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While Archie slept, Horatio would trace the marks on his back. They weren't the haunting silver o scars, but the strange split of skin. Horatio would let his fingers run over them like the flow of water, grazing flesh until Archie would stir and then he'd ease his hand away. There were marks of the cat - most every man in His Majesty's Navy had them - traces of punishments for crimes real and imagined. But these others Horatio knew were from Jack Simpson, his punishments meted out through different means. Horatio knew without asking that Archie never screamed. He knew that, in Archie's mind, the marks existed no longer - all of them washed away by the hard pucker of flesh that marred Horatio's shoulder, absolution spilled in blood for every unspoken sin.
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