ICARUS FAKED HIS DEATH. CRAWLED ONTO THE SHORE, SKIN SPARKLING GOLD AND REDDENED, AND APOLLO SAID, "YOUR FATHER WON'T FIND US HERE."
That morning Vercingtorix wakes in a stranger’s bed and leaves before the stallion awakes. Perhaps it is merely coincidence the stranger is such a bright chestnut he looks like copper; perhaps it is mere coincidence his eyes are red, and he is one of Denocte's soldiers. It is coincidence. Nothing else, Vercingtorix tells himself as he enters the cool morning streets, before the sun has risen to warm the cobblestone.
As he leaves, there is a thought that follows him. It is merciless; the equivalent of small birds frustrating an eagle. It picks at his hypothetical feathers; it pulls at his tail.
Coward, it breathes. You are a coward.
Unsurprisingly, it is his father’s voice, and it has followed him all the way across the sea. He would drink it away, perhaps, but he is not a drinker. He would fight it away, perhaps, but he cannot find anything to fight. Anything worth killing. There is a part him, small and satirical, that laughs at his struggles. Isn’t is so difficult, to live in a world where something is not trying to kill you? To walk on a land not inhabited by flesh-eating shapeshifters? To be cast out from your father’s shadow, and forced to become your own man
Isn’t it ironic, he wants nothing except to wake up and have the security of his old purpose? Vercingtorix wonders if it is sick, but his contemplations are cast aside when he very nearly collides with one of the Denocte citizens. The stallion snorts at him, “watch it,” but continues on his travels.
Vercingtorix decides, after a moment, to abandon the streets. He trails down to the infamous markets and, from there, attempts to see Locust’s ship. He cannot distinguish it among the throng of strange vessels, and abandons the effort. It does not matter, either way. There is too much keeping him in Novus for him to seek her passage elsewhere and with that he cannot help but think of copper skin and the way someone once, on an island with black cliffs and monsters, said I love you.
He purchases black tea and simple bread from one of the vendors, before stepping inside their establishment. But Vercingtorix is not so quick as to not notice the slender, palomino stallion behind him, browsing the wares. He stoops his mouth low toward the vendors ear and slides more coins onto the tabletop that separates them. “I’ll also purchase whatever that gentleman would like. You can keep the tip.” Vercingtorix seats himself by a burning fireplace and glances out the window, where it overlooks the sea.
He waits.
And waits.
And when he hears the sound of an approach, Vercingtorix offers his most charming smile.
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10-22-2019, 05:44 PM - This post was last modified: 10-22-2019, 05:46 PM by Vercingtorix
It would be foolish of Elchanan not to look him over, this golden stallion so obviously a stranger from a strange land.
So he looks him over. Watches. Keeps watching, slyly, coolly, gaze arced gracefully sideways through a swath of pale lashes that do not flinch against the incoming sun. Carefully he keeps his head close to his chest. Around them the port-shop is quiet; the smell of salt, of old wood and new boats, filters in through the just-cracked windows. Elchanan’s wings are tucked against his ribs, his staff left propped in a closet at home. For now he does not look dangerous. He looks like nothing but a pretty boy who could be a fool but isn’t quite.
The stranger goes to sit, and Elchanan takes his time picking over the wares. Glass jars of loose-leaf tea in many shades, smelling of many different fruits and flowers. Sweet, soft buns flaked with butter. Soda bread stuffed with dried fruits. Hard, shiny red pomegranates, piles of brown-skinned almonds that smell faintly toasted, braided loaves of pillowy dough. Minutes pass, then more; he has always been particular. Picky, some had said.
Eventually he wanders up to the counter, bearing a cup of cider and a slice of soft, fruit-studded bread nearer to a cake than anything else: when the shopmaster informs him that the wares have already been paid before, Elchanan only blinks once in surprise before his brain connects the dots, and his pale lips twist into a wry smile. He smooths down a ruffled layer of eggshell-blue feathers, works a knot from his neck without disrupting the row of neat, pale braids wound into his mane, and then without further distraction he turns to the stranger’s table.
He takes a seat, without asking.
And he smiles, to match the stranger’s: brilliant, dangerous, and threaded with just the finest suggestion of his charm-magics, thin and pretty as a veil of gold.
“That was kind of you,” says Elchanan, though he knows very well it was not meant to be kind. From deep in his throat his voice is almost a purr, only accentuated by the way he meets the stranger’s gaze with his gaze half-darkened. He shifts forward in his seat, just a little.
ICARUS FAKED HIS DEATH. CRAWLED ONTO THE SHORE, SKIN SPARKLING GOLD AND REDDENED, AND APOLLO SAID, "YOUR FATHER WON'T FIND US HERE."
I have always liked sharp things.
Things you could cut yourself on.
Others preferred the tridents and hooks so particular to our kind of warfare; I had loved the blades, the two-sided fishing spears.
I have always loved the boys, with their hard edges. The rest of my companions had sought the luscious curves our of our country’s women; but not me. Things you could cut yourself on. He is sylphlike; he is angles and slim and a little like a shard of sun-bright glass. His colours ought make him soft; they ought fool me into complacent friendliness.
But when he comes to my table as if expecting the gesture, when he smiles as brilliantly and dangerously as me, I am utterly charmed. I am utterly enticed.
“Hm. Kind for some.” I do not say it threateningly. He has a nice face, although the markings he bares unnerve me just so. I have seen too many Khashran bearing the scars of my people to believe it entirely innocent; how many suns had I painted upon the brows of my enemies, to know that Cain’s mark comes in many forms? “Are you from Denocte?” I ask, and it is nearly conversational. I take a drink of the tea.
I try to keep my eyes from devouring him.
I try to convince myself I shouldn’t.
I try not to think of a red and black horse on a blacker beach, running a hairsbreadth in front of me, laughing into the wind.
So the way this full-gold stranger looks at him—sharp and hungry, his eyes dark like the moon on water, the edge of his lips curling up oh-so-slight—Elchanan’s heart thrills like a plucked string. Whatever it is that holds his body together is beginning to vibrate. When he takes his seat in one swift motion, the movement is punctuated by a long glance—heavy with unconcealed interest, just as strong and intent as his partner’s.
Even if Vercingtorix’s comment that it would be kind for some was meant as a threat, Elchanan would not have heard it.
Already he is in love.
(Or as in love as he can ever manage to be.)
This man, whoever he is, will be Elchanan’s next conquest. The priest is the kind of man who does not shy from a challenge, especially not one so good-looking. Whether the stranger feels the same is completely besides the point. Elchanan does not know fear: not of the task at hand, nor of the obstacle of the table between them, nor of the edge in the foreigner’s voice that sounds heartbreakingly close to a dare.
He takes a deliberate sip of tea. Over the rim of the cup, through the curling steam that rises from its surface, the rich brown of his eyes burn into blue of Vercingtorix’s. “I suppose,” Elchanan says meditatively. Another sip. He rips off a piece of bread and offers it across the table. “Not originally. But now? Sure. Why not.”
It’s all relative, isn’t it? The truth, Elchanan tells himself, does not matter. Perhaps in other places. On the witness stand, or under questioning, or telling the story of one's life to a scribe. Perhaps in other places, but not here.
The only thing that matters here is saying the right thing to keep his new project interested.
