Chapter 278: Salvation 7*

Parc tipped over the pot, letting a viscous red fluid, thicker than those potions he always carried, onto the tips of the fingers on his left hand. He rolled the fluid around a bit, watching as it dyed his digits like ferrofluid. It was a jarring sight, such a bloodred shade on healthy skin, thankfully that was temporary as once he spread it, it would quickly be absorbed by her body and disappear.

As he did so, he glanced across Merigolds body, hissing silently as her wounds only seemed to grow in size. At her sides, Marigold was clutching the blanket tightly, using it like her crutch of sanity. She didn't look at him, just kept her eyes blank, moving between opened and closed as she stared at the ceiling. She didn't even look alive.

Parc rolled his thumb over the viscous cream and shook his head. There was too much damage for him to fix in just one night. The process would be arduous and take more time than he was ready to give her on this trip but he'd help her one way or another. Whether she'd be grateful, he'd have to see. Either way, at least she's away from that scumbag.

One more look to Blake let him see the girl watching him sharply, as if ready to bolt in if he tried anything too far. He rolled his eyes and raised his brows. He may be scum, but nothing so bad as to force himself on a battered woman. "This might be a bit cold," saying that, he slowly brought the creamed hand to her outer thigh and started gently massaging it into the skin just off the small red welt that was there.

Marigold shivered for a second but quickly calmed herself, as silent as could be. Even as his fingers moved over the thin, whip-like mark, raising pangs of heating pain, she bit her tongue and silenced herself. He was right when he said it would be cold, it was frigid if anything and caused her skin to tingle like he was actively teasing each of the nerves in her leg one by one. Like ants crawling over her skin, the tingle grew larger and even more uncomfortable.

But just as quickly, that numbness began to fade. She could still feel his fingers pressing into her skin and her fleshy thigh. His touch was gentle, gliding here and there with skill and finesse as he focused on each of her small bruises first. The old ones on her calf got a bit more attention than the ones on her hip.

It was comforting really, to liken it to anything it was like a skilled masseuse giving her a nice oily massage. She hadn't had one in a long time… years, possibly even a decade or two. Growing up they'd been a nigh weekly part of her life, to hydrate her skin and deal with what stress the daughter of a shipping conglomerate CEO had. Ever since Bleu… since he started hitting her, she just couldn't go and let someone see the marks he left on her.

Marigold's eyes slid open, bags forming beneath her eyes as she stared through the ceiling and into the starry night above. Lost in the few thoughts running through her mind. As Parc moved to her foot, pressing his thumbs into her soles and playing with her toes, frequently pouring out another small dollop of that tingling cream he had, Marigold chewed her lip. She ground it so badly she was sure her skin would snap sooner rather than later.

In her heart, she wanted to jerk her leg away, to grab the blanket and wrap herself up so tightly she would suffocate herself just to hide away from this humiliating situation… yet with every touch of her legs as he moved from her right to her left, it stopped her. There wasn't judgement or hesitation to his motions, but a subtlety like he didn't care. How he couldn't when such ugliness was before he befuddled her.

When Bleu saw them he'd grow furious and cold, blaming her for her hideousness…

As his hands finished with the outsides of her legs, Parc's gaze fell to her inner thighs and the large bruise standing out on her rosy white skin. He held his breath, soon releasing it in a hiss as she wondered how she could walk so easily. The pain it must bring her, the chaffing and what not… it must have been agonizing.

With a shake of his head, he brought one hand to just below the mark and gently guided Marigold's leg open so he could get a better view of it. His fingers pressed around the yellow-hued rim and sent a spike through Marigold's body that she bit down behind a soft grunt. Parc pulled away, watched her to see how she was and when she calmed down, continued.

"It's horrible isn't it?" she asked with a self-deprecating laugh.

"Horrible is an understatement," he mumbled in response as he pressed into her plush inner thigh flesh, fingers rolling here and there spreading the cream and bringing with it that paralyzing numbness. "But it's not ugly." Marigold's eyes jerked down at that. "I've got plenty of scars, more than I'd care to count. If anything I'd say I'm ugly." Blake scoffed at that, those scars—at least on him—made her lady bits quiver happily.

"While these… they're temporary," he moved further up her inner thigh, everywhere his fingers trailed the darkness of injury would fade, revealing beneath it skin as healthy as anything. Marigold listened to him intently, her leg shivering as his movements brought him closer to her thinly cloaked crotch with every moment. "Bruises fade, over days, over weeks, over months. The day they go so too does the pain your body feels." He pressed four fingers flat against her thigh and swept them through the thickest portion of the bruise, the tip of his middle ran so close to her panties she could almost feel his heatstroke her. In the wake of his swipe, the bruise faded as the cream was absorbed into her skin.

"There are some scars that don't heal… at least, they don't heal quite so easily. It's the ones you feel but can't see…" trailing off, he began to press deeper into her thigh with a little more force. Spikes of pain rang through her body causing her to his but quickly they turned to tingles of a hundred little ants crawling across her skin, and then finally, when it faded, a new feeling came. Not pain, though it did ache, pleasure, she felt. She chewed her lip, biting back the feeling as he pressed thinly beneath her panties, staying neatly between her thigh and her labia majora.

His word's lingered longer than she wanted, wounds that you feel but can't see… she stared hollowly at the sky. She has many of those. Hundreds… thousands… many small but plenty large and engulfing. Marigold's heart pattered faster as Parc pulled his hands from her lower half and brought them to her belly. He danced nimbly and kindly, stealing her scars like the worlds most proficient thief.

"Why are you doing this?" she asked through clenched teeth and misty eyes.

"Because you are too beautiful. No matter how many scars you may have."

She couldn't hold back her tears anymore. She dashed her eyes from the ceiling and to the weak smile of the boy looming over her. He didn't meet her gaze as he focused on her stomach and moved upwards towards her chest and arms. They went silent and she let him do his work as she watched him coddle each bruise and bump. Minutes drew on longer than they seemed as time began to mean nothing to her or him.

For a masseuse, he wasn't great but also not poor, and certainly not swift. It wasn't to the point she considered him a beginner but he wasn't experienced. All of that though… it didn't matter at the moment. For all his inexperience when it came to pressure points and massage techniques, he replaced them with an ungodly amount of tenderness. He focused on all the right places and ensured they were left shivering with sensitivity, and he didn't push farther than necessary. Something told her he was holding back on that front, that if she were any other girl, like Blake who had been watching them like a hawk, that he would have gone farther. To give her a massage in a field he was more skilled in.

"Can you flip over for me?"

Even the words that escaped him were subtle and soft. Far from loving but there was endearment laced within them. Marigold nodded and slowly rolled onto her stomach. For an instant, she paused and looked down at her body. Her mind raced to a stop as her fingers moved to her stomach and thigh to rub the shiny red flesh and gaped when she felt no pain but a small bite of sensitivity like a freshly healed scar.

Another look to him and Marigold was on her belly, her cheek flat on the pillow and pointed away from the boy. This time he started with her shoulders and arms and the several lash shaped welts that dotted her. They weren't quite scars, she was grateful Bleu never went quite so far…

When he moved down, past her lumbar and to his rump he whispered softly to her, "You won't have to worry about Bleu anymore Marigold." He pressed beneath her panties, rounding her cheeks and thieving away the mark of Bleu's boot, "he won't hurt you anymore."

Marigolds lips trembled heavily but she didn't cry, at least, she didn't make a sound. Tears still flowed, they ran over her nose and into the pillow leaving a stain but she bit away the noises even though she knew he knew. She was making too many chesty movements and her breaths were far from soft…

But he ignored them, simply continued his massage and gentle healing… and once he was done with her wounds and stuffed them into his bag of worries, he continued the massage. His focus went with the snap of a wrist from healing to nurturing. Every inch he touched struck nerves that made her heart palpitate faster, yet they never went as far as stealing her breath or leaving her aching down there.

Over time, Marigold's tears drained and with them her thoughts. Darkness crept up on her, exhaustion built up over years of pain addled nights where sleep came hard. For once she felt perfect, there wasn't the constant sting of fabric grinding against her sensitive body. Now all she felt was peace, fleeting peace, but enough that her eyes drifted shut and memories turned to dreams.

Hearing her soft snore like noises, Parc retracted his hands from Marigold's body and gazed down over her supple contours. Nodding as the redness of the cream faded to pale healthy skin. He wiped down his hands on a towel and moved to the wardrobe to rummage out a small blanket he threw over Marigold to let her rest in warmth.

He exited the room just after Blake and as it shut, she asked him. "Couldn't you have let her drink it?" and he shook his head.

"Drinking is too simple," He uttered softly, "giving her a massage like that, it let her know that I don't care about her wounds. That she's safe with me, Blake. That even if she sees herself as an ugly beast, that at least I do not."

She stared him down harder then shook her head, "You're manipulating her."

"Perhaps. But is what I'm doing wrong?"

Blake glanced to the lounge then shook her head. "No."

***

Stroking through Blake's thick black hair, Parc scratched the faunus kittens ears and smiled down at her napping form. She wasn't quite naked, though she was also far from modest in her panties and bra. There were pyjama's in her luggage, though the cruise brought them to wearing nothing as they slept. With Marigold there though, Blake simply didn't feel so well being in the nude.

Slowly Parc shift Blake from his pec and onto her pillow and watched her curl up beneath the downy blanket and extradited himself from the bedding. Making his way towards the balcony with scroll in hand, he slid open the glass door and escaped into the cool night cloaked outer world.

There were clouds this night, darker than the others and the odd snap of thunder rang from them blended with the shimmering burst of lightning snaking between the gulfs. "Pathetic fallacy… is it?" he smirked down at the serpents of light below as fire raged in his eyes and fingers of one hand clasped the railing till it creaked and threatened to crack.

He was angered, and anger brought hate.

With that, Parc flipped open his PDA and scrolled through his contacts before finding far down on the list a certain name he'd never called but had saved for a rainy day.

The PDA rang as he brought it to his ear. Five rings and by the sixth it was picked up for a dozy feminine voice to speak from beyond. "With Lisa." Followed by a squeaky yawn.

***

***

This'll be last arc before I head on vacay. Kill me now. I'll be back in basically three weeks. Yay...

<svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg">

<rect width="0" height="0"></rect> <!-- Used for easily cloning the properly namespaced rect -->

</svg>