Work Text:
shrinking spaces
It’s not a crush.
Rayla likes him, yeah, and he’s been a good friend these past couple of weeks—better, even, than the (very) few friends she’d ever had growing up—and she’ll admit that she thinks he’s sweet, and considerate, and kind of a dork (but not in a bad way), but it’s not crush, and she’s not twelve. Callum’s just… a nice guy, and they’ve spent almost every waking moment with each other since that night on the tower, so it’s completely reasonable that they’ve grown fond of each other, but that’s all.
They’re friends. Best friends.
It’s not weird to be wary of the space between them. Normal friends are wary of that. Personal space isn’t that different concept between humans and elves, and making sure he’s comfortable in his own space is absolutely something normal friends do. It’s just—sometimes—Rayla finds herself closing it.
By accident, of course. Never on purpose. A playful prod of his cheek here; the brush of an elbow there; a hug when she thinks he needs it—nothing untoward. Certainly nothing that means anything, and when she realizes she’s doing it, she steps back as subtly as elvenly possible and pretends that it’s fine, she’s fine, that it’s not her breath caught in her throat, that it’s just—the wind, or something. In any case, he does it too.
He helps her up and sits closer to her than strictly necessary and sometimes his fingers linger for a little while longer than they should, and it fills Rayla’s chest with an amount of warmth she doesn’t really want to have to explain—but that’s the point, right?
It’s a completely normal thing to be wary of those little touches, because they’re friends, and the—er, affection isn’t, like, unwelcome, but still. That space is important. That space is personal.
That space is the last thing keeping Rayla from admitting to herself that she might have a crush, and it’s really important that it stays there because this is definitely not a crush.
It’s just. A lot easier for it not to be.
They’re just friends.
And the space between them is there to stay.
It starts the day he collapses from his use of Dark Magic.
To be fair, it probably started long before that—and by long, Rayla doesn’t mean very long at all. They’ve only known each other a couple of weeks, but the little flutters are hard to ignore.
He’d done it to save her life. The Dark Magic, she means. When she’d gone down there, she’d fully intended to die, if she’d needed to, and of course that didn’t sit right by Callum—of course he’d risk everything to help, even if there wasn’t really anything he could do except—
It still makes her shudder. Dark Magic doesn’t suit him. He’s too gentle and too sweet and, in some ways, too ambitious for it, but he’d done it to save her and she’d been so mad at him about it because it was stupid; it was dangerous; it’s so against everything he stands for and she’s just—
“Not worth it?”
Callum frowns at her. It’s quiet without Ezran, and it’s barely been half a day, but they miss him already. That jagged ridges of the Breach are well in view now, and if they make it by sundown, crossing should be easy, but he stops her, a hand on her wrist, confusion in his brow.
Rayla presses her lips together. This obviously isn’t the first time they’ve ever touched—hours ago, she’d had both of her hands on his face; had held him closer than she’d ever intended and had almost admitted feelings to him that she hasn’t fully admitted to herself yet—but she swallows anyway and tugs her hand back, suddenly afraid of the proximity that should perhaps be familiar.
“I’m not,” she says. Her lips are dry. Her throat feels raw. She can’t look at him without feeling heat in her face. “It was a risk and you knew it. Our mission is to get Zym home, and if something had happened to you, if—if—”
If the spell hadn’t worked—if he hadn’t woken up—if he’d come to help her and it was all for nothing—
“How would I have done that without you exactly?” He’s still frowning at her, and the confusion is gone and replaced by something else. Something… kinda mad.
He steps towards her, his lips a grim, unimpressed line. Rayla tries to step back, but she stumbles against the craggy surface of the Breach. She only doesn’t trip because he catches her wrists once more.
Rayla swallows as he steadies her. “Y-you could have done it. You would have. If anything had happened at to me, you would—”
“How?” he demands again. “Ez and I would never have made it as far as we did without you. Rayla, I know, like, two spells, there’s no way—”
“You would have found one,” says Rayla quickly. She tugs her hand out of his grasp and ducks her head to hide the redness in her cheeks. “You’re smart, and brave, and resourceful, and Callum, you don’t need me. Not really. You would have made it.”
He scowls at her. Even Zym looks affronted by the way she puts it, but it’s not as though it’s untrue. A human forging their own connection to the Sky Primal is unheard of, but Callum had done so against all odds and expectations. Maybe she’s a little biased, but from what she’s seen, Callum can do anything if he cares enough about it, and she has no doubt that he can complete their mission on his own—if he has to.
“Please tell me you don’t honestly believe that.” He takes another step. He’s shorter than her by an inch—a couple, if she counts her horns as part of her height—but the severity of his frown makes him seem taller than he is. “Rayla—I don’t know what makes you think I can do this without you, but I can’t. You’re not a—a guide, or a bodyguard. You’re… my friend, and I need you with me on this.” He’s closer now. His hand shifts from her wrist to grasp at her fingers, his touch firm and warm against her skin.
Rayla’s breath catches, and the only reason she doesn’t pull away from him is because she’s forgotten how to move altogether. He’s close. Too close. Her pulse is so rapid that he must feel the way it flutters in her wrist, and the last time the space between them had shrunk to this, she’d almost told him—
But then, would that be so bad? He obviously doesn’t mind this distance—or rather, the lack of it. What if she just allowed herself to admit—
His frown falters. He looks away. The warmth of his fingers disappears almost as fast as it appeared to begin with, and it’s like he’s just noticed that there’s only a hand’s width between them. “Sorry, I - uh—” He flushes. Zym chirps curiously on his shoulder, but Callum shakes his head. “I just—I don’t know how to do this without you,” he murmurs. “You have to know that. And—I dunno—maybe you’re right. Maybe I’d find a way, but… it wouldn’t be right if we didn’t do it together.”
He cuts himself off awkwardly. Rayla wonders if he wants to say something else, but he keeps his lips pressed shut and his eyes on the stones at their feet.
She lets out the breath, relief in her smile, disappointment in her chest. “You’re sweet,” she says finally, without quite looking at him. “C’mon. We’re almost there.” She turns on her heel, determined to slip back into that easy silence—that comfortable air that she’s grown used to with that space between them back in place—and to let this conversation end at last. But—she pauses.
“For what it’s worth,” she adds without thinking. “I don’t really know how to do this without you, either.”
She knows without looking that he smiles at that.
It takes them longer to cross the Breach than Rayla anticipates. The sun rises. The runes on the Moonstone Path disappear. It’s only thanks to Zym that they make it across to begin with, and in her joy, Rayla forgets about the space—and from the way he throws himself at her, she thinks Callum might have too.
Does he think about it as much as she does, she wonders?
Does he distance himself the same way to keep the same feelings at bay?
No. She doesn’t think so.
She’s not sure if that makes her relieved or disappointed.
Then they come across Sol Regem. The whole time, she can’t help it. They could die here, but it’s strangely comforting to be near him—to joke with him; to prod him playfully; to—
She doesn’t call it flirting because that’s not what it is. Flirting has an active component; flirting means she’s actually vying for his attention—which she’s not. She’s… making light of an otherwise dire situation. She’s coping with the fact that they might die with jokes and silliness. Honestly, it feels like they need it. Zym is scared enough for both of them, and there’s too much at stake here to let their fear get the better of them too.
But then Sol Regem addresses them. Then Rayla tries to reason with him, and for one, shining moment, it feels like he might let them pass. But—
“Not the filthy human who cowers nearby.”
Rayla seizes up. Her arms tighten around Zym, and from his hiding place, she hears Callum sigh.
“It’s okay,” he says, resigned. “You go on without me.”
“No! Callum, we’re so close!” She ducks back to meet him as he emerges from behind the wind carved rock formations he’d been taking cover under. Something’s pulling in her chest. She doesn’t know how to explain it, really. Only that the idea of moving forward without him feels… wrong. Completely and utterly wrong.
“Rayla, getting Zym to Xadia is all that matters. Just… tell the Dragon Queen I helped a little.” He offers her a grim smile. A sad smile. One that means more than she understands. “I’ll… go back home.”
Sol Regem cackles. The sound rumbles in Rayla’s chest. “Home? No. There are two choices. You all die, or just the wretched, evil human dies.”
No. No. The fear in Rayla’s system falters, and it’s replaced, instead, by something else— something… angry—protective?—and determined. She passes Zym back to Callum and squares her shoulders, and Sol Regem is huge and powerful and terrifying, but she doesn’t care. Callum will not die here. Not by this dragon’s bitter, unfounded hatred of all things human. Not if she can help it.
“I agree with you, Sol Regem,” she says coldly. “Some humans are evil. But not this one. Not Callum. The only reason the Dragon Prince is alive is because of this human. He left his home and his family to save the egg, and he sacrificed everything so Azymondias could be born.” She turns for a moment to look at him, catching the look on his face, the disbelief that she believes in him so much, and she almost hesitates. But she steels herself, because this is the truth, and Sol Regem needs to hear it. “He’s noble,” she continues. “And true. When we met, he could have had me captured or killed, but he didn’t, because without knowing me, or anything about me, he saw past human hatred and did what he knew was right. He’s smart, and kind, and brave, and he’s—”
She swallows. There’s too much truth in this now, and her voice trembles because she’s not sure anymore about where she’d meant to go with this. Is this still about convincing Sol Regem to let them pass? She doesn’t think so.
“He’s my friend,” she manages at last. “My best friend.” And then she’s holding her hand out to Callum, and Callum takes it—his palm warm against hers, their fingers intertwined in a way that’s more than just best-friend-y and she knows it. This isn’t for Sol Regem. Sol Regem can’t see, so it doesn’t matter that they’re holding hands like this at all, but it’s comfort. Solidarity. A reminder that they’re in this together, and they make it past him together, or they don’t make it past him at all.
“So please,” she says, to Sol Regem this time. “Allow him to pass into Xadia and help me take the Dragon Prince home. Because… I don’t think I can do it without him.”
Oh, how she’s fallen.
This isn’t a crush.
It never was.
It doesn’t work, of course. Sol Regem is too stubborn and too full of hate for something as simple as reason to work. So they go back to sneaking, and Callum gives her his scarf so she can lead him away while he and Zym cross the canyon. Callum calls it ‘the worst idea she’s ever had’ and—well—yeah, it is. But he’ll be safe, and that’s all that matters.
She puts it on and he fixes it, and for a second—a second that drags on far too long—they catch each other’s eye.
It’s all there, in his face. The Please be careful, the You’re my best friend too, the I need you with me on this—and suddenly his face is too close to hers, and all she wants is for him to be even nearer still.
She looks away.
Moon and Stars help me, she thinks to herself. I’m done for.
They stop for the night in a cave at the edge of Sol Regem’s canyon. It’s not so dark yet, but they’d come so close to failing their mission—to dying—to losing each other—that this rest feels well deserved. The Moonshadow Forest is only a little way ahead now anyway, and if they make good time, they’ll be home before dusk.
The thought makes Rayla jittery. It’s only been a few weeks, but it feels like a lifetime. She’s certainly not the same person she was when she left, and so much has changed since then that she’s almost nervous about what her people might come to think. The elves in the Silvergrove don’t have a particularly friendly idea of humans, and the idea that Callum might be treated with hostility of any sort raises her hackles and puts tension in her shoulders.
“You gotta stop doing that.”
She blinks. Zym’s all settled now, but Callum’s still wide awake. His eyes are bright, shining with an excitement that can only be because they’ve finally made it across the border, but his smile seems… muted. He drops into the space next to her, probably a little closer than he means, but he doesn’t move. He just nudges her elbow gently and looks out over Moonshadow Forest. “I mean, I know you did it so Zym and I could get across, but we talked about this remember?”
Rayla scoffs and nudges him back. “You don’t get to lecture me about being self-sacrificing. You were ready to die.”
“Touché, I guess,” Callum laughs. “But no more of that though, okay? From either of us.” He touches her hand. There’s hesitance in it, like he’s testing the limits of their… affection, even after she’d gone ahead and held his in a show of solidarity that Sol Regem couldn’t even see. But his fingers close over hers, in the end, and she finds herself leaning into his touch in spite of her better judgement.
“No more of that,” she murmurs, returning the gesture.
They start towards Moonshadow Forest the next morning.
If Rayla’s being totally honest, then there are definitely easier ways to get to the Silvergrove than the route that she takes him, but Callum’s just so excited to be here—so wide-eyed and curious and eager—that it just seems cruel to deny him this. His joy is infectious. Catching. And though she’s used to the melodaisies, and the flatulillies, and the great jacaranda seeds that provide the quickest (funnest) path to the lower forest, she finds herself laughing with him like it’s her first time along this path too.
It’s less funny when they get to the ground, but that’s Rayla’s fault. He hadn’t quite had a grip when the seed came free, and he’d slid towards her and into her arms as they’d spun, around and around and around, until they came to a stop on the loamy forest floor.
“Sorry,” he’d said, red and flustered. “I d-I didn’t mean to—”
“It’s okay!” She’d winked. “It was a bumpy ride.”
That was a couple of hours ago now but she’s still agonizing over it. She can’t really have said that, but she did, and, oh, gods, she hopes Callum doesn’t think it was weird. It’s the first thing she can call actively flirting with him, and she can make all the excuses she wants, but there was no reason she had to wink, or smirk so coyly, or enjoy the proximity of his arms around her, his chest pressed to hers, as much as she had.
They’d agreed that there’d be no more secrets between them—not out loud, but after the thing with the death of his stepfather, Rayla, at least, had promised to herself that she wouldn’t keep secrets from him again, but this—
This one feels necessary. It’s got the potential to be horrendously complicated at worst, and a heck of a distraction at best, but it certainly won’t be a secret for much longer if this space keeps disappearing.
But gods, she likes being near him.
She likes it a lot.
In her heart, she hopes he likes it too, but she hopes more that he hasn’t caught on yet (especially if he doesn’t).
She kisses him in the Midnight Desert.
He’s not the most prepared for it. He’s not really prepared for it at all, and the very thought of it still puts red in Rayla’s cheeks and heat in her ears. In all fairness, it’s been an emotionally taxing past couple of days. Her return to the Silvergrove wasn’t exactly the homecoming she thought it would be, and in between finding out that Runaan and the others never made it home and her own self-loathing, it’d been easy to mistake Callum’s praises for… something more.
She’d been upset.
She’d been vulnerable.
She’s furious at herself now for allowing herself to be either. The night is dark and Zym is gone, and Moon and Stars know this should be the last thing on her mind, but the memory plays in her head relentlessly, and it’s a struggle to think about anything else.
They sit by the Wonderwall, staring out into the rest of the desert, spaced far enough apart that it’s noticeable. Awkward. They’ve grown so used to each other that it’s comforting to feel the brush of his elbow against hers; to know without looking that the other is there and nearby, but being nearer feels like it might be worse right now. The sensation of his lips against her own is still fresh in Rayla’s mind, and gods, it’d been so nice to think about—to believe, even just for a moment, that he might like her the way she likes him—
But she’d been naive to even consider it.
“Hey, y’know, um—” Callum clears his throat, his voice strangled and squeaking in odd places. “I know we said we weren’t going to talk about it but—”
“We’re not,” snaps Rayla. She sets her jaw and glares determinedly at the black sand beyond the barrier of the Wonderwall. She’s been vulnerable enough for one night, and she doesn’t care that it’s Callum and that he just wants to help. She’s not weak. And she closes herself off to him in an effort to prove it to herself.
“I just—” He swallows and glances at her from the corner of his eye, a tinge of pink in his cheeks visible even in the pale moonlight. “I-I meant what I said. You are amazing and I hate that—that you think of yourself as anything less.”
It’s not what she thought he’d say. Rayla tears her eyes away from the desert, the stiffness in her shoulders faltering just a little, her lips pressed together tightly because she’s not sure how to respond.
Callum sucks in a breath. He looks like he wants to say something. An apology, maybe? No, not quite. Rayla’s almost afraid of it—his rejection of her advances was clear enough and she doesn’t need his feelings spelled out for her any more than they already are—but he doesn’t say anything, in the end. He only shuffles towards her, reducing the space between their shoulders to something more reasonable—something more comfortable—the sand shifting quietly under his weight.
“I didn’t say those things just to make you feel better,” he says quietly. “I mean. I did, but it’s more than that. You’re my best friend, Rayla. I hate that you don’t see yourself the way I do.”
Rayla hesitates, because they’re coming close to their earlier conversation all over again, and she’s not sure she can do this a second time when she knows he doesn’t think of her like that. She already doesn’t know how to act about this. She’s not even really sure what he expects her to say. “How should I see myself?” she asks, grudgingly.
“Definitely not as someone worth rejecting,” Callum tells her quietly. He takes another breath. Sharper this time. And when he looks at her, there’s something… else in his eyes. “Listen. About before—”
Rayla stops him there. “We agreed,” she snarls, turning her eyes back to the desert.
“But—”
“No.”
He makes a face, pleading, desperate to salvage the situation, to explain—but Rayla squares her shoulders and sets her jaw.
They’re not talking about this. They never will.
She shifts against the sand, and the space between them feels bigger than it ever has before.
The night drags on. They don’t talk much. Twice, Callum looks like he wants to try again, but her refusal to discuss it—any of it—is resolute.
When the sun finally, finally peers over the horizon, Rayla makes the decision to very maturely pretend it didn’t happen at all, even as Callum climbs hesitantly onto the back of Ethari’s shadowpaw, too close to its tail to be comfortable or safe but too uncertain about where they stand to sit any closer to her. He’s not a very graceful rider to begin with, and he slips and and slides and almost falls off four times before Rayla grows sick of his squirming and groans.
“Will you stop moving around?” she snaps.
Callum winces. “Sorry,” he mutters. “I’m just—trying to find a good position. Oops!” He slips again and only manages to stay on by digging his fingers into the Shadowpaw’s saddle. “See? It’s tricky!”
Rayla rolls her eyes at him. She turns her head, eyebrows furrowed together in a frown that’s one-hundred percent done with his ridiculousness, and huffs. “Just hold onto me.”
He flushes, still dangling off the edge of the saddle, still struggling to climb back on, and looks away. “Oh, I mean, I guess I could do that? If you don’t think that would be…”
“If I don’t think that would be what?”
“Weird?”
The memory flashes in her mind once more: the honesty of his smile, the adoration in his eyes, the way she’d kissed him and the way he’d reacted—
“You’re already weird!” she says, determined to forget it’d ever happened at all. “Super weird. Just hold on.”
“Uh—okay!” he says. Declares. “Sure! Sure, not weird. Putting my arm around you seems— very normal! I’m just gonna do… that.”
His arms come to a rest around her waist. His hands clasp together over her stomach. His breath ghosts over her ear.
Rayla grows stiff under his hold. This was… less awkward in her head, but the fact that she’d kissed him is still fresh in her mind no matter how much she pretends it isn’t, and it’s clearly still fresh in his, too. But that’s not the weird part. The weird part is how much she’d missed it. His touch. His warmth.
She swallows thickly and tries not to think about it.
At some point, the adrenaline gets to her.
They climb the ambler’s leg together. Confront Nyx together. Rescue Zym together. And after things settle—after they rescue Nyx, too, and after they’re back on the ambler and on their way out of the desert—Callum kisses her.
Part of her is furious at him. How could he let her think he didn’t think of her that way? How could he let her think they were just friends? How could he let her agonize over it for an entire day without saying anything when, this whole time, he’d felt the same way?
“You didn’t let me,” he tells her. They’re leaning against the back of the ambler’s saddle, her legs thrown over his, his arm tucked around her waist. It’s late, and Nyx is sitting on the ambler’s other saddle—the one on its head—obviously reluctant to be around them, which is fair, Rayla thinks. There are a lot of feelings to air out here, and personally, she’d rather they had the time to talk about it between themselves without a stranger’s prying ears.
“I didn’t let you?”
“You didn’t!” says Callum, his tone playful and bright. The green of his eyes shines happily in the starlight, and Rayla falls for him all over again because of it. “I wanted to say something—in the Oasis, when we were waiting for the sunrise. Every time I tried, you kind of… shut me down.”
It’s not like it’s untrue. Rayla’d been so determined to never talk about it again that she’d refused to even look at him whenever he looked like he wanted to. It’s funny now, of course, but back then…
She shakes her head. “Sorry,” she offers. “I was…”
“I get it,” says Callum. “I just… I didn’t say those things just so you would kiss me. They’re true. You are the most amazing person I’ve ever met, and—I needed you to know that, outside of any other feelings, y’know?”
“I get that,” whispers Rayla. She pauses, her four slender fingers finding their way into the spaces of his five. “How—how long?”
“I dunno.” Callum breathes in and lifts their joined hands to his lips to press a kiss against her thumb. “That day, when we had to cross the canyon and not get roasted by Sol Regem? I think that was the day I realized I needed you. For—for more than just this. I think at some point, I just… always assumed you’d be there. With me. Does that make sense?”
“Yeah.” She’d started doing that too. She has no idea what the future might hold, but she’d assumed he would be there, and that they would face it together, and that made it… okay.
“What about you?”
She shrugs. “That day you did Dark Magic to save me and that dragon,” she tells him. “I almost told you then. When you got sick and you couldn’t breathe. I didn’t even really get it myself just yet, but… I thought you were going to die, and I couldn’t not…”
“Is that what you were going to say when you…?”
“Yeah.”
Callum laughs. “Ah, man,” he says. “Wish I’d woken up later.”
She scowls at him. “Don’t even joke.”
“I’m kidding,” he snickers, grinning at the little pout on her lips. “It just would have saved us some trouble. And a few days.” He lets out a sigh, contented, his heart full, and Rayla knows because she feels it too.
There’s comfort in this. She’s safe in his arms, and he’s safe in hers, and they both know it. There are no more secrets. No more hesitations. No more spaces separating their hands, their bodies, their lips. They’d started off as enemies with feet between them and a war between their people, but somewhere along the line, those feet had shrunk to inches and then shrunk to nothing at all.
Perhaps she should have let it shrink earlier, thinks Rayla. Perhaps that space was never meant to be there at all.