"

"Why the hell does it matter?" Brandon bit back at him. "They were all accidents."

Ezekiels hands touched his head again. Brandon refused to answer, as Ezekiels hands began to drift down. He gritted his teeth. "If all of these were JUST accidents I guess I could understand, but these aren't accidents. Someone has been hurting you." he growled and unlike Brandon when Ezekiel growled it sounded like there was a giant animal ready to pounce through his chest and maul the world around him. The sound made Brandon fell tiny.

And yet Brandon was far too preoccupied to be frightened. Ezekiel hands roamed down the back of Brandon's neck to his shoulders and then his ribs. And every time he came to a scar branded across Brandon's skin, Brandon felt his fingers outline it or feather across it gently as though they were still fresh enough to feel pain.

Everywhere that his hands visited tingled after he moved on. Brandon's fevered skin cooled where he touched it. Ezekiels palms ghosted down his back until they came to his ribs and it was here that Ezekiel paused. Brandon stifled a shiver as Ezekiels palms settled over his side and his finger wrapped around his body. His fingers sat in the groves where ten long horrible slashes cut across his right and left sides stretching down toward his belly. The cuts faded from view just a few inches above where his towel wrapped around his hips.

"Oh man...." Ezekiel said to himself. "Are these claw marks?" His voice filling the suppressive silence between them that Brandon refused to fill. "Has a Shifter been attacking you? Is that what happened?" he asked Brandon....but still got no response. So he moved on.

Ezekiels hands dropped from the marks over Brandon's sides as he reached around Brandon, his heat on Brandon bare back as he grabbed his writs. He pulled him around, forcing Brandon to face him. He locked eyes with Ezekiel for only a second before Ezekiel took his chin and tilted it backwards. He forced Brandon too look at the ceiling so that he could look closer at the gruesome marks that marred his chest and upper arms.

God...Why am I being so docile? Is it because the his hands are barely touching me. Or is it because where ever he touches I feel a zing from the top of my head to the base of my skull? Weird. Or Is that normal? I can't tell if I hate it or not....

Brandon wondered to himself. But that is what he felt every time Ezekiel touched him, a shock? But it was a good kind of shock, a good feeling after feeling noting but fatigue and pain.