Time dissolved in the torchlit stillness. There was only the throbbing ache in his bones and the bowl on the floor. It was a lodestone, drawing his attention, its foul-sweet scent a hook in his senses. The hunger it promised to soothe was a living thing inside him, gnawing at his marrow, crying out with a voice that was almost, terrifyingly, his own.
He wouldn't. He couldn't.
With a ragged cry that was half-sob, half-snarl, Aladdin scrambled forward and kicked the bowl. It flew across the room, striking the stone wall with a dull crack. The dark liquid splattered against the smooth rock, thick and sluggish like congealing blood, before running down in slow, obscene rivulets. The scent intensified, filling the chamber. His stomach clenched in a spasm of simultaneous craving and disgust.
He had done it. He had defied him. A small, pathetic victory, but it was his. He sagged back against the wall, breathing heavily, the tremor in his hands now a violent shudder. The brief surge of adrenaline drained away, leaving him hollowed out. The ache in his spine flared, sharp and punishing.
The heavy bolt slid back. The door swung open.
Jafar stood in the doorway, his eyes taking in the scene: Aladdin panting against the wall, the shattered remains of the bowl, the dark stain spreading on the stone. There was no anger on his face. Only that same chillingly calm, paternal disappointment, now tinged with a weary sigh.
"Well," Jafar said, stepping into the room. "I suppose I should have expected this. Tantrums are common at your age. Messy, but common."
He closed the door behind him but didn't bolt it. He didn't need to. The casual omission was a statement of power more profound than any lock.
"Stay away from me," Aladdin warned, his voice thin. He tried to push himself to his feet, but his legs trembled too badly, refusing to support his weight. He was trapped on the floor, a wounded animal.
Jafar ignored him, walking over to the splatter on the wall. He touched the liquid with a long finger, bringing it close to his face to examine it. "What a waste. Still, the lesson is learned. You're not ready to feed yourself."
He turned back to Aladdin. In his other hand, unnoticed until now, was a bundle of clean, white cloth and a small, dark leather bottle, not unlike a waterskin but fitted with a strange, polished wooden nipple.
The sight of it sent a jolt of pure, cold dread through Aladdin’s system. It was worse than the shadows, worse than the staff. It was a symbol of such profound humiliation he couldn't immediately process it.
"No," Aladdin whispered, shaking his head. "No, you're not."
"There is no shame in dependency, my son," Jafar said, his voice dropping into that low, soothing register that made the skin crawl. "For our kind, the first century is one of utter reliance. You have been forced to fend for yourself, to walk and run and fight when you should have been in a cradle. It has twisted your bones and starved your organs. We are correcting that."
He advanced slowly, setting the bundle and the bottle down on the mattress. "First, we must get you out of these filthy rags. They’re chafing your skin."
Panic clawed its way up Aladdin's throat. He scrambled backward, his bare feet finding no purchase on the smooth stone. "Don't you touch me!"
Jafar’s patience finally wore thin. The shift was subtle—a tightening of the jaw, a cold hardening in his eyes. "This defiance is the sickness talking. A fever dream of independence. I will not allow you to harm yourself further."
He moved, and it was too fast. Aladdin threw a wild punch, but Jafar caught his wrist in a grip of iron. It wasn't just strength; a wave of that same profound lethargy washed over him from the point of contact, a magical weariness that sapped the strength from his limbs. His body went slack against his will.
Jafar easily pushed him back onto the thin mattress, looming over him. "You are exhausted. Your body is screaming for rest it cannot find. Fight me, and you only deepen the damage."
"I'll kill you," Aladdin gasped, struggling weakly as Jafar began to unfasten the rope sash at his waist. The fight was a pathetic twitching. His muscles refused his commands, leaving his mind to rage uselessly inside a prison of his own flesh.
" Hush now," Jafar murmured, pulling the sash away. His movements were methodical, impersonal, like a physician tending to an unconscious patient. He began working on the buttons of Aladdin's trousers. "There's nothing to be frightened of. We will simply get you clean and comfortable. Then we will eat."
Tears of shame and fury pricked at Aladdin's eyes. He twisted, trying to roll away, but Jafar simply placed a heavy hand on his chest, pinning him effortlessly. The cold from that touch spread through his ribs, stealing his breath. Every ounce of his street-honed strength, all the agility and grit that had kept him alive, was less than nothing.
He had never felt so utterly powerless.
Jafar stripped off his trousers and vest, leaving him bare in the torchlight. He didn't mock him. He didn’t leer. He simply looked at Aladdin's trembling, underfed frame with a clinical pity. "So thin. We will fix that."
He unfolded the white cloths. They were thick, soft linen, shaped into a complex form he didn’t recognize. With an efficiency that spoke of long-lapsed but not forgotten practice, Jafar lifted Aladdin’s hips and began to swaddle him in the heavy cloth. It was a diaper. He was putting him in a diaper. A raw, hysterical sound tore from Aladdin’s throat as he bucked, a final, desperate surge of defiance.
Jafar held him down firmly until the spasm passed. "It's all right," he said, his voice maddeningly calm as he secured the linen wrap. "You are not used to proper swaddling. It will feel strange at first. But it is cleaner. It is what you require."
He then pulled a simple, long-sleeved linen shirt, soft as a cloud, over Aladdin's head. It was loose and comfortable, but it felt like a burial shroud. He was being dressed like a doll, an infant, his own clothes discarded in a heap on the floor.
When he was done, Jafar studied his work. A flicker of something that might have been satisfaction crossed his features. "There. Much better."
He sat on the edge of the mattress and reached for the leather bottle. "Now. Time to eat."
"No," Aladdin croaked, turning his head away. "Please." The plea felt like acid on his tongue.
Jafar’s expression hardened. "You do not have a choice in this. You are a child who does not know what is good for him."
He slid one arm beneath Aladdin’s shoulders, lifting him, and cradled him against his chest. The position was a grotesque parody of paternal care. Aladdin was held fast, his head crooked in Jafar's elbow, his body still Lead-heavy and unresponsive. He tried to speak, to spit, to bite, but he could do little more than tremble with helpless rage.
"Open your mouth, Aladdin." It was a command.
Aladdin clamped his jaw shut, glaring at the man who claimed to be his father.
Jafar sighed. He brought his free hand up and laid his thumb and forefinger on either side of Aladdin’s jaw, at the hinges. He applied a steady, inexorable pressure. It wasn't overtly painful, but it was a deep, irresistible force. Aladdin’s jaw muscles spasmed and then gave way. His mouth fell open.
The wooden nipple was pushed between his lips. It was smooth and warm. The scent of the liquid, now inches from his nose, was overwhelming. Raw, vital, spiced. The hunger, the deep, agonizing hunger in his bones, roared to life. His body, betrayed by instinct, wanted it. Needed it.
He held out for a few heartbeats, the liquid held in his mouth, his mind screaming. But Jafar tilted the bottle further, and a small amount trickled down his throat.
The effect was instantaneous.
A jolt of warmth, pure and profound, shot through his veins, extinguishing a fraction of the deep ache in his femurs. It was not the pleasant warmth of a fire or the sun. It was something more essential, a feeling of something stolen being returned. It felt like relief.
It was the most horrible feeling in the world.
A sob broke from him, and in that moment of weakness, he swallowed. His own body’s desperate, reflexive action. That was all it took. Jafar kept the pressure steady, the bottle tilted. The dark, thick fluid streamed into his mouth. He could do nothing but swallow it down, each gulp a surrender, each wave of warmth a mark of his defeat. He drank, and the fire in his bones receded, replaced by this alien vitality. The tremor in his hands stilled.
When the bottle was empty, Jafar slowly pulled it away. He kept Aladdin cradled against him, shifting him upright slightly.
"Good," he murmured. "That's a start."
He laid Aladdin's head against his shoulder and began to pat his back in a slow, rhythmic motion. The sheer, insane domesticity of the act shattered the last remnants of Aladdin's composure. He was being burped. After being changed and bottle-fed.
The warmth of the liquid spread through him, a seductive poison. The grinding pain that had been his constant companion for months was almost gone, replaced by a strange, humming energy. His thoughts grew fuzzy, his panic blunted by the sudden absence of suffering. He felt the solidness of Jafar's chest, the steady rhythm of his hand on his back. He hated it. He hated the part of him that was sinking into the relief, the part of him that was too tired to fight anymore.
A small, involuntary sound escaped his lips—not a word, just a noise—as his body responded to the patting.
Jafar ceased. He pulled Aladdin back slightly, looking down at his face. The torchlight cast deep shadows on Jafar's gaunt features, but his eyes were sharp, focused. He wasn’t looking at the man who had tricked him and bested him. He was looking at something else. Something he owned. Something he was fixing.
Aladdin stared back, his vision swimming. The room felt distant. The cold stone, the flickering light, the man holding him—it was all blurring at the edges. The only thing that felt real was the quiet, humming warmth inside him, a warmth that did not belong to him, and the terrifying, nascent peace that it brought.