Chapter Text
MILO
On its own, Raman's grumpy lecture about "them", a judge's stamp and a pair of Wilders, wouldn't have left a huge impression. Having come as it has, pressed between two nights of interrupted sleep, it's snagged against something raw and anxious in Milo's mind. They catch themself worrying at it as they sleepwalk though their morning chores: maybe Raman is right; maybe they're stupid to stay in Jrusar until Ashton is strong enough to sign on as a caravan guard. Maybe it's time to sell everything in the house that somebody will agree to pay coin for, and buy Ashton a spot on a cart.
That hadn't been the hope, last time they'd talked. With Ashton and Milo both working for their place with a caravan, they could travel a good distance, well out of reach of Jrusar's authority - and after a while they could just as easily make their way back to the Hollow, perhaps in time for the rest of the crew to start gathering again. Having to pay for Ashton, they wouldn't make it quite as far. Might have to stop just on the edge of Hellcatch, in one of the gods-forsaken towns that may have sounded glamorous when they were kids, but were actually miserable dust pits, not even as interesting as Bassuras itself.
Ashton is still sleeping; a gold and pink and white shimmer plays under his skull plate. Milo leaves him a breakfast plate of cheese-stuffed flatbreads balancing on a jug of sillgoat's milk, gathers all their will tightly into a fist, and forces themself to venture topside. With hands jammed deep into their pockets, cap pulled over their ears in an effort to muffle the sounds of the slowly waking city, and eyes trained directly on the road in front of them, they zip across the Fatewalk, take a shortcut down a few ladders, and there, nearly at the base of Lantern Spire, begin methodically studying the announcements board by the entrance to the road customs office.
There's something of a rhythm to the messages posted here. "Guards sought for a caravan departing for Sapiro Haven, inquire with Mistrex Arradil in the Independent Spicers' guildhall." "Guards and porters sought for a caravan returning to Goradire, inquire with Master Falco at the Harpy's Head tavern." Guards, guards, guards; everybody wants guards, and nobody is calling for tinkerers, but Milo doesn't allow this to distract them. They compile a list of every caravan setting off beyond the Wilds within a week, and then another list, of those going to the edge of the Wilds, but in the direction that might take them further once they get there.
Putting together the lists, brief as they are, feels like a task well done, and Milo has to resist a panicky whisper at the back of their mind that really wants them to get off the streets and back into the Hollow. They clench their fists tighter, breathe in and out, and allow themselves to indulge their stupid fears, and do a quick scan of the skies.
There is no dragon. Of course there's no dragon.
Briefly reassured, they set off on a tour of inns and guild halls, looking for that one caravan master who knows the value of a good tinkerer.
The fifth caravan master on Milo's list - the final name on it, in fact - is staying at the Weary Way. He's a portly orange katari with perfectly groomed white stripes across his face; the hand he uses to pat Milo on the shoulder is both heavy and soft, and it's like being thumped with a bolster cushion.
"Wish I could help," he says, "I've no doubt you're a fine tinkerer, my young friend, but what I need is porters and guards. And don't take it the wrong way, but as far as hefting and carrying goes -"
His voice trails off, as though he's trying to pick a delicate way to let Milo know how little he thinks of their musculature.
"No, I understand," they say. It's always porters and guards, and that's what the noticeboard had said as well, but in Milo's experience caravan masters rarely advertise other jobs. You have to find them and ask.
Milo refuses to feel dejected: these things take patience. They're an engineer, they're patient.
"Good, then," says the man. "But what about your friend, would they do well as a porter?"
Milo sighs, shakes their head. "They've got a mining injury, taking a while to recover."
The caravan master tuts and shakes his head too, all sympathy. He understands - probably better than Milo does - that they don't have a while: in a few weeks, the jungle paths will be lost to the rains. Caravans leaving now are some of the last road-bound trade out of Jrusar for a while.
"A godsdamned shame," says the man. Thump, goes his padded hand on Milo's shoulder. "They mess you up, the mines."
"Yeah. Well, thank you for your time, sir."
"No trouble, no trouble. I've been in your place - young, footloose, and broke. You keep looking. Check the board at the customs office, maybe."
Even though their list of names is the product of scouring that very board, Milo says they'd check, just to escape any more of this useless - if well-meaning - sympathy. It would be funny, if it wasn't so terrifying, how much the opposite of footloose they are. Leaving the Krook House behind is bad enough, but the idea of spending weeks on a cart, right out in the open with maybe a thin canvas between them and the sky, is so nauseating that they can't even think about it for too long. But the more Milo thinks about it, the more they agree with Raman: now that Ashton can more or less walk in a straight line, it's time to get going. Otherwise, the two of them get stuck here until the roads dry out: months of lying low, twitching at every sight of a guard, wondering which of their Fownsee Hollow neighbours will first succumb to the temptation of selling them out. If Ashton is having nightmares now, they'll be a nervous wreck by the end of it all, and Milo will be no better. No, Raman is right: the time to go is now. If only they can find a caravan to hire them.
Milo says their goodbyes, and is working their way around a large empty table stacked with upturned chairs, when they hear the caravan master's voice again:
"Hey, young 'un!"
They turn, and walk the few steps back, summoned with a wave of the large, furry hand. The caravan master leans towards them, close enough that Milo can smell the spiced oil he uses to shape his tiger stripes. He says:
"Look. An old associate of mine was talking about taking a cart or five towards Yios before the roads go bad. It's a long trek, a tinkerer might come in useful, you never know. In a couple of days ask for Mistress Reeta Garai at the Independent Weavers' guildhall."
Milo's heart is thumping. They have to swallow before they can speak. "All right." They wait to hear the catch.
"She's not going to hire you off the street, mind. Bring her something you've made - maybe a toy for her daughter. Not fancy, but something. If she likes you, she might even knock a few gold off the travel price for your friend; she's a kind one, Reeta."
"I can do that," Milo says. Something inside them, something tense and helpless relaxes all at once, lets them roll their shoulders and stand up straighter. "A toy, alright. I can do that. Thank you." Just like that, the search has turned into something they can influence with their craft. They're good at their craft.
The buzz of a nascent project is almost enough to dull the familiar gnawing terror of stepping out of the tavern into the street, under a wide-open sky.
ASHTON
You can barter for most things in the Hollow, but that's only any good if you never plan to leave again. Sooner or later - maybe even tomorrow - Ashton plans to shuffle their way out of the Hollow and straight into the Spire by Fire, and they plan for their first drink to be something fancy, and not from Ishir's own distilling experiments. And even before they do that, it would be nice - wouldn't it? - to ease things for Milo with a few coins.
Ashton leaves a note - "not dead, back soon" - and begins a slow tour of the neighbours' tents, cavelets and houses. He knows at least a few of them sometimes work for cash topside.
There're not many of their usual jobs that Ashton can do yet, so they don't say no to a few easy gigs for barter. They pry open a stuck box for Ma Faina in return for a sachet of coffee; they help a skinny orcish fellow with arthritic fingers shell some nuts, taking a fistful of green beans as payment. The job is deathly boring, but Milo will love having fresh greens, so Ashton gets to feel virtuous for contributing to dinner. Eventually, asking around pays off in cash: they agree on half a silver for a few hours of babysitting a neighbour's two daughters, while their parent books a quick shift at an unlicensed brothel right outside one of the exits of the Hollow.
The kids, two cute uniya girls with a scatter of golden freckles on their round grey faces, take to heart their parent's warning that Ashton has been sick, and is not to be jostled. First they want to play apothecary, but Ashton knows that game, and doesn't care to be fed mud pills and sand mixture, so he shuts it down, and instead suggests dress-up.
The girls don't argue. They are quite content to use Ashton as a dress-up doll, and don't expect him to talk at all. Instead, they chatter away at each other in a mix of Common and Marquesian that little kids often get before they sort their languages out from one another. It feels peaceful, like some of the good days at the home. There hadn't been many good days - but lately it's been easy to feel sentimental about those times, when Ashton's family was still around them, with the headmaster as their common enemy that they could all unite in loathing. Shirin and Petra still alive, the rest of them still together.
By the time Marrow, the girls' parent, returns from work, Ashton is not only wiped, but has spiralled down into the deepest well of loneliness. To themself, they feel raw-edged and jagged, as though somebody had gone for their soul with a pick-axe, prying off their loves and their memories, precious pieces they can't cope without. They don't know what's showing on their face, but they must look rough as fuck, because Marrow takes one look at them and says:
"We'll walk you home. Come, girls! We're going for a walk."
Ashton doesn't argue. He leans on Marrow's elbow, and the two of them walk the quarter of the way round the perimeter of the Hollow, with the kids walking quietly in front of them.
There's light coming through the door of the Krook House. "I'll be fine from here," says Ashton. "Thanks." The walk has helped, but they're exhausted and hollow, and could swear they feel the edges of each individual golden scar.
"Say bye-bye, girls," says Marrow. "And thanks, Ashton. If you feel like another one tomorrow, I could really use the work."
"I'll come by if I can," lies Ashton, and heads home.
They find Milo at their bench, working on something so small that it requires their tiniest tweezers. At the sight of them Ashton feels a rush of kinship and fondness that makes his breath catch. When Ashton walks in, Milo turns around and peers at him through their magnifier lenses.
"Hey! What's that your head's covered in?"
"Flour, probably. Marrow's girls were using it as make-up." Ashton clicks a few copper coins onto the common table one by one, and next to them adds his packets of coffee and green beans. "Been working."
"Whoa, awesome!" says Milo with a grin that gives Ashton a happy thrill. "I mean, you look terrible, actually. But this is awesome!"
There's still some couscous with raisins left over from the previous night's dinner; the two of them eat in silence, because Milo has that look on their face - the tinkering look, the one that clearly means they're mentally arranging tiny screws, or what have you. Ashton doesn't like to interrupt this process, so they offer to do the dishes; Milo mutters a thanks, and goes back to their bench.
"Guess what," says Milo when they're both settled into their tasks.
"Hmm?"
"I've got a lead on a caravan job. Going to go talk to the boss tomorrow, but I have a good feeling about it."
All at once, a dark pit opens inside Ashton. They imagine Milo leaving; imagine rattling around the Krook House for months, with the rains hammering the spires, and nowhere to go. Imagine hunkering down in the Hollow, trying to lie low as the search notices finally go up. They have often imagined this, but at no point had they thought they'd be doing this alone. But why not? Of course it makes sense for Milo to get out as soon as they can, now that Ashton can walk and look after themself. It's smart. Milo is smart to start taking care of it before the rains come down.
"That's fair," says Ashton, sounding to themself like something is pressing a giant hand around their windpipe.
"I know you're not up to working a caravan job yet, but I don't think it makes sense after all to wait until the roads dry out."
"No, I agree," says Ashton. They're recovering their composure fast.
"You do?" Milo stops working and turns around, eyebrows raised in surprise.
It hurts a little, seeing them surprised. When has Ashton ever stood in the way of anyone trying to save themself? When have they ever not tried to make it easier for their family to survive?
"Sure I do," says Ashton emphatically. "If there's any chance you can get your ass out of here in the next couple of weeks, you should."
"What?"
"I said, if you can get your ass out of here..."
"No, no, wait. Hang on. I am not leaving. We are leaving. I just meant, we're going to have to figure out how to pay your way. But we can sell some stuff. I can make that awful jointed whistle Effid was asking for, we're not going to be here to hear him play it."
They stare at each other across the room, both shocked and flustered.
"Well, fuck," says Ashton. Absurdly, he is finding it harder to absorb Milo's actual meaning, now that it doesn't involve him being left on his own. "That's... I suppose I agree with that too. If that's what you want."
"It is! You didn't think I'd just ditch you here, did you?"
"It would be fine if you did," Ashton says resolutely. "It would be smart. But if you think we can sell enough shit to get both of us out of the Wilds, then fuck yeah, let's get out of here."
For a moment it looks like Milo is going to argue some point or another, but instead they just shrug and turn back towards their bench. "It's not a sure thing, anyway," they say quietly. "I still need to talk to the boss about getting hired."
"You'll be great," says Ashton. "They'd be fucking stupid not to hire you."
It's ridiculous how bone-meltingly relieved they feel that Milo doesn't always do the smart thing.
In not too long, they finish scrubbing the cookware and carefully nudge the bucket of dishwater out of the door and across their landing platform, where they tip it over the edge. They hurt, but the ache is almost pleasant, like after a good, satisfying brawl.
They sink into bed and sink into sleep, as though sleep is a soft pile of feathers.
...Ashton is in the house again. He is in the creepy house again, but this time he's in the room - that room - and there's a window behind him, and all the sigils are lighting up red.
The woman is standing right next to him, eye to eye. One jerk of her head, the room floods with white light, and Ashton is falling backwards, shattering glass with their back. A scream rises in their chest - not again, not again - their fingers clutch at empty air - and just as their kicking feet are clearing a little faux balcony, the entire scene freezes.
Ashton hangs in the air, surrounded by shards of broken glass that glitter, motionless, around them. Their breath is coming in sharp, moaning inhales and exhales.
The woman leans over the railing of the little balcony and stares straight into Ashton's eyes.
"Come visit me, little burglar. You know where I live."
Fuck you, thinks Ashton. It's been a long time since anybody has called him little, and he finds that he hates it. He licks his lips, but his tongue is dry. With some effort, he manages to speak: "Go fuck yourself."
She tuts and shakes her head, smiling - and steps back into the dark of the room behind her. She is gone, she leaves him there, alone - and there he stays, frozen between the cobbles and the sky among a cloud of glass shards, biting back a long scream, for what feels like hours. When a pounding headache drags him back into the waking world, it feels like a mercy.
The following night she suspends him there again.
MILO
The morning doesn't go so well, just like the one before, and several before that. Yet again, Milo finds Ashton sick with pain, curled around a pillow, breathing in tiny, moaning gasps.
"Shit, shit, shit! Hold on!" They try not to jostle the cot or shake the floor as they rush to assemble what pain-killing kit has helped before. They feed Ashton the last of their poppy sweat mixture, then carefully place a damp towel on their forehead. Ashton doesn't resist any of it, other than to mutter "enough, enough" when Milo tries to unclench his fingers from their grip on the pillow. "Sorry!" says Milo, and draws back.
"Got any water?" Ashton asks through their teeth.
"On its way."
Together, they work through the steps of their grim ritual - Ashton endures, Milo waits until there's something they can do - until eventually Ashton says, "'m just gonna nap. Go back to sleep."
It's nearly ten in the morning, but there's no point in telling Ashton that. Milo places a fresh jug of water onto a crate next to them and tiptoes out; they wonder what the fuck they're going to do if Ashton gets one of these bastard migraines on the road. Beg to stop the cart, probably.
They brew coffee from the packet Ashton had brought home the previous week, half-fill their largest clay mug, and top it off with warm milk. They take the coffee outside the front door, and exhaustedly arrange themself on the walkway, feet dangling off the edge, one arm hugging a skinny strut for safety. They're not even halfway done with their drink when Raman the Mage lowers himself onto the walkway next to them.
"Uh, hi," says Milo.
"I asked in the scrollery about your dreams," says Raman without a preamble. "They know a spell. It's like I'd thought - a high-level working, illusionist bullshit, all that."
"Oh."
"Yes, oh. My pal says it's used for messages, not very much else. Still a waste of ink, in my opinion. Your brawler getting any messages?"
"I don't think so."
"Waste of time then. Nobody's that rich and petty."
"You're probably right," says Milo thoughtfully. "Unless the dreams themselves are a message."
"Interesting, interesting. How do you mean?"
"Well. If you're sending a letter, and you want to show how fancy you are, you use good paper and maybe hire a scribe with a nice hand. If you're giving a gift, you might use a nice box."
Raman's face lights up. "And if you're a wealthy person with too much magic, and you want to show how much power you've got over a little thug, you may show up in their dreams. Clever, young 'un, clever, well done."
"Thanks." Milo isn't especially pleased to have come up with this theory. Instead of dwelling on it, they pull out their log book. "Could you please tell me more about how the spell works?"
Raman obliges, even though it's clear that he still believes that such a complex working would be utterly wasted on someone like Ashton. Milo hopes he's right. After Raman leaves - having refused any more payment other than a single gulp of Milo's coffee - they sit alone for a while, staring down the dark well of the Hollow.
Milo has to believe that Ashton's dreams are just dreams. Otherwise, how can any of their work be of any help at all?
They're about to go back to their workbench and continue packing up their tools for travel, when Ashton wanders out of their room and stands in the door of the Krook House, their features barely visible against the bright light indoors.
"Hey, uhh. Heard you talking to Raman about dream spells. What the fuck is up with that?"
Milo's cheeks grow hot. "I went to ask him about them the other day. Just in case he knew something. I didn't tell you, because he said he didn't."
"Huh. No, it's cool, it's fine, you don't have to tell me about all of your shit. But he stopped by just now to say he found something?"
"It's a spell for messaging, he says, quite complicated, not many people can probably do it."
"Huh," Ashton repeats. "Weird." He goes inside and disappears into his room. Milo drains their coffee and heads to the workbench.
Seven minutes later, they hear the floor creak as Ashton emerges again.
"So, uh. She talked to me."
Milo's breath catches. "What?" They spin on their chair, nearly spilling a box of tiny washers all over the floor.
Ashton is standing on the threshold of their room, hands deep in their pockets, hunched over, looking like a young apprentice caught chucking rocks at a window. "The dream woman, she talked to me."
"Alright." A little pool of panic is starting to build in Milo's chest. Trying to keep their voice from betraying any agitation, they pick up their log book, shake it open. "What did she say?"
"Just some rich person bullshit. Don't worry about it."
Ashton has never been great at lying, it's one of the things Milo loves about them the most. What they don't love is their stubborn habit of just deciding to say nothing at all - and then staying silent, indefinitely.
"Don't do this," Milo says.
"What?"
"Don't bullshit me, it's not fair. What was the message?"
"Milo, it doesn't matter!"
"If it doesn't matter," says Milo, as evenly as they can manage, "then please tell me."
Ashton closes their eyes. Their brain behind the glass plate flares white and silver.
"Alright. Alright." They open their eyes, and look straight at Milo. "She wants restitution. She told me to go see her. At her place."
"And then?"
"And then, nothing. Some stupid nightmares."
Milo stares straight ahead of them, fear flooding their senses and threatening to burn their self-control to cinders. They don't know what to do.
They don't know what to do.
"OK. OK. So we have a confirmation, she's casting something." Milo paces the length of the room, turns, marches back, turns again. "Or she's paying somebody to cast it. Fuck. I was really hoping I'd made it all up. Ashton, I don't know what to do."
Milo leafs through their log book, too unfocused to read any of their own writing.
"I know what to do," says Ashton. "Finish packing up your shit, join the caravan. Just like we planned."
"You don't think her spell can get to you in Yios?"
Ashton grins, and the grin isn't kind. " You are going to Yios. I am going to the rich lady's house."
Milo stares straight ahead of them for a few heartbeats while Ashton's meaning sinks in, then bursts out: "Fuck!" They hurl their log book at the wall, clutch at their head, feeling utterly flooded with fear and heartbreak.
"Hey. Milo, hey. Can you stop freaking out for a second." Ashton crosses the room in two strides, spins them easily to face him, with a strong stone hand grasping Milo at each shoulder. He leans down until he's staring directly into their eyes. "Listen. Things are not much different today than they were yesterday. She was casting her shitty spell all along, we just didn't know that for sure. Now we know, but for you it changes fucking nothing . You're leaving."
Milo is speechless; they might suspect Ashton is mocking them, if he hadn't always been so completely earnest with them.
"You don't think it would change things for me, just a little bit , if you loaded me onto a cart like a sack of rice, on my own, while you go and give yourself up to that hag?"
For just a moment Milo is eleven again, and the red walls of Bassuras are fading in a cloud of fine dust as the cart carries them towards Evishi, away from every friend they've ever had.
"You don't even see how fucked up this is," says Milo bitterly, voice breaking up with tears. "You weren't even going to tell me about going to see her, were you? You were deciding whether to tell me, and then you weren't going to, until the last minute?"
Ashton has the good grace to look embarrassed. "Look. You've got a lot of bullshit to deal with, OK?"
"All of my bullshit is dealing with this fucking situation, Ashton. How can I fix it for you, if you won't tell me?" Their voice rises nearly to yelling and they try to yank their arms out of Ashton's grip. "Let me go !"
Ashton immediately releases them, and raises his hands.
"Calm the fuck down, Milo, I'm protecting your ass!"
"My ass doesn't need protecting," Milo spits out. "Look in the mirror, look at the state of you, and tell me whose ass needs protecting."
They watch their words hit home, notice how Ashton's breath catches, how he goes to wrap his arms around himself. Disgusted with themself, they press their advantage:
"She wants restitution? Maybe I should go. I was a guild engineer. I'm valuable."
Milo prepares for a return snipe, maybe something about how they couldn't handle the guild, maybe something about how they think that every shadow in the sky is the dragon coming to finish them off. But Ashton doesn't go for any of those easy to reach cruelties.
"You're a kid ," he says instead, and he isn't even yelling. "Listen to me. Just listen. You can't fix everything, you can't solve everything, and some things don't need fixing. Some things just are what they are."
"Bullshit, Ashton. She's manipulating you, OK?"
"She doesn't have to manipulate me. She can just say what she wants, and it's pretty clear that whatever it is, I should prefer it to five years in the granite mines. And it's not on you to fix any of this shit for me."
"Why not? Just let me try! I've got nobody left except you!"
This hits something in Ashton. He looks around the room - empty shelves, empty chairs, empty rooms where another three people should be. He looks wild-eyed, and Milo wonders if this is where Ashton's grip on their temper runs out - but instead he lets out a shaky half-breath, half-sob, and opens his arms.
"Come here. Come here."
Milo doesn't understand how things have turned out like this, with them utterly losing it and Ashton the one offering comfort. But they don't want to fight, they can't fix anything if they fight, and so they sink into the embrace, and rest their flushed face against the cool stone of Ashton's shoulder. "I'm not going to Yios," they say into his clavicle.
Ashton's chest expands as they heave a deep sigh. "Fine. I can't make you."
"And I am going to her house," Milo says stubbornly. "You can't stop me, either."
Ashton says nothing for a second, then sighs again and releases Milo from the circle of his arms. "You know," he says with a small, sad smile, "it's true that I haven't been able to do a lot of things lately. But I definitely can do that."
And that is the last thing Milo hears for a while, because in one precise blow Ashton punches them out cold.
***
CODA
The city of Jrusar is well aware of its hierarchies, even if persons with the ultimate authority meet each other in secrecy. It doesn't take any intimate knowledge of Jrusar politics to develop an eye for people out of place, who are walking where they don't belong. When on a wet afternoon a scruffy young person disembarks from a gondola at the Lucent Spire terminus, and sets off walking along the road, it is clear that they don't belong here. They don't have the look of a servant, or a trader, and certainly not that of a member of a noble house - they are simply a visibly injured youth who looks like they've forgotten how to sleep. Nevertheless, their face looks focused, and they walk with confidence, if slowly, favouring their left side.
Their confidence falters only once, as they turn from the main street into the gate of a fine mansion built out of foreign wood. They pause at the gate, draw a few deep breaths, and grind the palm of their left hand into the side of their face. They hesitate only for as long as it takes to catch their breath, after which they square their shoulders and stride through the gate towards the front door, without as much as a glance either at the surrounding greenery, or the huge stone guardians that are tracking their approach.
Across the city, in the depth of a shanty town that clings to the internal walls of the Core Spire, another young person is sprawled supine on a bed. One could imagine that this person is sleeping, if not for two circumstances: one, a vivid bruise blooming on the side of their face, and two, their left hand being haphazardly bound to the bedpost with a few loops of rope.
The bound youngster licks their dry lips with a dry tongue and moans quietly; their free hand goes up to their face to feel the bruise - then they abruptly pull and strain against their binding, as the reality of their state sinks in.
When the rope doesn't easily slacken, an expression of grief falls over the youth's face. They don't reach their free hand towards the drum that serves as their nightstand, where a cup of water is waiting. Nor do they attempt to loosen the rope. Instead, they fall back onto their pillow, and dissolve into tears.
At the same time on the Lucent Spire, an older elven woman opens the front door of her mansion. The injured young person stares at her without blinking.
"You wanted restitution, here I am," they announce in place of a greeting.
"I see," says the woman, looking them up and down. She glances past their shoulder, as though expecting to see somebody else. "Just you?"
The youth shrugs; says nothing.
"Well," she says. "In that case, come in, let's get acquainted. Take off your boots."
She steps aside to allow them in, and as they slightly clumsily go down onto one knee to loosen the purple ladder lacing of their boots, she says:
"Did you know? In your dreams you don't have the cracks."